"More than 92,500 civilians have been displaced by armed conflict in Myanmar’s Rakhine state, where hostilities between Myanmar forces and the rebel Arakan Army have raged for a year, according to a tally issued Wednesday by a nonprofit organization that promotes ethnic rights. Zaw Zaw Tun, secretary of the Rakhine Ethnics Congress (REC) and a relief volunteer in the region, said his organization has been surveying the number of ethnic Rakhine civilians who have fled their homes because of armed clashes. “We are trying to survey the IDPs [internally displaced persons] as accurately as possible,” he told RFA’s Myanmar Service. “So far, we’ve recorded more than 92,500 IDPs.” But he added that a true estimate would be difficult to state because of a shortage of people on the ground to count the numbers of IDPs. After fighting intensified in northern Rakhine state in late November, thousands of residents from villages in Rathedaung, Buthidaung, and Myebon townships left their communities to seek safety elsewhere Rathedaung township, where the greatest number of clashes has occurred, has the greatest number of IDPs at about 30,000, as estimated by local lawmakers..."