Twelve people have died in Myanmar’s Rakhine state in recent clashes between armed men and troops, state media reported Wednesday, in a growing challenge for the country’s new democratically elected government.
Four soldiers and one attacker were killed on Tuesday when hundreds of men wielding pistols and swords attacked troops in Pyaungpit, a village near the town of Maungdaw.
Troops also discovered seven dead after fighting in the nearby village of Taung Paing Nyar.
“After the incident, troops found seven dead bodies,” the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar reported.
“Swords and sticks were found with the bodies.”
The military has been scouring the region, not far from the border with Bangladesh, after nine police officers were killed on Sunday in coordinated attacks on three border posts.
Most people in the impoverished area are Muslim Rohingya, a stateless minority Buddhist whom nationalists vilify as illegal immigrants even though many trace their lineage in Buddhist-majority Myanmar back generations.
The recent unrest has raised the specter of a repeat of 2012, when violence in Rakhine left more than 100 people dead and drove tens of thousands of Rohingya into displacement camps.
Hundreds of schools have been closed in Maungdaw and the surrounding area, a curfew is in force and teachers and government workers have been heading south to Rakhine’s state capital Sittwe.
Escalating violence in the region poses a major challenge for the country’s new democratic leadership.
Source: AFP
