Thailand begins Hmong deportations

Thailand intends to send back 8,000 Hmong backto Laos under a repatriation pact [AFP]

Source: Al Jazeera and agencies

Thailand has started sending Hmong asylum seekers back to neighbouring Laos, where they fear political persecution.

Twelve Hmong were removed from a camp in Thailand's Petchabun province on Thursday.

The camp is estimated to hold nearly 8,000 Hmong from Laos, most of whom say they fear for their safety in their communist homeland.

Aid agency witnesses say they were sent back against their will, but Thailand insists they went voluntarily.

The deportations began as Samak Sundaravej, the new Thai prime minister, made his first official visit to Laos on Friday to discuss energy deals as well as the fate of thousands of Hmong.

Under a Laos-Thai repatriation pact, the Thai government is to send nearly 8,000 Hmong back to Laos.

According to the Thai military supreme command's border affairs office, which manages the Petchabun camp, the 12 volunteered to go back to Laos as a goodwill gesture prior to Sundaravej's visit.

Aid group's concerns

But the UN refugee agency is concerned about the repatriation because of reports that they were sent back involuntarily, a spokeswoman said on Friday.

"The Hmong people
- The Hmong have been living in Laos for more than 100 years
More than 200,000 Hmong have fled Laos since 1975
- Thailand has initially taken in some Hmong into camps for resettlement or repatriation

About 90 per cent of Hmong refugees have been resettled in the US"

Doctors Without Borders said the separation from her children suggested that her return was not voluntary.

The displacement of Hmong is a legacy of the Vietnam War.

During the 1960s and '70s, the US Central Intelligence Agency recruited Hmong fighters in Laos to attack neighbouring Vietnam's communist forces and their supply lines.

After the conflict ended in 1975, many who fought on the American side fled Laos, fearing persecution.

International monitors have been barred from the country but the Laos government says the Hmong will be safe.

Detention woes

In a recent incident, Hmong secretly filmed themselves locked up in the Nong Khai immigration detention centre.

Up to 153 people were filmed crammed in a temporary holding cell since December 2006. More than half were children.

They had staged hunger strikes, and some were threatening to kill themselves if they were not released soon.

Some 15 months ago, Thai immigration raided a poor suburb of the capital, Bangkok, along the Bang Sue Canal. They rounded up more than 150 Hmong.

At the time, most were carrying UNHCR refugee certificates.

The group was sent to prison despite having their UNHCR special status.

Several countries have agreed to take them, yet every day they wait to hear their fate.

Since then, hundreds of Hmong have fled the area.