Radical Myanmar and Sri Lankan Buddhists gang against Muslim minorities

A radical monk who heads a movement accused of stirring violence against Muslims in Myanmar (My Anmar) has announced a partnership with a hardline Buddhist group in Sri Lanka to defend their religion.

The declaration by the monk, who once called himself “the Burmese bin Laden”, was the clearest signal to date of a push to spread the ideology of his controversial 969 movement beyond Myanmar to build a front against Muslims.

In one of his speeches, he thanked Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa for granting him a visa, despite protests by some Muslim groups in the island nation.

This is while thousands of Myanmar’s Muslim minorities could face indefinite detention under a new government plan that requires them to either accept ethnic reclassification and register as Bengalis or be detained.

Muslims in Myanmar have faced torture, neglect, and repression since the country’s independence in 1948.

The Myanmar government has been repeatedly criticized by human rights groups for failing to protect the Muslims in the country.