Ethnic armed group suspected of deadly attack in Myanmar on Rohingya trying to flee fighting

BANGKOK (AP) — At least 150 civilians from Myanmar’s Muslim Rohingya minority may have been killed this week in an artillery and drone attack in the western state of Rakhine that survivors suspect was carried out by a major force in the resistance to military rule.

The Arakan Army, the military wing of the state’s Rakhine ethnic group, denied responsibility for the assault Monday on Rohingya trying to flee fierce fighting in Maungdaw town by crossing the Naf River into Bangladesh.

A statement issued Friday by an international medical assistance group, Doctors Without Borders, said that in the past week, it has been treating increasing numbers of Rohingya people with violence-related injuries who managed to cross the border into Bangladesh.

The statement said some patients “reported seeing people bombed while trying to find boats to cross the river into Bangladesh and escape the violence. Others described seeing hundreds of dead bodies on the riverbanks.”

Two self-described survivors contacted by The Associated Press blamed the Arakan Army, as did Rohingya activists and Myanmar’s military government. The attack, if confirmed, would be one of the deadliest involving civilians in the country’s civil war.

Gruesome videos circulating on social media purport to show dozens of bodies of adults and children strewn along a road near the riverside.

Neither the video nor details of the attack can be easily verified due to tight restrictions on travel and ongoing combat in the area.

Pro-democracy guerrillas and ethnic minority armed forces have been attempting to oust the country’s military rulers since they seized power in 2021 from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi.

However, the fighting in Rakhine has raised fears of a