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3 Explosions Rock Capital of Myanmar’s Troubled Rakhine State


Security personnel investigate at the site of an explosion in Sittwe, Rakhine state, Myanmar, Feb. 24, 2018, in this picture obtained from social media. Courtesy of Ministry of Information Webportal Handout/via Reuters.
Security personnel investigate at the site of an explosion in Sittwe, Rakhine state, Myanmar, Feb. 24, 2018, in this picture obtained from social media. Courtesy of Ministry of Information Webportal Handout/via Reuters.

Three bombs exploded Saturday morning in Sittwe, the capital of Myanmar’s troubled Rakhine state, authorities said.

One of the explosions injured a police officer, but no other casualties have been reported. Authorities are working to determine who was behind the bombings, police said.

Three unexploded devices targeting government offices and other places were seized at other locations in Sittwe.

The blasts come three days after a bomb explosion killed two bank employees and injured about two dozen people in the northeastern city of Lashio, where several ethnic insurgent groups are fighting the Myanmar military.

Last month, at least seven Rakhine Buddhists were killed and a dozen injured when local police fired at protesters in the ancient city of Mrauk-U.

A massive military intervention in Myanmar's violence-torn Rakhine state against Rohingya Muslim insurgents since August of last year forced about 700,000 Rohingya to seek refuge in neighboring Bangladesh.

Myanmar has said that government forces have undertaken a legitimate campaign against what it calls Muslim "terrorists."

The United States and the United Nations have called the military crackdown on the Rohingya “ethnic cleansing,” but the government of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has blocked U.N. investigators and other independent monitors from entering the conflict zone.

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