Inferno in Buthidaung: Arakan Army's Ruthless Assault on Rohingya

Saifur Rahman recounts the harrowing events on May 17 in Buthidaung, Myanmar, where flames engulfed the town during an attack by the Arakan Army. The incident, part of an ongoing ethnic conflict, resulted in at least 45 Rohingya deaths and left thousands homeless. UN findings implicate the Arakan Army in deliberate arson.

Saifur Rahman woke up to screams. In the darkness, the air reeked of fuel. Flames blazed in the distance. The town of Buthidaung in Rakhine state, Myanmar's largest settlement of minority Rohingya, was on fire and under attack.

"All I could see was fire," said the 30-year-old Rohingya. "We knew something bad could happen but never imagined this." When the fires subsided, much of the riverside town near Myanmar's western border with Bangladesh was smouldering debris, rendering thousands of Rohingya homeless. Initial estimates suggest at least 45 Rohingya died during the attack and its immediate aftermath, a senior United Nations official said. The attack at around 10 p.m. on May 17 was the latest of many bouts of violence against the Rohingya, Myanmar's largely Muslim ethnic minority group, which suffered what the U.N. called "textbook ethnic cleansing" at the hands of the Buddhist-majority country's military in 2017.

That year, the military spearheaded the killing of an estimated 10,000 Rohingya, sending more than 700,000 fleeing into neighbouring Bangladesh, according to the U.N. Since then, fighting has flared between junta troops and the powerful Arakan Army ethnic militia in Rakhine state, with combat intensifying in recent months as the rebels scored major victories. Reuters interviewed 12 Buthidaung residents on the phone as well as near refugee camps in Bangladesh, and reviewed satellite imagery of the area taken before and after the fires to reconstruct the events of May 17. The news agency found that the party directly responsible for the May arson attacks was not the military but the Arakan Army, which is composed mainly of ethnic Rakhine, the Buddhist majority in Rakhine state.

(With inputs from agencies.)