The UN accuses the Burmese army of genocide

A YEAR ago insurgents armed mostly with makeshift weapons attacked a series of police posts in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, killing a dozen security personnel. In response, the Burmese army led a pogrom against the Rohingyas, a downtrodden Muslim minority in whose name the insurgents had launched the attacks. More than 700,000 fled to nearby Bangladesh to escape the violence. But the scale of the atrocities has been hard to confirm, since the Burmese authorities have restricted access to the affected area. This week, however, the UN’s Human Rights Council published an authoritative report, which shows that the abuses were, if anything, worse than has been suspected.