More on forcible repatriation

Reuters photo of an earlier 2010 entry of Burmese to Thailand, fleeing fighting there.

A few days ago, PPT posted on the Abhisit Vejjajiva government’s continued forcible repatriation of border crossers, including those fleeing fighting in Burma. In that post we linked to a report in The Irrawaddy. The government’s abysmal reputation in this area gets worse and worse.

This is reinforced in a report sourced to AFP that states that the UNHCR, the UN refugees agency, has “raised concerns over Thailand’s move to forcibly return a group of displaced Myanmar nationals on Christmas day, saying that conditions were not met for safe returns.” In a statement, it said it was “concerned over the circumstances of the return of some 166 Myanmar nationals seeking temporary protection from Thailand on 25 December…”. The group expelled included 50 women and over 70 children.

The UNHCR appealed “to the Royal Thai Government that returns should take place on a strictly voluntary basis, and only when conditions are in place to return in safety and dignity…. These conditions were not met on December 25…. In the past few weeks, UNHCR had already expressed its concern to the Royal Thai Government over the hasty manner in which some returns took place, where some persons returned home only to have to flee again when fighting resumed shortly afterwards…”.

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