Refugees whipped and towed out to sea?

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Refugees whipped and towed out to sea?

Ungelesener Beitragvon KoratCat » Fr Jan 16, 2009 9:54 pm

Thailand denies whipping refugees on beaches

BANGKOK, Thailand (CNN) -- Thailand's military has denied abusing refugee boat-people from Myanmar after claims some were whipped on a tourist beach and hundreds more left dead or missing after being towed at to sea without food and water.

Photos showing refugees being made to lie face down on a popular beach and media reports claiming refugees been deliberately lost at sea have sparked concerns for their safety.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees says it is "concerned" about the fate of the Muslim ethnic minority Rohingya people, who have fled from Myanmar's border with Bangladesh.

The agency says it has written a formal note to the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs asking for clarification of what is happening.

CNN spoke to one Australian tourist, who declined to be named for fear of being barred from Thailand, who says boat-people were "whipped" by Thai guards on popular diving resort island in the Similan Archipelago last month.

Local media also report claims by Rohingya survivors that the Thai military have been detaining hundreds of them an island called Koh Sai Daeng before towing them back out into open water without supplies.

The survivors say hundreds of them drowned and only the lucky ones made it to the Indian Andaman Islands or Indonesia's Aceh province.

The Thai Navy denies knowledge of the incident.

Rear Admiral Naris Pratumsuwan told CNN "as a normal practice, if Navy finds illegal immigrants, we will hand them over to related authorities, e.g. police or immigration police."

He said he had not received any information on an island where migrants are being detained.

There were reports of another boatload of 46 Rohingya detained by the Thai military Friday, but there was no official confirmation.

The Rohingya have been fleeing persecution of the hard-line military regime in Myanmar, formerly Burma, for years and often seek refuge in Malaysia.

Boat loads of Rohingya arriving in Thailand is nothing new, but non-governmental organizations are increasingly worried about what they say is an apparent change of government policy.

They say the army's Internal Security Operations Command is forcing the Rohingya out to sea rather than deporting them overland back to Myanmar.

"The Thai government is taking highly vulnerable people and risking their lives for political gain," says Refugee International's Sean Garcia says.

"It should be engaging the Burmese government on improving conditions at home for the Rohingya if it wants to stem these flows.

"The Rohingya will continue to make the journey because they have no hope for a better life in Burma. Pushing them back out to sea is not an effective deterrent it just jeopardizes lives."

CNN Jan 16, 2009
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Re: Refugees whipped and towed out to sea?

Ungelesener Beitragvon KoratCat » Sa Jan 17, 2009 9:31 am

Thailand's deadly treatment of migrants

A shocking story is unfolding in Thailand. Migrants and refugees who turn up on its shores have testified that they are being sent back to sea in boats without engines, their hands tied, left to their fate.

Hundreds are thought to have suffered this treatment - among them many Rohingya people of western Burma - and many have died. The BBC's Jonathan Head in Bangkok has been investigating what has been happening.

The 46 Rohingyas who arrived by boat at Phrathong Island on Friday morning may be lucky.

Like the hundreds of other asylum-seekers from this Burmese Muslim minority who have arrived on Thailand's Andaman Sea coast, they have been handed over to the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC), a military authority set up under the Cold War and still given sweeping powers to protect national security.

That means they disappear into a black hole. No visits from lawyers or refugee advocates. The military can do what it likes with them.

But after the spotlight now being shone onto the treatment of previous Rohingya groups, this one may be handled more leniently.

Overboard

Harsh treatment of asylum-seekers is nothing new in Thailand. But the allegations made by Rohingyas who have drifted hundreds of kilometres to the Andaman Islands and Indonesia's Aceh province are shocking.

According to a local civic group, the Arakan Project, whose staff have done extensive interviews with some of the survivors, they were detained by the Thai security forces in late November and December last year as they arrived by boat.

Instead of being handed over to the police or immigration for processing as illegal immigrants, they were instead taken by military units to an island called Koh Sai Daeng. They were detained there for several days, sleeping out in the open, their hands tied at night.

On 18 December one group of just over 400 was put on a navy boat, which was towing a barge behind it, says Chris Lewa from the Arakan Project.

Their hands were tied. Once out at sea they were ordered to move onto the barge at gunpoint. They refused. The Thai troops then tied the feet of four of them and threw them overboard.

The group then moved onto the barge, and the rope was cut, leaving them with food and water for two days.

They drifted for more than 10. According to the testimony she has obtained, Ms Lewa says they sighted land - the Andaman Islands - on around the 12th day.

Fearful that the current would sweep their barge away, many of the exhausted and dehydrated Rohingyas leapt into the sea to try to make it to land.

Fewer than 100 were found on board by the Indian coastguard, although an unknown number was also picked up from the sea or on beaches.

Briefer telephone interviews with survivors by the BBC have confirmed this account. Survivors who reached Aceh have told the local media the same thing.

In all, more than 800 Rohingyas were expelled in this way in December. Hundreds may have died.

Denial

The local commander of ISOC in Ranong, Col Manas Khongpan, has denied these allegations. He told the BBC that illegal immigrants are never held by his troops.

But that contradicts comments the BBC has been given by other military and police officials, who say all Rohingya boat-people are now being handled by ISOC.

Some of those officials, who did not want to be named, confirmed that Rohingyas had indeed been set adrift at sea, with little food and water.

They explained that Rohingyas are seen as a greater security threat than the tens of thousands of other illegal migrants, because they are Muslim, because they tend to arrive in large numbers at one time, and because they are almost exclusively men.

Immigration officials told us there is no evidence to support the allegation made by some in the military that Rohingyas have gone to Thailand's deep south to join the Islamic insurgency there.

The officials have told us that while most of the Rohingya want to go to Malaysia - where there is already a community 20,000 strong and the prospect of well-paid jobs - increasing numbers are staying in Thailand. The official figure last year was 4,886, and the unofficial figure may be much higher.

Military's power

The Thai government has now issued a statement saying it is investigating all the facts surrounding these allegations.

It has promised to re-assess the situation of all illegal immigrants in Thailand, numbering perhaps three or four million, most of them from Burma, and to treat them in accordance with humanitarian principles.

Whether it can truly hold the military to account though is open to doubt. In many areas of Thailand the army operates with little civilian oversight. It has huge secret budgets, and extensive business interests.

The current Democrat-led coalition was stitched together last month thanks to the intervention of the powerful army commander General Anupong Paochinda - he may well resist any calls for his men to be brought to justice over these allegations, as his predecessors have.

But it is also worth remembering that under the most recent constitution the most senior commander of ISOC is, in fact, the Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva.

He has made the rule of law one of the core principles of his administration. Any crimes committed by ISOC personnel, whether against Thais or illegal migrants, will ultimately lie at his door.

BBC Jan 17, 2009
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Thailand refuses to grant access to Myanmar boat people

Ungelesener Beitragvon KoratCat » Do Jan 22, 2009 7:00 am

Thailand refuses to grant access to Myanmar boat people

BANGKOK (AFP) — Thailand's prime minister Wednesday refused to grant UN experts access to 126 boat people from Myanmar, following allegations that the Thai army had left them to die on the open seas.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva dodged reporters' questions on a request from the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) to visit the group, and urged it instead to work with Thai authorities.

"The agency should come and talk to us about how to work together. Our work together should be based on cooperation and appropriate rules," Abhisit told reporters.

"They (the UN) should understand that every country has this problem (of refugees)," he said, adding that he wanted to discuss the matter with Myanmar.

Late Tuesday, the UNHCR announced it had asked the Thai government for access to the refugees to assess their needs.

Spokesman Ron Redmond said 80 of the migrants were being held on Koh Sai Daeng island off the Thai coast in the Andaman Sea.

Another 46 have been handed over to the Thai military authorities with no further information on their current location, he said.

Thailand's foreign ministry on Wednesday said it spoke with UNHCR frequently and may arrange a meeting with agency officials to discuss the matter further.

Survivors and a human rights group have accused the Thai army and navy of detaining and beating up to 1,000 members of the Rohingya minority from Myanmar late last year, before towing them out to sea with little food and water.

Nearly 650 of the Muslim Rohingya have been rescued in waters off India and Indonesia.

Some of them told officials that they had been beaten in Thailand before being set adrift in barges with no engines or navigational equipment.

The spokesman for Thailand's state security body, Colonel Thanatip Sawangsaeng, said Tuesday the case was being investigated.

He added that the army chief had said that the military "followed international standards and adhered to humanitarian principles."

Abhisit said he had requested further photo evidence and information from the navy on Thailand's routine treatment of illegal immigrants.

Foreign ministry permanent secretary Virasakdi Futrakul said neighbouring countries would be invited to a joint discussion on the Rohingya, describing them as a "regional problem".

"The ministry will invite ambassadors from Myanmar, India, Bangladesh and other countries who also have a problem with the Rohingya to discuss the problem and what kind of measures they use," Virasakdi told AFP.

"The Rohingya people are not only one country's problem but a problem for the whole region."

AFP Jan. 21,2009
Es gibt nichts Gutes, ausser man tut es! Erich Kästner, 1899 - 1974

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"Rohingya boat people 'escorted' to sea already"

Ungelesener Beitragvon KoratCat » So Jan 25, 2009 8:29 am

Thailand says 126 Rohingya boat people 'escorted' to sea already

Bangkok - A group of 126 Rohingya boat people whom the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) wanted to access to determine whether they needed protection has already been pushed back to sea by Thai authorities, officials said.

'These people have been escorted out of Thailand,' said Thai Foreign Ministry deputy spokesman Thani Thonpakdi.

On Tuesday the UNHCR requested access to 126 Rohingyas, members of a Muslim minority group from the North Arakan State in Myanmar, and said they should be kept in custody in southern Thailand to determine whether they were in need of international protection.

The request was made amid reports that the Thai navy had towed about 1,000 Rohingya boat people out to sea last month and set them adrift on boats without engines or sufficient food and water supplies.

The reports, based on the testimony of Rohinghya survivors rescued by the Indian navy, suggested that as many as 500 of the boat people were still missing and believed drowned.

According to UNHCR sources, some 126 of the pushed-back refugees had been picked up in Thai waters and were under Thai detention, with 80 if them on Sai Daeng island in the Andaman Sea, earlier this week.

The Thai government had waffled over the UNHCR request to interview the 126 refugees, who might have shed light on the alleged atrocities of last month. It was unclear whether the refugees were still in Thailand.

But the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC) has now made it clear that the 126 boat people had been pushed out to sea already, said Thani.

Thailand's newly appointed government under Prime Minster Abhisit Vejjajiva has come under heavy criticism for the Rohingya incident, which casts doubts on the new government's commitment to human rights and the fair treatment of refugees and illegal migrants, all huge problems for Thailand.

Abhisit has promised to investigate the incident but has assigned ISOC to carry out the probe, which is therefore not expected to be impartial.

Abhisit has also called for a long-term region-wide solution to the Rohingya problem.

Thai Foreign Ministry permanent secretary Veersak Futrakul on Friday met with the ambassadors of Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar to seek a region-wide solution to the Rohingya problem.

Myanmar's ruling junta has declared the Rohingyas stateless, denying them citizenship as they are deemed to be Bangladeshis, despite having lived in the Arakan for at least two centuries.

There are an estimated 250,000 Rohingya refugees living in Bangladesh, and an estimated 20,000 working illegally already in Thailand.

Lacking citizenship and job opportunities, the Rohingyas have migrated to Malaysia and Indonesia looking for work, receiving little welcome.

Despite their pathetic status in the region, few Western countries have expressed interest in opening their doors to a Rohingya resettlement programme to date.

Indonesia has taken a similar push-back policy towards the unfortunate boat people.

The Jakarta government has denied requests by the United Nations refugee agency for access to 193 Myanmar boat people stranded in the westernmost province of Aceh, believed to be survivors among the 1,000 Rohingya pushed out to sea by Thai authorities last month.

The Myanmar boat people were found adrift off Sabang island in Aceh province on January 7 and are now being sheltered at the naval base.

'From information we have collected, it appears that they are economic migrants,' Faizasyah said.

Faizasyah said the foreign ministry could not involve the UN refugee agency UNHCR because the Myanmar refugees were not believed to be political asylum-seekers.

But he said the International Organization for Migration was involved in the verification of the boat people's status.

The spokesman said the ministry would decide next week on what to do with the boat people.

'Deporting them is an option,' he said.

Monsters & Critics Jan. 23, 2009

... :cussing
Es gibt nichts Gutes, ausser man tut es! Erich Kästner, 1899 - 1974

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Re: Refugees whipped and towed out to sea?

Ungelesener Beitragvon newsclip » Mo Jan 26, 2009 2:40 pm

UN concerned about 126 boat people missing in Thailand

BANGKOK (AFP) — The United Nations refugee agency said Monday it was concerned about the fate of 126 boat people from Myanmar who were detained in Thailand, as authorities refused to reveal their location.

The UN refugee agency last week officially requested access to the group after reports that Thailand had abandoned up to 1,000 members of Myanmar's Muslim Rohingya minority out at sea in ill-equipped boats with scant supplies.

Kitty McKinsey, Asia spokeswoman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), said it had not received a response from the Thai government.

"We have no idea where they are right now, but we continue to press for access to any Rohingya remaining in Thailand," she told AFP.

"Of course we are concerned, especially in view of a lot of media reports that the push-backs are continuing ... this would violate the most basic human right to life," McKinsey added.

She said the UNHCR received reports this month that at least 80 Rohingya were rescued from a boat that the Thai military had towed out to sea, while 46 were intercepted on January 16, brought ashore and put in military custody.

Since then, their fate is unknown, with Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva last week dodging questions about their whereabouts.

A senior army officer based along the Andaman coast -- who refused to be named as he was not authorised to speak to the media -- denied that any Rohingya were in the kingdom.

"We have no idea where the figure of 126 refugees comes from, and which 126 Rohingya the UNHCR mean," he told AFP.

"Rohingya come in small or big groups. Once they arrive, we send them back (to sea) with food, water and petrol. Thai authorities have never sent them back without food, water and petrol. We have zero Rohingya in Thailand now."

Accusations of mistreatment surfaced earlier this month after nearly 650 Rohingya were rescued in waters off India and Indonesia.

Indian authorities and a local human rights group said the survivors gave accounts of being tied up and beaten by the Thai military, before being towed out to the high seas with only a few bags of rice.

Hundreds of the boat people are still believed to be missing at sea.

AFP Jan. 26, 2009

... :(

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Re: Refugees whipped and towed out to sea?

Ungelesener Beitragvon KoratCat » Fr Feb 13, 2009 11:39 am

PM admits Rohingya pushed out to sea

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva admitted in an interview with CNN that there were "some instances" in which Thai authorities pushed Rohingya boat people out to sea.

The admittance came after about 200 Rohingya refugees, Muslim minority group from Burma, accused the Thai authorities of towing them out to sea with little food and water. They were rescued by fishermen off northern Sumatra.

Mr Abhisit said he cannot pinpoint who in the government approved the practice, but said he is trying to correct the situation.

"It's not exactly clear whose work it is," Mr Abhisit said. "All the authorities say it's not their policy, but I have reason to believe some instances of this happened, but if I can have the evidence as to who exactly did this I will certainly bring them to account."

Mr Abhisit also said he regrets any losses that may have occurred from the ordeals.

Go to the link below to watch Mr Abhisit discussing the issue:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/0 ... nnSTCVideo

Bangkok Post Feb. 13, 2009
Es gibt nichts Gutes, ausser man tut es! Erich Kästner, 1899 - 1974


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