As hundreds of thousands of the Rohingya Muslim minority flee ethnic conflict in Myanmar, Brahma Chellaney looks at the history of the country’s simmering internal divisions.

At least 163 people have been killed and 91 others have gone missing over the past year in attacks carried out by Rohingya Muslim militants in the restive Rakhine state, Burma's government said.

Amnesty International has claimed that Myanmar security forces and local vigilante mobs are still burning Rohingya villages in Burma, despite assertions by the country's leader Aung San Suu Kyi that they had stopped.

Bangladeshi authorities on Sunday took steps to restrict the movement of Muslim Rohingya refugees living in crowded border camps.

Bangladeshi authorities have summoned Burma's envoy to protest against violations of their airspace amid an exodus of Rohingya Muslims fleeing violence in the country.

About 240,000 children have fled Burma's Rakhine state into neighbouring Bangladesh over the last three weeks, according to a UN agency.

UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres has said that ethnic cleansing is taking place in Burma against the Rohingya Muslim minority.

A hospital near Bangladesh's southeastern border has treated dozens of Rohingya refugees who arrived with bullet wounds and broken bones after fleeing violence in western Burma.

Three boats carrying ethnic Rohingya fleeing violence in Burma have capsized in Bangladesh and 26 bodies of women and children have been recovered, officials said.

Following a stinging rebuke by the UN human rights chief, Burma’s ultranationalist Buddhist monk fired back, saying he did not regret calling a UN special envoy a “whore” and a “bitch” after she criticised a bill opposed to interfaith marriage and religious conversions.

Overcrowded boats carrying more than 100 people trying to escape an approaching cyclone have capsized off the coast of Burma with dozens feared drowned.

The UN General Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution welcoming positive changes in Burma but expressing serious concern at an upsurge of sectarian violence between Muslims and Buddhists in strife-torn Rakhine state.

At least 56 people have been killed and nearly 2,000 homes destroyed in the latest outbreak of ethnic violence in western Burma, a government official said today.

A rare white elephant has been caught in a jungle in western Burma, with the press today hailing the find as an auspicious event that bodes well for the military state.