The Burmese army has been accused of carrying out extra-judicial killings of Rohingya Muslims in response to clashes with insurgents. Soldiers have allegedly shot indiscriminately at unwarmed men, women and children during their intensified operations against Rohingya insurgents after three days of clashes with militants in the worst violence involving Burma's Muslim minority in five years. The fighting - triggered by coordinated attacks by insurgents wielding sticks, knives and crude bombs on 30 police posts and an army base - has killed 104 people and led to the flight of large numbers of Muslim Rohingya and Buddhist civilians from the northern part of Rakhine state.
The violence marks a dramatic escalation of a conflict that has simmered in the region since October, when a similar but much smaller series of Rohingya attacks on security posts prompted a brutal military response dogged by allegations of rights abuses. One witness told Al Jazeera the army stormed his village in Maungdaw and began "firing indiscriminately at people's cars and homes," killing women, children and even a baby. He said government forces were "shooting at everything that moved" and accused them of carrying out arson attacks. "Women and children were among the dead," he added. "Even a baby wasn't spared."
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