Last Tuesday afternoon, the Thai Navy
stopped a fishing boat off the coast of the holiday island of Phuket. It
wasn’t a routine procedure however – naval officers couldn’t board the
rickety looking craft because there wasn’t room for them to stand on it.
Every single inch of it was packed with desperate human beings from neighbouring Burma.
In video filmed by a local newspaper you
can see 205 men and boys begging for assistance from naval personnel.
Their pleading — and their tears went unanswered though. The Thais
tossed them a couple of canisters of drinking water and ordered them to
sail south, towards Malaysia. It’s better known in these parts as a
‘push-back’ – a pitiless decision made in face of great human misery.
The people on board this luckless vessel were Muslim Rohingya – and there are thousands of them now fleeing persecution and ethnic conflict in
Burma’s north-west. The vast majority of Rohingya see Thailand as their
best bet — either as a place to settle – or a temporary home before
moving on to Malaysia or Indonesia.
Yet the Thais cannot decide what to do with the Rohingya and there is
growing evidence of a massive split developing within government - the
country’s military for example, seems to be acting wholly independently of its civilian masters.
Eight days ago, the Thai government convened a special
inter-departmental meeting where it was decided that Rohingya arriving
in the country would be offered temporary shelter for six months:
Here’s how the Bangkok Post reported it:
“Thailand will shelter Royingya for six months and seek talks with
Myanmar (Burma) and other countries to settle the fate of the illegal
migrants, Foreign Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul said on Friday.
The decision was reached in talks between the Foreign Ministry and
other security agencies amid growing calls for Thailand not to turn the
migrants away after they have entered the kingdom.”
On Tuesday however — the same day 205 people were ‘pushed-back’ off
Phuket — the National Security Chief, Paradorn Pattanathaburt, announced
that the Thai military will ‘no longer’ allow the Rohingya to land in
Thailand. One day later, another 140 Rohingya were turned away from
waters near the port of Ranong.
These two ‘decisions’ — letting Rohingya stay for six months – or
pushing them back — are completely contradictory and suggest a major
divergence of opinion within the Thai government. Civil rights groups go
further, suggesting the Thai military may be actively trying to
undermine the government by engaging in these ‘push-backs’:
Here’s what Phil Robertson from Human Rights Watch has to say: “The
problem is the Thai security forces have not changed their view that
these helpless Rohingya, arriving with nothing more than the clothes on
their backs, are somehow a national security threat to Thailand.”
On Thursday I conducted an exclusive interview with Secretary-General
Paradorn and I put it to him that Thailand’s position on the arrival of
Rohingya was confused. He disagreed with my assertion; “it is not a
conflicting policy at the operational level. We are still trying to stop
them and push them back. But if we can’t send them back right away,
we’ll detain them for a period of time, like six months.”
I asked Secretary General Paradorn to outline the particular
circumstances when the military decides not to send boats with Rohingya
back to sea. “When we are unable send them back to their country of
origin or on to another country,” he replied.
If the military was applying this rational consistently however, all
Rohingya would be given temporary leave to remain in Thailand because
the occupants of all these boats are in the same position – no Rohingya
can be sent back to Burma (because the Burmese won’t let them back) and
no ‘third-country’ has volunteered to take them. So why is the Thai Navy
engaing in ‘push-backs’?
The best way to understand what is happening here is to focus on
which branch of the Thai government makes initial contact with the
vessels. If the Thai Navy gets there first, in all likelihood they will
be sent back to sea. If another government department is called in –
like the marine police for example, there is a good chance they will be
allowed to stay (and that is exactly what took place in our film shot in
the town of Karaburi).
This arrangement — if that’s the word for it – is arbitrary and
unfair. It seems incredible to put it this way but the chances of
survival for many Rohingya may depend on who comes out to meet them when
they enter Thai waters.
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http://blogs.channel4.com/world-news-blog/push-back-the-desperate-search-for-refuge-in-thailand/23592
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