4 dead, mosques burned as Buddhists, Muslims clash in Myanmar

March 21, 2013 : A dispute between a Muslim gold shop owner and two Buddhist sellers erupted in clashes that left four people dead, 20 injured and four mosques burned to the ground in central Myanmar, police said Thursday.

The clashes began Wednesday morning in Meiktila Township after a quarrel between the shop owner and the sellers, police said. The sellers were beaten up by four other Muslim shop owners, police said. In retaliation, Muslims and Buddhists took to the street, torching each others' houses and schools, said Police Lt. Col. Aung Min. Among the dead is a Buddhist monk. To defuse tensions, police imposed a curfew Wednesday night.

Myanmar is emerging from decades of military repression to democracy, but has been plagued by bouts of ethnic violence. In the western state of Rakhine, tensions between the majority Buddhist community and the Rohingya -- a stateless ethnic Muslim group -- boiled over into clashes that killed scores of people and left tens of thousands of others living in makeshift camps last year.

Citing government figures, the United Nations said at least 89 people were killed in Rakhine and 110,000 people were now displaced. "The ongoing intercommunal strife in Rakhine State is of grave concern," the International Crisis Group said in a November report. "And there is the potential for similar violence elsewhere, as nationalism and ethno-nationalism rise and old prejudices resurface."

A failure by authorities to address deepening divisions between the communities could result in a resumption of violence in the future, the report said, "which would be to the detriment of both communities, and of the country as a whole."

(Source: CNN)