Myanmar’s junta targets displaced people returning to embattled Rakhine state

n just over a year of fighting, Myanmar’s ethnic Arakan Army has captured 14 of Rakhine state’s 17 townships, defeating the military in battle after battle in a stunning advance.

Amid the rapidly changing situation in the western state, residents displaced by the conflict have begun to return home, bolstered by the belief that the Arakan Army, or AA, would offer them protection from the military, which seized control of Myanmar in a February 2021 coup d’etat.