During World War II, Japanese forces invaded Burma, then under British colonial rule. The British forces retreated and in the power vacuum left behind, considerable inter communal violence erupted between Pro-Axis Buddhist Rakhine and Muslim villagers. The British armed Rohingya locals in northern Arakan to create a buffer zone from Japanese invasion when they retreated.
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The period also witnessed violence between groups loyal to the British and Burmese nationalists.
Inter communal violence
Aye Chan, a historian at the Kanda University, has written that as a consequence of acquiring arms from the Allies during World War II, Rohingyas tried to destroy the collaboratonist Arakanese villages instead of resisting the Japanese.
Muslims from Northern Rakhine State killed around 50,000 Arakanese, including the Deputy Commissioner U Oo Kyaw Khaing, who was killed while trying to settle the dispute. However the number of Arakanese killed is being questioned, and the number of Muslims killed is claimed to be around 40,000 too. The total casualty of both parties in that conflict is not certain and no concrete official reference can be found.
Persecution by the Japanese forces
Defeated, 50,000 Arakaneses eventually fled to the Dinaspur Chittagong Division of Bangladesh after repeated massacres by the Rohingya and Japanese forces.