Aung San Suu Kyi, the Myanmar de facto leader who has been under intense international pressure for her handling of the crisis in the Rakhine state, has talked at length about the issue in a nationally televised speech from the capital Naypyidaw.

Aung San Suu Kyi acknowledged concerns among the global community but appeared to stop short of condemning the actions of the Myanmar army, whose campaign in recent weeks was denounced by the United Nations as a “textbook case of ethnic cleansing”.

Fighting in Rakhine, in western Myanmar, broke out on August 25 when militants from the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army targeted about 30 police posts and an army base, killing several people. The country’s security forces responded with a security operation that sent people fleeing from their homes, according to Rohingya, and killed several people. More than 400,000 Rohingya Muslim refugees have since fled the area over the past three weeks.