Myanmar security forces have brutally driven out half a million Muslim Rohingya from northern Rakhine state, torching their homes, crops and villages to prevent them from returning, the U.N. human rights office said on Wednesday.

Jyoti Sanghera, head of the Asia and Pacific region of the U.N. human rights office, called on Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi to "stop the violence" and voiced fear that if the stateless Rohingya refugees return from Bangladesh they may be interned.

"If villages have been completely destroyed and livelihood possibilities have been destroyed, what we fear is that they may be incarcerated or detained in camps," she told a news briefing.