State-led violence against Myanmar’s Rohingya population has received increasing attention in the Western media over the last few months, however the oppression of the Muslim minority in the Buddhist-majority country is a long-term injustice. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have already been forced to leave their homes in Rakhine State as a result of ethnic discrimination, and the latest round of attacks by the country’s military has seen a further 600,000 flee, mostly for neighbouring Bangladesh – now facing a humanitarian crisis of its own as a result of the exodus.

State counsellor and (once) iconic Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who is being stripped of her various other international accolades at a fast pace, is fielding much criticism for failing to denounce, and act to end the violence – which has been described as nothing short of ethnic cleansing and genocide. Sarah spoke to a New Zealand-based Rohingya woman* who moved to Aotearoa from Myanmar, or Burma as it used to be called, in 2006 with her family. Hers is a moving personal insight into a conflict with no clear end in sight.

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