(RNS) Buddhists are killing Muslims in Myanmar with impunity because the government failed to stop the attacks, New York-based Physicians for Human Rights reported amid fresh assaults that left more Muslims homeless.
During the past year, scattered clashes across Buddhist-majority Myanmar, also known as Burma, have left more than 240 people dead, most of them Muslims.
A mob of about 1,000 Buddhists burned more than 35 Muslim homes and a dozen shops on August 24 in Kanbalu in Myanmar's central Sagaing Division after hearing rumors that a Muslim man sexually assaulted a young Buddhist woman, police told The Associated Press.
Police arrested a male Muslim suspect but refused the mob's demand to hand him over, sparking its arson attack against his innocent Muslim neighbors, police said. The fires also destroyed a mosque.
"The Burmese government must make a concerted effort to allow an effective investigation into these abuses and hold perpetrators accountable," the physicians group wrote in its report.
More ominously, the report concluded: "While such massacres are not sweeping the country at present, the brazen nature of these crimes and the widespread culture of impunity in which these massacres occur form deeply troubling preconditions that make such crimes very likely to continue.
"If these conditions go unaddressed, Burma may very well face countrywide violence on a catastrophic level, including potential crimes against humanity and/or genocide."
The U.N. special rapporteur for human rights, Tomas Quintana, investigated Buddhist attacks against Muslims in another central town — Meiktila, in Mandalay Division — during a 10-day trip that ended on August 21.
Residents accused Quintana of bias against Buddhists involved in the Meiktila clashes, which occurred in March, and the government denied his claims.
Quintana's experience gave him "an insight into the fear residents felt when being chased down by violent mobs." Police allegedly stood by as angry mobs beat, stabbed and burned to death 43 people, he said.
Rakhine state's Muslims describe themselves as citizens who are persecuted because they are minority ethnic Rohingya competing with Buddhists in the impoverished region.
Buddhist militants and the government insist the Rohingya are not citizens but instead are Muslim ethnic Bengalis who have illegally migrated from neighboring Bangladesh during past decades.
When Buddhists rampage and torch Muslims' homes and businesses, driving them off their land, there are "multiple instances where police and/or the army attacked Rohingyas and other Muslims, or watched as they were attacked, instead of protecting them," the physicians' report said.
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Muslim Rohingya women sit inside a tent at Mansi Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camp in Sittwe on May 14, 2013. Boats carrying scores of Rohingya Muslims fleeing a cyclone have capsized off Myanmar's coast, the UN said on May 14, heightening fears over the storm which threatens camps for tens of thousands of displaced people. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya man prays in front of a temporary relief camp in a school in Thetkaepyin village, on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya woman waits for a truck to move back to her temporary relief camp in the village of Thetkaepyin on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up on May 17 after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. At least 40 people were either killed by Cyclone Mahasen or while trying to flee its impact, including 25 Muslim Rohingya whose bodies washed up on the shores of Bangladesh after their boat capsized while sailing from Myanmar. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
Muslim Rohingya families unload their belongings from a truck as they return back to a camp for iternally displaced people in the village of Mansi on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013 following their evacuation from the site. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up on May 17 after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. At least 40 people were either killed by Cyclone Mahasen or while trying to flee its impact, including 25 Muslim Rohingya whose bodies washed up on the shores of Bangladesh after their boat capsized while sailing from Myanmar. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
Muslim Rohingya carry their belongings as they arrive back to a camp for iternally displaced people in the village of Mansi on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up on May 17 after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. At least 40 people were either killed by Cyclone Mahasen or while trying to flee its impact, including 25 Muslim Rohingya whose bodies washed up on the shores of Bangladesh after their boat capsized while sailing from Myanmar. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya woman prepares her kitchen after arriving back to a camp for iternally displaced people in the village of Mansi on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up on May 17 after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. At least 40 people were either killed by Cyclone Mahasen or while trying to flee its impact, including 25 Muslim Rohingya whose bodies washed up on the shores of Bangladesh after their boat capsized while sailing from Myanmar. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya family sits outside their temporary relief camp in a school in Thetkaepyin village on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya family waits for a truck to move back to their temporary relief camp in the village of Thetkaepyin on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya woman collected rice supplies at a temporary relief camp in a school in Thetkaepyin village on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Muslim Rohingya family travels in a truck to their temporary relief camp in the village of Thetkaepyin on the outskirts of Sittwe on May 17, 2013. Bangladesh and Myanmar cleaned up after a killer cyclone wrecked thousands of homes, relieved that the damage was not much worse after the storm weakened as it made landfall. (Soe Than WIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Rohingya Muslim child receives a pack of food as local authority removes them to a dentention center in Banda Aceh on April 8, 2013, after stranded on remote island Pulo Aceh. Indonesian police on April 7 detained 80 Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar on a remote island off Sumatra after they had got lost attempting to reach Malaysia, an official said. It was the latest boatload of Rohingya to arrive on the shores of Indonesia, as thousands flee Myanmar after tensions between Muslims and Buddhists exploded in their home state of Rakhine last year. (CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN/AFP/Getty Images)
In this photograph taken on March 2, 2013, ethnic Rohingya refugees who were among two boatloads of asylum-seekers carrying 184 people from Myanmar rescued by Indonesian fishermen on February 26 and 28, 2013 off the waters of Sumatra island read a Quran at the immigration quarantine center in Langsa district in Aceh province. Indonesia is expecting an influx of Rohingya as Thai authorities crack down on Rohingya refugees entering their country. The UN considers the Rohingya, a stateless Muslim ethnic group, one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, and Myanmar views its roughly 800,000 Rohingya as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, denying them citizenship. Buddhist-Muslim unrest in the western Myanmar state of Rakhine has left at least 180 people dead and more than 110,000 displaced since June 2012. (CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN/AFP/Getty Images)
A Rohingya man peers into a makeshift mosque as families crowd a tented camp November 25, 2012 on the outskirts of Sittwe, Myanmar. An estimated 111,000 people were displaced by sectarian violence in June and October affecting mostly the ethnic Rohingya people who are now living in crowded IDP camps racially segregated from the Rakhine Buddhists in order to maintain stability. Around 89 lives were lost during a week of violence in October, the worst in decades. As of 2012, 800,000 Rohingya live in Myanmar. According to the UN, they are one of the most persecuted minorities in the world. (Photo by Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)
In this photo taken on Sept. 8, 2012, Muslims gather during a visit by a delegation of American diplomats including U.S. Ambassador to Myanmar Derek Mitchell, unseen, at a refugee camp in Sittwe, Rakhine State, western Myanmar. Three-and-a-half months after some of the bloodiest clashes in a generation between Myanmar's ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and stateless Muslims known as Rohingya left the western town of Sittwe in flames, nobody is quite sure when -or even if- the Rohingya will be allowed to resume the lives they once lived here. (AP Photo/Khin Maung Win)
In this photograph taken on March 2, 2013, an ethnic Rohingya refugee who was among two boatloads of asylum-seekers carrying 184 people from Myanmar rescued by Indonesian fishermen on February 26 and 28, 2013 off the waters of Sumatra island stands by the window of an immigration quarantine center in Langsa district in Aceh province. Indonesia is expecting an influx of Rohingya as Thai authorities crack down on Rohingya refugees entering their country. The UN considers the Rohingya, a stateless Muslim ethnic group, one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, and Myanmar views its roughly 800,000 Rohingya as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, denying them citizenship. Buddhist-Muslim unrest in the western Myanmar state of Rakhine has left at least 180 people dead and more than 110,000 displaced since June 2012. AFP PHOTO / CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN (Photo credit should read CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN/AFP/Getty Images)
Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa, center, listens to Muslim refugees as he visits Kaynipyin camp in Pauktaw in Rakhine State, western Myanmar, Monday, Jan. 7, 2013, Rakhine is the state where sectarian violence between Muslim Rohingya and Rakhine Buddhists killed about 200 people and left at least 110,000 displaced, the vast majority of them Muslims late last year. (AP Photo/Khin Maung Win)
Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa, top seated third right, accompanied by Myanmar Border Affair Minister Lt. General Thein Htay, top seated second right, meets Muslim refugees as he visits Satmalay camp in Pauktaw in Rakhine State, western Myanmar, Monday, Jan. 7, 2013. Rakhine is the state where sectarian violence between Muslim Rohingya and Rakhine Buddhists killed about 200 people and left at least 110,000 displaced, the vast majority of them Muslims late last year. (AP Photo/Khin Maung Win)
http://www.information.myanmaronlinecentre.com/myanmar-buddhist-on-muslim-violence-is-governments-fault-says-physicians/
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