Thailand set to deport Rohingya

Thai prison officials have released 62 Rohingya refugees being held in detention in southern Ranong province, handing them over to immigration authorities for deportation.

Immigration authorities said on Saturday that they did not know where the group would be deported to.

"Normally under the law these people would be deported out of Thai territory after serving their sentence, but this is a special case so we have to wait for government instruction," an immigration police officer in Ranong told the AFP.

Human rights groups have said that hundreds of Rohingya, a Muslim minority group fleeing persecution in Myanmar, had been detained by the Thai military and towed back out to sea and left to die.

Myanmar denial

"We handed over 62 people who just completed their sentences. Immigration have to wait for doctors' permission to release four more who are in hospital having wounds tended to," Wanchart Wongchaichana, Ranong's governor, said on Saturday.

Myanmar’s military government has denied the Rohingya arriving in Thailand, India and Indonesia recently could not have come from its soil because they are not among its recognised ethnic groups.

The Thai government insists they are not refugees, and should be deported.

According to the UNHCR, at least 230,000 Rohingya now live a precarious stateless existence in Bangladesh alone, having fled their homes in Burma's north-west.

Those who have not fled are restricted from travel inside the country.

The UNHCR has again urged Thailand not to forcibly return the refugees to Myanmar.

On Friday, Amnesty International, a leading human rights group, called on Myanmar to stop persecuting the Rohingya and urged neighbouring countries to meet their humanitarian obligations.

Thailand's military has been accused of towing hundreds of Rohingya out to sea in poorly equipped boats with scant food and water, a charge it has "categorically denied".

'Illegal immigrants'

Abhisit Vejjajiva, Thailand's prime minister, told Al Jazeera: "We will allow the UNHCR to come and observe the way we are dealing with these people and we maintain a policy that we do treat them as illegal migrant workers but we would treat them according to humanitarian principles."

Many of the thousands of stateless Rohingya living in Bangladesh illegally or in
migrant camps say they would rather die than be returned to Myanmar, where they say "only death awaits us".

"Where shall we go?" asked Haji Abdul Motaleb, a leader of the Muslim Rohingya group living in an unofficial camp at Ledha, on the bank of the Naf river along the border between Bangladesh and Myanmar.

"There (in Myanmar) the military junta is ... trying to cleanse the Muslim minority by forcing them from their homes and into hard labour without pay. Rapes, killings and other torture have been rampant," Motaleb told the Reuters news agency.

The accusations surfaced earlier this month after nearly 650 Rohingya were rescued off India and Indonesia, some claiming to have been beaten by Thai soldiers.

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

Community Rohingya Isslam Pro-Democracy Organization(CRIPDO): "Boat people claim Thai mistreatment"

Community Rohingya Isslam Pro-Democracy Organization(CRIPDO): "Boat people claim Thai mistreatment"

Indonesia denies migrants asylum
Indonesia has refused to grant political asylum to 193 migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh who are being held at a navy base after they were found stranded off the country's western coast.

Most of the group identified themselves as the Rohingya - a Muslim ethnic group from Myanmar.

The all-male group of Rohingya Muslims has been held at a naval base in the island of Sabang in the province of Aceh since their wooden boat was found on January 7.

The migrants were found floating in an 11-metre wooden boat without food or water, officials said.

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Hassan Wirajuda, the foreign minister, said on Friday that the people are economic migrants and not political asylum seekers.

But according to Human Rights Watch, more than 250,000 Rohingyas fled Myanmar to Bangladesh in 1992 amid a campaign of persecution and what many have labelled "ethnic cleansing" on the part of the government in Naypyidaw.

Wirajuda also said the Indonesian government is working with their countries of origin and the International Organisation for Migration to properly repatriate the migrants.

But it is not clear if they will be sent to Myanmar or Bangladesh.

Perilous journey

Shortly after their arrival on Sabang, Imam Husen, one of the migrants, told the Reuters news agency from his hospital bed that he and about 580 other people had set off from Mundu in Myanmar in four boats on December 9 to flee the country.

He said some members of the group had been beaten after landing in Thailand.
They were then towed out to sea and set adrift, he said.

According to Wirajuda, citing accounts by the navy, many died on the trip to Indonesia during which they had to stand because the boat was so full.

Imam Husen's testimony corroborates reports from a Rohingya human-rights group and Indian police reports from other Rohingyas found adrift near the Andaman Islands that Thai security forces towed 992 people out to sea and abandoned them in engine-less boats.

The Arakan Project, a Rohingya non-governmental organisation, estimates that 550 of the 992 are missing, feared drowned.

Colonel Manas Kongpan of the Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc) denied on Tuesday any abuse, saying that all the migrants who arrived in Thailand were sent out to sea with food and water.

UN demand

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has asked Thailand for access to 126 Rohingyas it believes are still in custody on a remote island called Koh Sai Daeng.

"[We] welcome the Thai government's willingness to discuss the Rohingya issue on a broad regional basis, because this is a regional issue ... [but] the reason that the Rohingya boat people throw themselves into these small boats and cross the seas on these perilous journeys - the root causes - need to be addressed," Kitty McKinsey, a UNHCR spokeswoman, told Al Jazeera.
Abhisit Vejjajiva, the Thai prime minister, has promised to investigate the allegations and co-operate with the UNHCR, although the refugee body said on Friday that there has been no formal response to their request from Bangkok.

The Thai prime minister also said any Rohingyas in Thailand would be treated as illegal immigrants and repatriated.

"We have to send them back," Vejjajiva said after chairing a National Security Council meeting.

"We are discussing this, which will require briefing ambassadors of various countries to find a solution."

About 28,000 Rohingyas recognised as refugees are living in UNHCR camps in Bangladesh.

"Boat people claim Thai mistreatment"

Thai authorities are grappling with a scandal over alleged mistreatment by soldiers of hundreds of ethnic Rohingyas refugees from Myanmar.

Details are surfacing about the plight of Rohingya boat people who were apparently beaten by Thai soldiers before being towed out to sea.

The allegations, apparently supported by photographs and witness accounts, have dented Thailand's tourist-friendly image.

Some of the migrants managed to reach Indonesia and videos of them arriving on the shore show them to be in a shocking physical condition.

Others are in detention on the Indian islands of Andaman. Two of those held there have spoken of being abused by Thai soldiers.

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Thai admission

Thani Thongpajkdi, the Thai foreign ministry's deputy spokesman, says the Thai authorities did escort the migrants back to sea.

"We are asking the agencies concerned what happened that led to the report, the allegations that came out," he told Al Jazeera.

"The government does not have a policy of treating these people inhumanely, or mistreating them. What we do is, when they arrive in the country, we get them provisions - we get them food, water, medicine, and then we escort them out.

"Of course we're concerned for them but in escorting them out, we ensure that their vessel is seaworthy, we ensure that they have been given enough food, water, etcetera."

Abhisit Vejjajiva, the Thai prime minister, who has repeatedly stated a commitment to human rights and the rule of law, said on Thursday there were "quite a large number" of Rohingya in Thailand but that they were illegal immigrants and had to be "sent back".

Thousands of Bangladeshis and Rohingyas - members of a stateless, Muslim ethnic group that fled to Bangladesh to escape persecution in Myanmar - leave Bangladesh aboard rickety boats each year in hope of finding work in neighbouring countries.

UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, says as many as 230,000 Rohingya Muslims are now living a perilous, stateless existence just over the border in Bangladesh.

In the last three years, one of the most popular migration routes has been by boat to Thailand and then overland to Malaysia.

Migrants' accounts

Reports from survivors who washed up on India's Andaman islands and northwest Indonesia suggest as many as 550 of the 992 towed out to sea by Thai soldiers are dead.

The men were headed from Bangladesh to Thailand when their boats were intercepted around December 27 by Thai naval ships.

In a detailed account of their experience, two survivors rescued by the Indian coastguard have told Arakan Project, a refugees' advocacy group, that they were detained and beaten by Thai authorities on Koh Sai Daen, a remote island in the Andaman Sea.

They were then abandoned in the Indian Ocean in boats with no engines and only a few bags of rice.

Arakan Project provided transcripts of their accounts on Friday to the Associated Press news agency.

'Handfuls of rice'

The migrants told Arakan that they survived on banana leaves and handfuls of rice while they on the remote island and that they were abused by armed guards they thought were from the Thai security forces.
"I was beaten with a stick while collecting banana plants for no reason," said a 20-year-old Bangladeshi, whose identity was concealed by the rights group.

"Other detainees arrested before us also complained they had been beaten without any reason."

The two survivors said they were then rounded up at night along with about 500 others and forced into four rickety boats with no motors.

The boats - each holding 150 people and provided with only a 25kg bag of rice and a few containers of drinking water - were tied to a navy ship and dragged for a day out into the high seas.

"When the sun disappeared in the horizon, they suddenly started cutting the rope that tied each boat to their ship," the Bangladeshi survivor said.

"Then, the navy boat made a U-turn and vanished in the dark of the night. We started drifting in the sea."

The two survivors said their food and water ran out after the first day and that the boat drifted in the open ocean for eight days. It was unclear if any of the 150 migrants on their boat died on the journey.

"We drifted for eight days and then we suddenly saw a hill. None of us was able to move because of severe dehydration and food deficiency," a 23-year-old Rohingya survivor said.

He said they survived for three days on coconuts before the Indian coast guard rescued them and took them to the Andaman islands.

Fate unknown

Fears are also growing over the fate of 126 Rohingya boat people thought to remain in Thai military custody.
But the government says it no longer has any Rohingya migrants within its borders, citing the army's Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc), which admits to overseeing the arrest and detention of the group of Rohingya.

"The latest information that we have from Isoc is that there are no longer any Rohingya left in Thailand," a Thai foreign ministry spokesman said.

He refused to answer repeated questions about the current whereabouts of the 126 and he did not say where, when and how they left the country.

The Isoc colonel at the heart of the abuse allegations has denied any wrongdoing.

The UNHCR asked Thailand on Tuesday to see the 126, most of whom it said were in army custody on an Andaman Sea island.But the government says it no longer has any Rohingya migrants within its borders, citing the army's Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc), which admits to overseeing the arrest and detention of the group of Rohingya.

"The latest information that we have from Isoc is that there are no longer any Rohingya left in Thailand," a Thai foreign ministry spokesman said.

He refused to answer repeated questions about the current whereabouts of the 126 and he did not say where, when and how they left the country.

The Isoc colonel at the heart of the abuse allegations has denied any wrongdoing.

The UNHCR asked Thailand on Tuesday to see the 126, most of whom it said were in army custody on an Andaman Sea island.

The office in Bangkok said on Friday it was still waiting for a formal response to its request, which was made on Tuesday.


The office in Bangkok said on Friday it was still waiting for a formal response to its request, which was made on Tuesday. >>> Relly History Video This News

New UNHCR Head Meets With Refugee Leaders, Assures Greater Dialogue

KUALA LUMPUR, 18 February 2009 (UNHCR) – New UNHCR Representative Alan Vernon met with some 50 refugee group representatives, here on Friday. This marks his first large-scale public meeting with these communities since becoming head of the UNHCR Office in Malaysia four months ago.

In his address, Alan Vernon assured refugee communities of greater dialogue and cooperation between them and his Agency in order to find solutions to the issues and concerns they face.

“UNHCR values your role as leaders. Not only do you help organise your communities so that the members can better help themselves, but you represent their concerns to organisations like UNHCR,” said Vernon to the group. “We hope to continue this meaningful dialogue with you.”

Unlike smaller community meetings held in the past, this consultation demarked itself by involving individuals from many different communities.

“What was most significant about this meeting, was the fact that refugees of several nationalities and ethnic groups came together to discuss their concerns,” said Vernon. “Not only were there representatives from most of the Myanmar refugee communities, for the first time there were also representation from the Somali and Sri Lankan groups.”

“For me, this meeting was a good way of getting to know the representatives of the refugee groups we interact with on a daily basis,” said Vernon. “It was also an opportunity for community leaders to voice their concerns to us and share information with other refugee groups.”

Sri Lankan refugee Ravindran, a representative from the Society for Displaced Refugees, described the event as being very useful.

“We don’t always know if our messages are being passed on to the Representative,” he said. “Here is a face to face chance with officials; we know that we’re being understood.”

These feeling were echoed by L Mya Yin, a community leader from the Organization of Karenni Development. She explained that participating in such a forum made her want to connect with non-Myanmar communities to better understand the larger refugee situation in Malaysia and what else could be done.

“I’m interested in contacting other communities so we can exchange. I wonder if they have the same problems as us? Does RELA cause them as many problems, what do they do to stop it?”

Responding to questions with his customary candidness, Vernon explained that UNHCR was working to improve the conditions of refugees in Malaysia, but that outside factors often prevented a quick resolution of problems.

“We are continuously working to prevent arrests, to regularize status of refugees and to speed up the registration process,” said Vernon. “In regard to registration, for example, over 17,000 new cases were registered last year. That’s a 23 percent increase over the previous year. We expect the same in 2009.”

The UNHCR head concluded by addressing the often contentious subject of resettlement. He explained that UNHCR would pursue all new possibilities to expand the programme, but asked for understanding and patience regarding the likelihood of significant improvements in the short term.

“The reality is that we resettled 6,000 people last year, which is roughly 10 percent of the global resettlement number in 2008,” said Vernon. “I would like to be able to say that everyone who wants to be resettled will be. But the reality is that we can’t do that. What we can do, however, is work with you and with other partners to help improve your lives while you are here.

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United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Address: 570, Jalan Bukit Petaling, 50460 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Telephone: (603) 2141 1322
Fax: (603) 2141 1780
Email: mlslu@unhcr.org

Myanmar offers to take Rohingya boat people back with conditions

Submitted by Mohit Joshi on Fri, 02/27/2009 - 10:22. FeaturedThailand
Cha-am, Thailand - Myanmar's junta has tentatively offered to screen Rohingya refugees for repatriation on the condition that they admit they are of Bengali descent and have fixed addresses in Myanmar, the Thai foreign minister said Friday.

"If they can prove they are from Bangladesh and lived in Myanmar, then they are ready to take back these people," Kasit Piromya said.

Myanmar Foreign Minister Nyan Win made the proposal at an informal dinner of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Thursday night in Cha-am, a beach resort 130 kilometres south-west of Bangkok.

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The Rohingya are a Muslim minority group who have lived in Myanmar's Arakan state for generations. They have been denied citizenship by Myanmar's military regime on the grounds that they are not on the government's list of 131 recognized ethnic minority groups and are rather deemed immigrants from Bangladesh.

For the Rohingya to admit they are Bengali would deny their special ethnic status in Myanmar.

There are about 800,000 Rohingya living in Arkaan state, where they are denied the right to own property, work and travel freely and are frequently subject to persecution. Without owning property, it would be difficult for the Rohingya to prove they have lived in Myanmar.

About 200,000 others live in refugee camps in neighbouring Bangladesh, and thousands of others work abroad, mostly illegally in Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia.

The Rohingya have recently risen as a regional priority after the Thai military was criticized for pushing back about 1,000 Rohingya refugees from Thailand's southern shores in December, leaving them at sea in boats without engines and insufficient food and water.

Some of the boat people were rescued by the Indonesian Navy off the coast of Aceh, where they told officials they were rounded up and beaten by Thai military personnel. The remaining Rohingya remained missing.

The issue of what to do with the Rohingya boat people has been kept off the official agenda for the 14th ASEAN Summit in Cha-am this weekend, but it was discussed informally on the sidelines of the foreign ministers meeting.

Myanmar tentatively agreed to allow the ASEAN Secretariat to play a role in the screening process, Kasit said.

Myanmar also agreed to send a delegation to attend the Bali Process meeting in Bali on April 14 to 15 when the Rohingya issue is to be discussed.

The Bali Proccess, created in 2002, brings participants together to work on measures to help combat people-smuggling and related transnational crimes in the region.

Thailand has insisted that the Rohingya issue be solved regionally with participation from the concerned countries, which include Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar and Thailand.

ASEAN's members are Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. >>> More