YANGON: Ethnic Rakhine rebels carried out pre-dawn attacks on four police stations near the Bangladesh border, Myanmar’s army said yesterday, with the militants claiming to have taken 14 “prisoners of war” as operations ramped up.
The western state has seen a surge in violence in recent weeks between the rebels from the Arakan Army (AA) and security forces, displacing thousands.
It has added a new dimension to the violence in a state already scored by deep ethnic and religious enmity, which saw hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims forced over the border by a bloody army crackdown in 2017.
The AA are calling for greater autonomy for the ethnic Rakhine Buddhist population in what is one of the country’s poorest states.
Friday morning’s attacks took place in Buthidaung township in the north of Rakhine state, army spokesman Brigadier General Zaw Min Tun told AFP.
“We can confirm that the attack on the four police stations was by the AA,” he said, adding that the army immediately sent a support team and that fighting continued into the afternoon. “We don’t have information on casualties.”
AFP could not reach the ethnic rebels to confirm the attacks. – AFP
