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NCGUB: News on Migrants & Refugees-15 December, 2009 (English & Burmese)
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NEWS ON REFUGEES
Thai 'Fear Factor' Makes Boatpeople Fly Now
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NEWS ON REFUGEES*************************************************************
Thai 'Fear Factor' Makes Boatpeople Fly NowBy Chutima Sidasathian and Alan Morison, Monday, December 14, 2009
BOATPEOPLE are not coming to the Andaman coast this sailing season, according tothe army colonel who has led his country's campaign to keep them out of Thailand.
Phuketwan
and The South China Morning Post newspaper in Hong Kong revealed inJanuary that the boatpeople, often a mixture of Rohingya and Bangladeshis, were heldin a barbed-wire compound on Koh Sai Daeng off the Andaman coast.Paramilitary trained by the Thai army then secretly towed hundreds out to sea andabandoned them in unpowered boats. Survivors who made it to Indonesia and Indiatold authorities that hundreds had died.Colonel Manat Kongpan, of the Internal Security Operations Command, credited thepreparedness of coastal villagers as one cause of the boatpeople ceasing to travel."The arrests last sailing season helped to stop the boatpeople from coming," he said.However, the Arakan Project, an NGO with connections in Bangladesh and Arakanstate in Burma, the departure points for the Rohingya, said it was too early to be surethat no boats would come before the sailing season ends in April.''We are told that there is some activity and some have paid the brokers and are readyto come,'' said Chris Lewa, the NGO spokeswoman. ''They are waiting to see whathappens to the detainees who are currently being held in Bangkok. However, most arenow flying direct to Malaysia.''
Ms Lewa said the availability of cheap flights and access to forged Bangladeshdocuments meant that for the first time, Rohingya women were also able to move toMalaysia, primarily as brides for Muslim Rohingya men, who are generally youngand single.''Brokers have switched to the air routes,'' she said. ''In many ways, it's simpler andsafer.''The first group of Rohingya to avoid the ''pushbacks'' are being held in detention inBangkok. The men were transferred from a detention centre in Ranong, a town on theborder between Thailand and Burma, after two teenagers died in custody.As many as 30 of the would-be refugees, held captive in confined spaces withoutaccess to sunlight for six months, could barely walk when they arrived in Bangkok.
Phuketwan
journalists were told in a face-to-face interview with the commander of the Ranong detention centre and in regular telephone calls that the detainees werehappy, that they were well-treated, that they were content.No action has been taken over the deaths in custody or against the people responsiblefor carrying out the pushback policy.Thailand has held the chair of Asean this year as the 10-nation group attempted to setrules for human rights within the region.When the Foreign Ministers of Asean met with US Secretary of State Hillary Clintonon Phuket mid-year, the Rohingya issue was the last item on a long list. Nothing wasresolved then, nor has it been resolved since.Almost 5000 Rohingya arrived on the Andaman coast in the 2007-2008 sailing season,prompting the then Thai government to look at methods of deterring others fromfollowing.In 2008-2009, about 1200 would-be refugees arrived before exposure of the inhumanepushbacks received international media coverage.Despite the risks involved, the hardship of life in Rohingya villages usually meanspeople will try more than once to reach Thailand or Malaysia.In Malaysia, their treatment has improved in reaction to a US State Department reportthis year condemning ''revolving door'' abuses in which corrupt Malaysian officialstraded released boatpeople into various forms of slavery in Thailand.The Andaman coast, meanwhile, continues to produce surprises. World-beating five-star resorts flourish along a holiday strip that of late combined sunbathing tourists andcaptured boatpeople lying on the same beach, but with vastly different levels of freedom.Phuket has a small Rohingya community, a mix of both legal and illegal residents. Itis believed that some boatloads of would-be refugees have come ashore on Phuket
over the years, only to be arrested and transported to detention in Ranong as illegalBurmese.Those with enough money would have been able to pay to be recycled. The fate of those without the capacity to bribe corrupt officials and brokers is less clear.http://phuketwan.com/tourism/boatpeople-stop-coming-says-andaman-colonel-11904/
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15Dec09 NCGUB: News on Migrants & Refugees-15 Dec, 2009 (English & Burmese)
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