Myanmar's parliament on Thursday ousted nine constitutional court judges in the culmination of a long-running standoff that observers say exposed growing political rivalry within the regime.

Three-quarters of lower house lawmakers voted to impeach the members of the Constitutional Tribunal, whose duties include interpreting provisions under a controversial 2008 charter drawn up by the former junta, and vetting new laws to ensure they conform with the text.

Christian students from Myanmar's Chin ethnic minority have been forced to convert to Buddhism, shave their heads and wear monastic robes, a rights group said Wednesday.

The Chin, a mainly Christian group in the poor and remote west of the predominantly Buddhist country, face harassment for the link between their faith and British colonial rule, according to the Chin Human Rights Organization (CHRO).

China has pushed thousands of refugees from Myanmar's Kachin minority back across the border into a province wracked by fighting between government troops and ethnic guerillas, the rebels said Friday.

Around 2,000 Kachin refugees have returned from China's Yunnan province this week and languish in camps near the border between the two nations, La Nan of the Kachin Independence Organization (KIO) told Agence France Presse, adding more were expected to cross.

Although unshackled from decades of direct censorship, journalists in Myanmar still face repressive laws that can land them in prison and say they will not stop fighting for greater freedom.

The end of pre-publication checks is the latest reform by a regime seeking the lifting of Western sanctions, but there are concerns that without wider changes a climate of fear will persist and self-censorship prevail.

Myanmar said it had abolished media censorship on Monday in the latest in a series of rapid democratic reforms, delighting journalists who lived for decades under the shadow of the censors' marker pen.

Draconian pre-publication checks -- applied in the past to everything from newspapers to song lyrics and even fairy tales -- were a hallmark of life under the generals who ran the country for almost half a century until last year.

Myanmar has set up a new commission to probe sectarian clashes that saw scores killed and displaced tens of thousands, members told AFP, following intense scrutiny of its handling of the issue.

The nation's authorities have faced heavy criticism from rights groups after deadly unrest between Muslim Rohingya and ethnic Rakhine Buddhists in western Rakhine state.

Saudi Arabia accused authorities in Buddhist-majority Myanmar on Monday of "ethnic cleansing" against the Muslim Rohingya minority in the west of the country, state media reported on Tuesday.

The Saudi cabinet said it "condemns the ethnic cleansing campaign and brutal attacks against Myanmar's Muslim Rohingya citizens, as well as violation of human rights by forcing them to leave their homeland," in a statement carried by the official SPA news agency.

Egypt's foreign ministry Saturday denounced attacks against Myanmar's Muslim minority, saying its envoy in the Buddhist-majority East Asian country had seen extensive damage caused by sectarian clashes.

The ministry statement came a day after protesters in Cairo burnt the flag of Myanmar's mission.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met Myanmar President Thein Sein on Friday for landmark discussions days after Washington eased its sanctions on the once-pariah state.

The pair held talks in the Cambodian tourist town Siem Reap on the sidelines of a U.S. business conference, after the U.S. on Wednesday gave the green light to firms to invest in Myanmar, including in oil and gas, in its greatest loosening of tough sanctions so far.

Ten aid workers including some U.N. staff have been detained in western Myanmar in the wake of deadly communal unrest, the body said Friday, as rights groups warned of mass detentions of Muslims in the restive area.

In a bulletin on the situation in violence-wracked Rakhine state, the U.N. said humanitarian staff have been held for "questioning" -- adding that Myanmar's government has failed to respond to queries about those detained.