The regime’s rescue plan took shape in the elaborate model village scheme, which over the years would see Buddhists, invariably the poor or condemned, shifted out from their hometowns and organised into new communities. They would correct the demographic imbalance, one that was considered proof enough that Islam was gaining strength in Myanmar. Buddhists had by then become a minority in northern Rakhine State, and for the regime, that meant a weakening of its ability to project its power there. So the Buddhist prisoners were brought out of their cells to begin new lives far away.
