400 new political refugees in Thailand

Human Rights

400 new political refugees in Thailand

During the month of May, at least 400 people who could be regarded as political refugees arrived from Burma's Shan State into northern Thailand, according to Thai border-based Shan Human Rights Foundation:

The SHRF that has been monitoring the Shan refugee flow into Chiangmai province since 1996 found that 395 of the 896 arrivals in May in Chaiprakarn, Fang and Mae Ai maintained that they had fled to Thailand following persecutions by both proponents and opponents of the Interim Shan Government (ISG) formed by a group of Shan elders who declared Independence from Burma on 17 April.

"The number of arrivals in May from Laikha, Mongkerng, Kehsi and Mongnawng (where the ISG is based) is plainly suggestive," added a relief worker.

Monitored arrivals, January - May 2005

The social workers discovered during their interviews that 69% of them (150 from Laikha, 139 from Mongkerng, 11 from Mongnawng and 95 from Kehsi) had claimed to have been forced to participate rallies organized by both the pro-ISG and anti-ISG in their areas, and had subsequently suffered for "having it both ways."

"So we decided we had had enough of being the dyke between two buffaloes locking horns with each other and left," said a 41-year old former village headman told S.H.A.N. last month. (Re: Hundreds fleeing from hot spot township, 20 May 2005)

The SHRF claimed to have missed more than a hundred of the refugees who crossed the border into the nearby Chiangrai province.

"Last month, Thai authorities launched a crackdown along the Fang - Chaiprakarn border following the bombings in Rangoon," an SHRF member explained. "Many were stuck across the border and were forced to make a detour."

The SHRF that had published Dispossessed: Forced Relocation and Extrajudicial Killings in Shan State, 1996-98, was founded by the late Hkun Kya Oo in 1990. Its present head is Kham Harn Fah <shrf@cm.ksc.co.th>.