FILE PHOTO: A boy sits in a burnt area after fire destroyed shelters at a camp for internally displaced Rohingya Muslims in the western Rakhine State near Sittwe, Myanmar May 3, 2016. REUTERS/Soe Zeya Tun/File Photo
WASHINGTON/COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh (Reuters) - The U.S. government is conducting an intensive examination of alleged atrocities against Myanmar's Rohingya Muslims, documenting accusations of murder, rape, beatings and other possible offences in an investigation that could be used to prosecute Myanmar's military for crimes against humanity, U.S. officials told Reuters.
The undertaking, led by the State Department, has involved more than a thousand interviews of Rohingya men and women in refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh, where almost 700,000 Rohingya have fled after a military crackdown last year in Myanmar's northwestern Rakhine State, two U.S. officials said. The work is modelled on a U.S. forensic investigation of mass atrocities in Sudan's Darfur region in 2004, which led to a U.S. declaration of genocide that culminated in economic sanctions against the Sudanese government.
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