The juggernaut of hatred in the name of faith is spreading. It is hounding the Rohingya Muslims as they flee Myanmar in various directions to escape ethnic cleansing.

Added to the list of excesses committed against them is an attack led by Buddhist monks on a UN-run safe house in Colombo where several of them had been given shelter.

The perpetrators justified their action with claims that the Rohingyas had been involved in violence against the Buddhists in Myanmar.

Reports say the protesters demanded that these Muslim refugees in transition, who are awaiting the processing of their cases for asylum in a third country under the aegis of the UNHCR, be sent back from where they had arrived in Sri Lanka.

The message has the most sinister connotations, for we know that only death and decimation awaits these uprooted people at home.

The attack in Sri Lanka truly brings into focus the extent and scale of the Rohingya crisis.

It is a warning of how far and fast the hatred can spread, threatening to turn the world into a battleground.