Mohsena Begum, a Rohingya who escaped to Bangladesh from Myanmar, holds her child and sits at the entrance of a room of an unregistered refugee camp in Teknaf, Dec. 2, 2016. (AP Photo/A.M. Ahad, File)

Canada’s Ambassador to Indonesia Peter MacArthur was ordered by Global Affairs to delete a tweet of photos he’d taken of beaches in Myanmar — currently the scene of a brutal crackdown on minority Rohingya Muslims by state security forces.

“First day of 2018 unfolded on a Myanmar beach where the great surf is pleasingly turquoise coloured, warm, clear and clean — perfect for snorkelling to visit with nature and the fish …” MacArthur tweeted on January 1, sharing photos he’d taken. London-based CTV correspondent Daniele Hamamdjian tweeted a screen shot of MacAthur’s tweet.

Canada’s Ambassador to Indonesia, @AmbMacArthur, goes on holiday to #Myanmar, tweets photos of serene beaches from the country accused of ethnic cleansing, then deletes tweet. In case you missed it, here it is. #Rohingya #cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/PCYdmmLAzo — Daniele Hamamdjian (@DHamamdjian) January 2, 2018

A spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada Brianne Maxwell said in an email to iPolitics that “the government of Canada takes the situation in Myanmar very seriously and is deeply concerned by the ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity that are occurring there.”

“Ambassador MacArthur was advised to delete the Tweet in question.”

A Canadian official said that MacArthur was in Myanmar on a private trip to visit a family member who works for the Canadian government in the country.

According to a United Nations estimate, 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Myanmar since August 25. The Myanmar military has been accused of raping Rohingyas and burning their homes, forcing thousands to brave the elements in their flight to safety in Bangladesh.

In early December, International Development Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau announced that Canadians donated more than $12.5 million to registered charities to assist Rohingya Muslims facing violence in Myanmar. The federal government has promised to match those contributions.

That $12.55 million is in addition to the more than $25 million in humanitarian assistance already committed by the federal government to Bangladesh and Myanmar since the beginning of 2017. According to the Department of Global Affairs, this brings Canada’s overall humanitarian response to this crisis to more than $37.5 million and “strengthens Canada’s position as one of the top donors in this humanitarian response.”

Bob Rae, Canada’s special envoy on the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar, said recently that it’s hard to put the extent of the humanitarian crisis into words.

Rae’s interim report said refugee camps are “deplorably overcrowded and pose a threat to human health and life itself.”

The United Nations Human Rights Council has appointed a fact-finding mission to examine the treatment of the Rohingya, but officials have not been allowed to visit Myanmar or interview officials in the country’s government and military, Rae said.

Two Reuters journalists who were covering the western state of Rakhine, where Rohingya Muslims have fled a fierce military crackdown on militants, have been detained in Myanmar since December 12 on suspicion of violating the country’s Official Secrets Act.

With files from The Canadian Press.