The Rohingya are often described as "the world's most persecuted minority".
They are an ethnic Muslim group who have lived for centuries in the majority Buddhist Myanmar. Currently, there are about 1.1 million Rohingya Muslims who live in the Southeast Asian country.
The Rohingya speak Rohingya or Ruaingga, a dialect that is distinct to others spoken in Rakhine State and throughout Myanmar. They are not considered one of the country's 135 official ethnic groups and have been denied citizenship in Myanmar since 1982, which has effectively rendered them stateless.
Nearly all of the Rohingya in Myanmar live in the western coastal state of Rakhine and are not allowed to leave without government permission. It is one the poorest states in the country with ghetto-like camps and a lack of basic services and opportunities.
Due to ongoing violence and persecution, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have fled to neighbouring countries either by land or boat over the course of many decades.
Muslims have lived in the area now known as Myanmar since as early as the 12th century, according to many historians and Rohingya groups.
The Arakan Rohingya National Organisation has said, "Rohingyas have been living in Arakan from time immemorial," referring to the area now known as Rakhine.
During the more than 100 years of British rule (1824-1948), there was a significant amount of migration of labourers to what is now known as Myanmar from today's India and Bangladesh. Because the British administered Myanmar as a province of India, such migration was considered internal, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).
The migration of labourers was viewed negatively by the majority of the native population.
After independence, the government viewed the migration that took place during British rule as "illegal, and it is on this basis that they refuse citizenship to the majority of Rohingya," HRW said in a 2000 report.
This has led many Buddhists to consider the Rohingya as Bengali, rejecting the term Rohingya as a recent invention, created for political reasons.
Shortly after Myanmar's independence from the British in 1948, the Union Citizenship Act was passed, defining which ethnicities could gain citizenship. According to a 2015 report by the International Human Rights Clinic at Yale Law School, the Rohingya were not included. The act, however, did allow those whose families had lived in Myanmar for at least two generations to apply for identity cards.
Rohingya were initially given such identification or even citizenship under the generational provision. During this time, several Rohingya also served in parliament.
After the 1962 military coup in Myanmar, things changed dramatically for the Rohingya. All citizens were required to obtain national registration cards. The Rohingya, however, were only given foreign identity cards, which limited the jobs and educational opportunities they could pursue and obtain.
In 1982, a new citizenship law was passed, which effectively rendered the Rohingya stateless. Under the law, Rohingya were again not recognised as one of the country's 135 ethnic groups.
State Chancellor Aung San Suu Kyi, who is the de facto leader of Myanmar, has refused to really discuss the plight of the Rohingya.
Aung San Suu Kyi and her government do not recognise the Rohingya as an ethnic group and have blamed violence in Rakhine, and subsequent military crackdowns, on those they call "terrorists".
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate does not have control over the military but has been criticised for her failure to condemn indiscriminate force used by troops, as well as to stand up for the rights of the more than one million Rohingya in Myanmar.
The government has also repeatedly rejected accusations of abuses. In February 2017, the UN published a report that found that government troops "very likely" committed crimes against humanity since renewed military crackdowns began in October 2016.
At the time, the government did not directly address the findings of the report and said it had the "the right to defend the country by lawful means" against "increasing terrorist activities", adding that a domestic investigation was enough.
The international community has labelled the Rohingya the "most persecuted minority in the world". The UN, as well as several rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, have consistently decried the treatment of the Rohingya by Myanmar and neighbouring countries. The UN has said that it is "very likely" that the military committed grave human rights abuses in Rakhine that may amount to war crimes, allegations the government denies.
Following violence that broke out last year, more than 87,000 Rohingya fled to Bangladesh from October 2016 to July 2017, according to the International Organization for Migration. Many Rohingya also risked their lives trying to get to Malaysia by boat across the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. Between 2012 and 2015, more than 112,000 made the dangerous journey. The UN estimated that there are as many as 420,000 Rohingya refugees in Southeast Asia. Additionally, there are around 120,000 internally displaced Rohingya. The violence in Myanmar's northwest that began in late August has forced around 58,000 Rohingya to flee across the border into Bangladesh, while another 10,000 are stranded in no-man's land between the two countries, Reuters reported, citing UN sources.
Since then, Rohingya people have regularly been made the target of persecution by the government and nationalist Buddhists.
There are roughly 1 million Rohingya in Burma, which is also known as Myanmar. More than 100,000 live in squalid displacement camps, where they are susceptible to hunger, as well as continued attacks. A village schoolteacher in Rakhine state told the Associated Press that many more Rohingya were hiding in forests due to the scorched earth campaign by the military. “Since the violence last month, villagers have been accused of burning their own houses. Villagers are hiding in the forest. No one dares to live in their own house because of the arrests and killing,” said the teacher.
Over the past three weeks, Human Rights Watch has identified three villages in Burma's Rakhine state that have been all but completely burned, presumably by the military. Before-and-after satellite imagery depicts about 430 buildings reduced to ash, along with the tree cover surrounding them. Rakhine state has experienced recent violence stemming from a much-longer conflict between ethnic Burmese and the Bengali-speaking Rohingya minority, who are considered, by the Burmese state, to have immigrated illegally despite having deep historical roots in the region. On Monday, the Burmese government said its military had killed 34 people, who they claimed had attacked first, though locals said the dead were unarmed civilians.
Human rights groups have documented numerous extrajudicial killings, rapes and beatings by state security forces.
Endless Stream of Rohingya Flee Military Offensive in Myanmar.
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They are nutritionally deprived, they have been cut off from a normal flow of food for possibly more than a month.
At least 270,000 Rohingya flee Myanmar violence in 2 weeks, UN says
There are already almost 400,000 Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh in squalid camps near its border with Myanmar.
Many Rohingya with their children also risked their lives trying to get to Malaysia by boat across the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea.
UN official says more than 1,000 people, mostly Rohingya Muslims, may have been killed including children.
Satellite data show fires burning in Rakhine state
Muslim Rohingya flee Myanmar violence, Aung San Suu Kyi silent on attacks.
The vast majority are women, including mothers with newborn babies, families with children.
Women, children, the elderly - no one has been spared. The situation is continuing to get worse.
