More than 140,000 refugees will be forced back to war-torn Burma unless Thailand’s Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva shows a rare bit of backbone in dealing with his country’s increasingly powerful security forces. Last week, the nation’s head of security announced its intention to close nine refugee camps along the Thai-Burma border after elections were held in Burma last fall. The announcement drew sharp criticism from human rights groups and representatives of Burma’s ethnic minorities who said the refugees would face persecution, torture, rape and worse if sent back to Burma under current conditions. “Burma is still a dangerous place — too dangerous for the refugees to return,” says Sunai Phasuk of Human Rights Watch
Thailand has served as a safe haven for refugees from neighboring countries for four decades, sheltering hundreds of thousands over the years, from Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and, most recently, Burma. Ethnic Karen, Shan, Mon and others have been spilling into Thailand since the 1980s when Burma’s military regime began launching a brutal series of armed campaigns to bring ethnic regions fighting for autonomy under its control. The Burmese military has a documented record of burning villages, torture, rape, summary executions, forcing villagers to serve as porters for soldiers and to work in other forms of slave labor.
