ISTANBUL

A U.K. government spokesman on Monday said violence against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar "looks a lot like ethnic cleansing".

In comments reported in U.K. media, the Downing Street spokesman said the British government had been "appalled by the inhumane violence which has taken place in Rakhine state".

"It’s a major humanitarian crisis which has been created by Burma’s military and it looks like ethnic cleansing," he added.

This follows the UN's description of the violence against Rohingya Muslims as a "textbook example of ethnic cleansing".

Turkey has also been at the forefront of raising the Rohingya crisis internationally.

Earlier on Monday, Live Aid founder Bob Geldof returned a civic award in Dublin in protest at Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi's response to the Rohingya crisis in her country, where, since Aug. 25, over 611,000 people have fled the western state of Rakhine into Bangladesh.

The refugees are fleeing a military operation in which security forces and Buddhist mobs have killed men, women and children, looted homes and torched Rohingya villages.

The Rohingya, described by the UN as the world's most persecuted people, have faced heightened fears of attack since dozens were killed in communal violence in 2012.