Muslim shops and a mosque have been damaged by Buddhist mobs in Myanmars second city of Mandalay. The incident was apparently triggered by a rumour that a Buddhist woman had been raped by Muslim men. Police stepped in to prevent more than 500 Buddhists from attacking Muslims. Local reports say three Buddhists were injured and there are unconfirmed reports that a Muslim man was shot. Myanmar has seen several outbreaks of violence targeting Muslims since 2012. Muslims are a minority group in Myanmar, which is also known as Burma. The BBCs Jonah Fisher says tensions rose when a blogger posted that two Muslim men had raped a Buddhist woman. The post was then shared by one of Mandalays most controversial monks - Ashin Wirathu - on his Facebook page. Wirathu is the leader of the controversial 969 group and was previously jailed for inciting religious hatred. The 969 group are opposed to what they see as Islams expansion in Myanmar. On Tuesday night, a group of Buddhists gathered in a Muslim area of Mandalay, ransacking shops and burning vehicles before police managed to restore order, according to reports. The police fired shots on Wednesday to disperse crowds of Buddhists and Muslims facing off on the streets, Reuters reported. Much of the violence between the two groups has taken place in Rakhine state in the west of the country, where at least 200 people were killed and tens of thousands were displaced in 2012. Many of the displaced - mostly Muslims - continue to live in refugee camps. Those clashes were sparked off by the rape and murder of a young Buddhist woman. The violence continued throughout 2013. The last reported clash happened in January in Rakhine state, killing more than 40 people, according to the United Nations. Controversial Buddhist monk Wirathu (centre) who is accused of instigating sectarian violence between Buddhists and Muslims through his sermons, stands with other monks in support of five Buddhist monks who were forced to give up their robes outside a courthouse in Yangon, Myanmar, on 20 June 2014. Rohingya women and their children wait to receive treatment at a makeshift clinic in the Thet Kae Pyin camp for internally displaced people in Sittwe, Rakhine state, 24 April 2014. Many Rohingya Muslims are displaced in Rakhine state and are now living in refugee camps There have been particularly bitter and long-standing tensions between the Rakhine people, who are Buddhist and make up the majority of the states population, and Muslims. Most of these Muslims identify themselves as Rohingya, a group that is considered stateless and is rejected by both Myanmar and neighbouring Bangladesh. The clashes have posed a challenge for Myanmars nominally civilian government, which was elected in 2010 after decades of military rule. President Thein Sein has previously said that the Rakhine violence puts the countrys moves towards democracy in danger.
Posted on: Wed, 02 Jul 2014 18:12:56 +0000
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