A spokesman for Burma’s military government has denied allegations that army troops and their local collaborators entered a village in the western state of Rakhine last week and killed 76 people, state-controlled media reported on Wednesday.
Rakhine has become the focal point of Burma’s nationwide civil war, in which pro-democracy guerrillas and ethnic minority armed forces fight the country’s military rulers, who took power in 2021 after the military ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi.
The fighting there has also raised fears of a resumption of organised violence against members of the insurgency. Muslim Rohingya minorityAs of 2017, at least 740,000 members of their community were forced to flee to neighbouring Bangladesh for safety.
The massacre in Bayin Phyu village in northern Rakhine was blamed on the Arakan Army, an ethnic armed group that has been attacking army posts in Rakhine since November last year. They have gained control of nine of the 17 townships in Rakhine and one township in nearby Chin state.
Bayin Phyu village occupies a strategic location on the outskirts of Sittwe, the capital of Rakhine, with easy access to the Bay of Bengal.
The Arakan Army is the well-trained and armed military wing of the political movement of the Buddhist Rakhine minority, which seeks autonomy from Burma’s central government.
However, it has also been accused of widespread human rights violations, most notably in relation to its takeover of the town of Buthidaung on May 18. It was accused of forcibly moving the town’s nearly 200,000 residents, most of whom are from the Rohingya ethnic minority, and then setting most of the buildings there on fire.
He has denied the allegations and blamed the army for burning down the town, but residents interviewed by phone since the incident said The Associated Press The Arakan Army was responsible for this.
In this photo provided by a displaced Rohingya, red flames from burning homes are seen in the distance in Buthidaung township, Rakhine State, Burma, on May 17, 2024. (AP Photo)
The competing claims could not be independently confirmed, as tight restrictions on travel in the region make it nearly impossible to verify details of such incidents directly.
Accounts of the incident at Bayin Phyu village were similarly disputed.
State-run newspaper Myanmar Alin on Wednesday quoted Major General Zaw Min Tun, a spokesman for the ruling military council, as saying that army troops had gone to the village on May 29 searching for Arakan Army members and detained about 20 people for questioning.
He said security forces were forced to shoot three male suspects, who were not residents of the village, as they tried to snatch a gun from a military officer, but there was no mass killing.
An Arakan Army statement issued on Tuesday said that about 170 soldiers from the Military Regional Command Headquarters in Sittwe, together with armed members of the pro-army Rakhine group and local Muslims recruited by the army, arrested everyone in Bayin Phyu village and killed 76 people.
It claimed that the army attackers treated their captives brutally and raped three women.
Only one of 20 residents of the area contacted by the AP was willing to talk about the incident. Many said they would not talk because they were worried about friends of detained family members.
One woman said her younger brother was among those arrested, but she did not know how many had been killed or whether her brother was still alive. She spoke on condition of anonymity for her personal safety.
The UN human rights office on May 24 warned of “horrifying and disturbing reports” about the impact of new violence in Burma’s western Rakhine state, pointing to new attacks on Rohingya civilians by the military and an ethnic armed group fighting against it.
The fighting in Rakhine has sparked particular concern, as it suggests the Rohingya minority could face new violent persecution.
The Rohingya people were the target of a brutal counter-terrorism campaign including rape and murder, which led to an estimated 740,000 people fleeing to neighbouring Bangladesh as their villages were burned down by government troops in 2017.
They have lived in Burma for generations, but many among the country’s Buddhist majority, particularly the Rakhine minority, regard them as illegal migrants. from BangladeshThe Rohingya face severe prejudice and are generally denied citizenship and other basic rights.
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After the Arakan Army seized Buthidaung on May 18, Rohingya activists accused it of burning down the town’s homes and forcing its residents to flee. The Arakan Army rejected the allegations as baseless and blamed the military government’s troops and local Muslims who were fighting alongside them for the destruction.
