Myanmar Muslim face uncertain future after attacks

Myanmar Muslim face uncertain future after attacks

By YADANA HTUN and TODD PITMAN | Associated Press – Wed, May 1, 2013

Buddhist Mobs Set Fire to Myanmar Villages

Buddhist mobs attacked and overran two mosques and set hundreds of homes ablaze in central Myanmar on Tuesday, injuring at least 10 people in the latest anti-Muslim violence to shake the Southeast Asian nation. (April 30)

OKKAN, Myanmar (AP) — They slept terrified in the fields, watching their homes burn through the night. And when they returned on Wednesday, nothing was left but smoldering ash and debris.

One day after hundreds of Buddhists armed with bricks stormed a clutch of Muslim villages in the closest explosion of sectarian violence yet to Myanmar's main city, Yangon, newly displaced Muslims combed through the wasteland of their wrecked lives. Unable to go home, they faced an uncertain future — too fearful of more attacks even to leave.

"We ran into the fields and didn't carry anything with us," Hla Myint, a 47-year-old father of eight, said after the mobs overran his village.

Tears welling in his eyes, he added, "Now, we have nothing left."

Thet Lwin, a deputy commissioner of police for the region, put the casualty toll from Tuesday's assaults at one dead and nine injured. He said police have detained 18 attackers who destroyed 157 homes and shops and at least two mosques in the town of Okkan, 50 miles (80 kilometers) north of Yangon, and three outlying villages.