[Tlc] TL-2 Hmong Stories

[justinm at ucr.edu]

2007-0820 - Reuters - UNHCR calls for Lao Hmong refugees to be
released after hunger strike

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/UNHCR/c9475bda016cb928302a769ddf2bf55d.htm

Reuters AlertNet

UNHCR calls for Lao Hmong refugees to be released after hunger
strike
20 Aug 2007 11:50:58 GMT
Source: UNHCR

Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of
this article or for any external internet sites. The views
expressed are the author's alone.

Monday 20 August, 2007

GENEVA – The UN refugee agency is relieved that 149 Hmong
refugees held in a detention center in Thailand have now
called off their hunger strike, but the agency remains alarmed
at their living conditions and their health and wellbeing.
UNHCR calls on the Thai government to release them – all
recognized refugees – from detention.

The Lao Hmong began their strike last Thursday at the Nong
Khai Immigration Detention Center in a protest over the
deteriorating conditions under which they have been held since
early December last year. After a UNHCR team visited and
counseled them on Sunday evening, they began taking food
again. Among the 149 recognized refugees are 90 children,
including some babies born in the detention centre which is
run by the Thai Immigration Ministry.

"We are alarmed and deeply concerned about the steadily
deteriorating detention conditions of the refugees over the
last weeks," said Janet Lim, Director of UNHCR's Bureau for
Asia and the Pacific. "They are being held in truly inhumane
conditions – including innocent children – confined to two
small cells into which daylight does not even shine and they
are not allowed to leave." They also have no water source
other than a water tap in the cells.

"There is absolutely no reason for these 149 people to be
detained, especially as other countries have come forward and
offered them resettlement places if they are only allowed to
leave Thailand," Lim added. "They have committed no crime; on
the contrary, they have been recognized as refugees in need of
international protection. It is particularly disturbing to us
that young children and babies are being subjected to these
deplorable conditions."

The group was rounded up for deportation in Bangkok on 17
November 2006. After UNHCR intervened, the deportation was
called off and the group was transferred on 8 December to the
Nong Khai detention centre on the border with Laos. Thai
authorities attempted to deport them on 30 January 2007, but
backed down when the refugees put up fierce resistance.

Since then, UNHCR has been urging Thai authorities to release
the refugees. "We appreciate the assurances given by the Thai
government that these 149 will not be deported, but now we
need to move forward to end their detention, particularly as
there is a solution at hand," Lim said.

UNHCR is also concerned about conditions faced by other asylum
seekers and refugees in detention in Thailand, particularly as
children are also in custody.

UNHCR continues to urge the Thai Government to conclude its
discussions on a screening mechanism which meets international
standards that would allow the proper identification of
different needs and claims concerning all asylum seekers on
its territory.

UNHCR news

URL:
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/UNHCR/c9475bda016cb928302a769ddf2bf55d.htm

2007-0817 - VOA - Lao Hmongs in Thailand Insist They Do Have
CIA Links

http://www.voanews.com/lao/2007-08-17-voa3.cfm


Lao Hmongs in Thailand Insist They Do Have CIA Links
By Songrit PhonNgern
17/08/2007

Songrit PhonNgern reports in Lao, 867 KB audio clip
Listen to Songrit PhonNgern reports in Lao, 867 KB audio clip

Members of the Hmong refugees in Ban Huay Nam Khao, Thailand,
assert that they did have CIA connections, in response to the
Lao government spokesman's remark that they had lied in hope
of being accepted for resettlement by the United States or
other third countries.

Meng Ly Yang, who has been living in Ban Huay Nam Khao since
2006, said his father had worked for the CIA and American
troops, as had the parents of some 2,000 of his fellow Hmongs
who are currently liding in the jungles of Laos, hiding from
government troops and as a result facing famine and starvation.

He calls on the United Nations and the international community
to demand that the Lao government stop its oppression of those
Hmongs.

______________
Dr. Justin McDaniel
Dept. of Religious Studies
2617 Humanities Building
University of California, Riverside
Riverside, CA 92521
951-827-4530
justinm at ucr.edu