The situation in Rakhine State should be closely watched in the coming days and weeks with the reports of possible renewed sectarian conflict targeting Rohingya Muslims. The concerns are raised as the reports indicate collaboration resumed between the junta and the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) in Northern Rakhine State in recent weeks. Rohingya communities could become a scapegoat once again for such a collaboration as they were in 2017.

With the junta’s promise for an election is in a doldrum, and it has no solution on how to deal with rampant inflation in the country, it is expected that the junta will try to exploit the underlying ethnic crisis in Rakhine State to find a way out from the political crisis it created by itself.

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