In deeply divided Arakan State, some Muslims hope that an NLD victory will bring rights and support to the disenfranchised Rohingya population.

Khin Mar Saw, a Muslim woman, arrived at Burma’s western coast near the Arakan State capital Sittwe late last month. She spent a grueling two-day journey on board a boat after escaping from the fishing town of Kyaukpyu on the evening of Oct. 23 as violence between Muslims and Buddhists engulfed the area.

Journalists and other external observers can have no excuse for uncritically repeating narratives that have contributed to bringing untold devastation to both communities for decades.

The future is uncertain for the thousands left displaced by the violent conflict in Mindanao.

On one side of a checkpoint, he is a Muslim living in a wretched refugee camp. On the other side, he belongs to the majority Buddhist community in northwestern Myanmar's Rakhine State. The checkpoint separates Buddhists and Muslims in a region that erupted in sectarian violence in June 2012, forcing more than 70,000 internally displaced Rohingya Muslims into camps.

Myanmar’s LGBT community suffers abuse, stigma and the legacy of colonial and dictatorial rule. Slowly, however, it is mobilising and finding a voice.

Suu Kyi has been far more engaged in playing politics in the opaque corridors of power in Naypyidaw and making tours abroad than trying to listen to the Burmese public at large, whose support she and the NLD seem to take for granted.

Eyewitnesses to a massacre at an Islamic school say it was carried out by Buddhists,and many contend it stems from a coordinated effort with ties to the top. Photos by Vincenzo Floramo.

Rohingya in the region are confined to designated areas while all around them monks and authorities stoke anti-Muslim sentiment. And this disdain for the group seems to be receiving the tacit approval of the majority of Myanmar people —with even Aung San Suu Kyi silent.