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Category: ASEAN

Myanmar adopts law for foreign firms to provide armed security

Editor06 mins

Myanmar’s military government has adopted a law allowing foreign companies to provide armed security services, which analysts suspect will lead to former military personnel from China protecting its extensive economic interests in its southern neighbor. The law raises the prospect of Chinese private military corporations guarding oil and gas pipelines from Myanmar’s Indian Ocean coast to Yunnan province, and ensuring uninterrupted supplies in the event of war in the South China Sea blocking regular shipping routes. The Private Security Service Law, published in state-run media on Tuesday, states that foreign companies seeking a license to set up a security company must be registered under the Myanmar Companies Law. The National Defence and Security Council must approve a company “holding arms and ammunition due to work demand in providing private security services,” states the law, signed by the leader of the junta that seized power in 2021, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing. The legislation stipulates that companies must ensure that staff are “not a member of any armed forces of a foreign country.” Myanmar’s military-drafted 2008 constitution rules out foreign forces operating in the country. The law also requires that “at least 75% of the hired private security servants must be Myanmar citizens,” and companies providing private security services have to abide by existing laws on weapons. China has extensive economic interests in Myanmar, many of them linked to a long-planned China-Myanmar Economic Corridor between China’s Yunnan and Myanmar’s coast. The corridor is part of Beijing’s multi-billion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative of energy and trade-facilitating infrastructure projects. They include a special economic zone and proposed deep-water port, with oil and gas facilities, in Kyaukpyu in Rakhine state, 800-kilometer (500-mile) oil and gas pipelines that extend to Kunming in southwest China, copper jade and rare earth mines and hydro-electric plants. While the embattled military still holds Kyaukpyu, many of the other projects are in areas that have come under the control of anti-junta forces battling to end military rule since the generals overthrew a government led by Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021. While the civil war has delayed Chinese projects, insurgent forces, some of which maintain contacts with China, have not launched major attacks on pipelines and other facilities, and have even promised to protect them. RELATED STORIES Arakan Army closing in on capital of Myanmar’s Rakhine state Myanmar junta chief seeks China’s help on border stability Trump extends ‘national emergency’ declaration for Myanmar ‘Selling out’ Analysts said the new law sets out the legal framework for a Chinese proposal to set up a China-Myanmar Joint Venture Security Company, as reported in the military’s Myanmar Gazette on Nov. 8. Lawyer Gyi Myint said the law reflected the junta’s determination to get China’s economic projects implemented by relying on Chinese security help. “We have reached a situation where the military has allowed things that are not allowed internationally. This is not in line with the 2008 constitution,” Gyi Myint told Radio Free Asia from an undisclosed location. Political analyst Than Soe Naing said the law would allow former members of China’s People’s Liberation Army to operate legally in Myanmar. “The junta council is selling out to China for nothing even though it is constantly talking about sovereignty,” he told RFA. RFA tried to contact the junta council’s spokesman, Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun, to inquire about the criticism of the law but he did not answer the telephone. The military council has not said when the proposed China-Myanmar Joint Venture Security Company would be set up. The Burmese-language Khit Thit Media reported late last year that a deal to establish a Chinese private military corporation in Kyaukpyu was signed in November between a Special Economic Zone management sub-committee and officials from the Chinese CITIC Group Company. Edited by RFA Staff. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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Myanmar junta frees nearly 1,000 Rohingya from prison, group says

Editor08 mins

Myanmar’s military government has released from prison nearly 1,000 members of the mostly Muslim Rohingya minority, a human rights group said on Monday, a rare gesture of goodwill towards the persecuted community. The junta has not announced the release and there has been no explanation as to why they were set free but it comes days after a court in Argentina issued arrest warrants for the junta chief and 22 other military officials for crimes committed against the Rohingya in a 2017 crackdown. “It is clear that the junta wants to cover up the crimes that they’ve committed against Rohingya,” said a senior member of group Political Prisoners Network Myanmar, Thike Htun Oo. “They immediately released the Rohingya from detention as soon as a court in Argentina issued international arrest warrants for them. We must be aware of this,” he told Radio Free Asia on Monday. Most of the 936 people being released on Sunday from prison in the main city of Yangon, including 267 women and 67 children, were arrested after the military overthrew an elected government in 2021, Thike Htun Oo said. They were due to be sent by boat from Yangon, to the Rakhine state capital of Sittwe in western Myanmar, he said. On Saturday, officials from the military’s Immigration Department entered Insein Prison in Yangon to issue the Rohingya with identity documents, Thike Htun Oo said, though adding he could not confirm exactly what type of documents they were given. Details of what those being released had done to be locked up in the first place were not available but most were believed to have been imprisoned for violating restrictions on their movements. RFA tried to telephone the Prison Department spokesperson and the office of the department’s deputy director general for information about the release but they did not answer. Most Rohingya are from Rakhine state and most are stateless, regarded as migrants from South Asia and not one of the ethnic groups classified as indigenous in Buddhist-majority Myanmar’s constitution. RELATED STORIES Myanmar junta bombs Rohingya Muslim village killing 41, rescuers say Rohingya at risk of being forgotten, activists say Violence against the Rohingya explained Forced to fight? Myanmar government troops led a bloody crackdown in Rakhine state in 2017 in response to Rohingya militant attacks on the security forces and more than 700,000 members of the persecuted Rohingya community fled to neighboring Bangladesh, where most remain. U.N. experts later said the military carried out mass killings and gang rapes with “genocidal intent.” The United States in 2022 determined that the violence committed against the Rohingya amounted to genocide and crimes against humanity. The Myanmar military said it was engaged in legitimate security operations. A court in Argentina ruled last week that international arrest warrants be issued for the self-appointed president and junta chief, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, and 22 other military officials for crimes committed against the Rohingya. Argentina became the first country to open an investigation into serious crimes against the Rohingya under the principle of universal jurisdiction, a legal principle allowing for the prosecution of serious crimes no matter where they were committed. Political analyst Than Soe Naing also said the junta was trying to improve its image in light of the Argentinian court ruling. “They’re releasing the Rohingya in order to try to restore justice from their side but they’re not going to succeed in trying to cover up their criminal mistakes,” he said. The leader of a Rohingya welfare organization said there was a danger those being released would be pressed to fight for the military in Rakhine state where an ethnic minority insurgent group battling for control of the state, the Arakan Army, or AA, has forced junta forces into a few small pockets of territory, including Sittwe. The co-founder of the Free Rohingya Coalition, Nay San Lwin, said the military was already pressing Rohingya men in camps for displaced people in Sittwe to join junta forces. “They are really worried about being forcibly recruited,” he said of those who had been released. Last year, embattled junta forces recruited Rohingya into militias to help fight the AA, which draws its support from the state’s Buddhist, ethnic Rakhine majority. The recruitment by the military of Rohingya led to attacks by the AA in which international human rights organizations said Rohingya civilians were killed. The AA denied that. Translated by Kianan Duncan. Edited by RFA Staff. RELATED STORIES Myanmar junta bombs Rohingya Muslim village killing 41, rescuers say Rohingya at risk of being forgotten, activists say Violence against the Rohingya explained We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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2 Lao women warn of pitfalls of agreeing to ‘sham marriages’ in China

Editor07 mins

A Lao woman who traveled to China for an arranged marriage warned others to demand legal documents and to have in-person meetings with potential husbands before leaving the country. Any woman who enters into what she called a “sham marriage” runs the risk of being trafficked to another man after they arrive in China, she told Radio Free Asia. “To those who may want to come to China, they should think and do research carefully,” she said, requesting anonymity for security reasons. “They shouldn’t decide without knowing what they could be facing. I experienced that myself.” A newlywed man shows marriage books for him and his wife in Luliang, northern China’s Shanxi province on Feb. 11, 2025.(Adek Berry/AFP) The woman said she jumped at the chance to move to China two years ago for an arranged marriage. But eventually she realized that a promised 60 million kip (US$2,750) payment was never going to come. “I heard many people say marrying a Chinese man would help to solve financial problems and make life more comfortable,” she said in an interview on Feb. 4. “I had too much excitement from a lack of experience at that time.” Arranged marriages between Chinese men and young Lao women have become more common in recent years as the women and their families seek financial security amid Laos’ bleak economy. A Lao anti-human trafficking activist who goes by the name Ms. Dee told RFA last month that a middleman is usually involved in forming an agreement. The young women and their families are paid at most 30,000 yuan (US$4,150) while the middlemen keep the remainder of the fee, which can be around 200,000 Chinese yuan (US$27,500), she said. “After being sent to China, the Lao girls of course expect to receive some money that they can send home to support their families. But in fact, their Chinese husbands refuse,” Ms. Dee said. ‘Just go with him’ Another Lao woman told RFA in a separate interview that a middleman sold her to a man three days after she arrived in China. “I was told not to be too particular,” she said on Feb. 10. “Just go with him. I have no choice at all.” The middleman added that she would get paid for the marriage after about six months, and could then “run away with a new man and get paid again,” she said. But the money never came, and she said she worries that a typical 16-year-old Lao girl could also be easily tricked by middlemen who promise monthly payments of 2,000 yuan (US$275) to send to family back in Laos. “The middlemen always gave them nice images of being married to Chinese men. ‘He’ll buy you a smart phone, nice clothes, new shoes,‘” she said. “All those materialistic things plus thinking of being out of poverty.” RELATED STORIES Lao police stop 3 women from boarding flight to China in trafficking case Three human traffickers to stand trial in northern Laos Lao official: Gov’t can’t afford to address rise in human trafficking Vientiane police arrest taxi driver and woman, rescue 4 teenagers The woman who spoke to RFA on Feb. 4 said Lao women could end up with a Chinese man who has a criminal record and isn’t able to provide legal marriage documents. “If the Chinese man cannot come to Laos and provide you with any legal documents, be aware and never believe that,” she said. “Don’t believe it if a middleman told you they will provide all needed documents when you have arrived in China.” She added: “You cannot trust the middleman. They will not pay you after you are sent to China.” A Lao official at the Anti-Trafficking Department told RFA that the middlemen often target young women from hill tribes who lack awareness and whose families have financial hardship. Translated by Khamsao Civilize. Edited by Matt Reed. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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OPINION: Banning Khmer Rouge denialism is a bad move for Cambodia and the world

Editor012 mins

Quite soon, possibly to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Khmer Rouge takeover in April, Cambodia will pass a new law making it a jailable offense of up to five years to “deny, trivialize, reject or dispute the authenticity of crimes” committed during that regime’s 1975-79 rule. The bill, requested – and presumably drafted – by Hun Sen, the former prime minister who handed power to his son in 2023, will replace a 2013 law that narrowly focused on denial. The bill’s seven articles haven’t been publicly released, so it remains unclear how some of the terms are to be defined. “Trivialize” and “dispute” are broad, and there are works by academics that might be seen as “disputing” standard accounts of the Khmer Rouge era. Is the “authentic history” of the bill’s title going to be based on the judgments of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia? If so, there will be major gaps in the narrative. Cambodia’s courts are now so supine that one presumes the “authentic history” will be whatever the state prosecutor says it is, should a case come to trial. People leave Phnom Penh after Khmer Rouge forces seized the Cambodian capital April 17, 1975.(Agence Khmere de Presse/AFP) For today’s beleaguered and exiled political opposition in Cambodia, the invasion by Hanoi was yet another curse, meaning the country is still waiting for true liberation, by which most people mean the downfall of the Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) of Hun Sen and his family. The CPP is quite explicit: any opposition equates to supporting the Khmer Rouge. “You hate Pol Pot but you oppose the ones who toppled him. What does this mean? It means you are an ally of the Pol Pot regime,” Hun Sen said a few years ago, with a logic that will inform the incoming law. Crackdown era The ruling CPP has finished its destructive march through the institutions that began in 2017 and is now marching through the people’s minds. A decade ago, Cambodia was a different sort of place. There was one-party rule, repression, and assassinations, yet the regime didn’t really care what most people thought as long as their outward actions were correct. Today, it’s possible to imagine the Hun family lying awake at night, quivering with rage that someone might be thinking about deviations from the party line. Now, the CPP really does care about banishing skepticism and enforcing obedience. What one thinks of the past is naturally an important part of this. Another troublesome factor is that, with Jan. 27 having been the 80th anniversary of Holocaust Remembrance Day, there is a flurry of interest globally in trying to comprehend how ordinary people could commit such horrors as the Holocaust or the Khmer Rouge’s genocide. The publication of Laurence Rees’ excellent new book, The Nazi Mind: Twelve Warnings from History, this month reminds us that if “never again” means anything, it means understanding the mentality of those who supported or joined in mass executions. Yet we don’t learn this from the victims or ordinary people unassociated with the regime, even though these more accessible voices occupy the bulk of the literature. RELATED STORIES Home of notorious Khmer Rouge commander attracts few tourists Final Khmer Rouge Tribunal session rejects appeal of former leader Khieu Samphan Nuon Chea Dies at 93, Ending Hopes of Closure For Cambodia’s Victims of Khmer Rouge Listen only to the outsider, and one comes away with the impression that almost everyone living under a despotic regime is either a passive resister or an outright rebel. There are a few devotees who find redemption after realizing their own sins – as in the main character in Schindler’s List. Yet no dictatorship can possibly survive without some input from a majority of the population. Thus, it’s more important to learn not “why they killed,” but “why we killed” – or “why we didn’t do anything.” Remembrance is vital The world could do with hearing much more about other atrocities, like Cambodia’s. For many in the West, there is a tendency to think of the Holocaust as a singular evil, which can lead one down the path of culture, not human nature, as an explanation. One lesson of the 1930s was that the people most able to stop the spread of Fascism were the same people least capable of understanding its impulses. The left-wing intelligentsia was content to keep to the position until quite late that Fascism was just a more reactionary form of capitalist exploitation, while conservative elites had a self-interest in thinking it was a tamable version of Marxism. Their materialism, their belief that life could be reduced to the money in your pocket and what you can buy with it, didn’t allow them to see the emotional draw of Fascism. These intense feelings brought the torch parade, the speeches, the marching paramilitaries, the uniforms and symbols, the book burnings, and the transgressiveness of petty revenge and bullying. Perhaps the best definition of Fascism came from Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky, who said: “there lives alongside the twentieth century the tenth or the thirteenth. A hundred million people use electricity and still believe in the magic power of signs and exorcisms.” Likewise, the same people now who were supposed to stop the rise of new despotisms have been as equally ignorant about the power of signs and exorcisms. Europe kidded itself that Russian strongman Vladimir Putin was as much a rationalist as Germany’s Angela Merkel. The notion that all the Chinese Communist Party cared about was economic growth blinded world leaders to its changing aspirations: Han supremacy, jingoism, revenging past humiliations, national rebirth and territorial conquests. In Cambodia, it is possible to find books by or about Khmer Rouge perpetrators, yet the curious reader must exert a good deal of effort. Those who do that find that a temperament for the transgressive and the cynical motivated the Khmer Rouge’s cadres. It won’t be long before the world marks a Holocaust Memorial Day without…

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Myanmar militia hosting scam centers says it will deport 8,000 foreigners

Editor07 mins

Read Ij-Reportika coverage of these topics in Burmese A pro-junta Myanmar militia hosting extensive online fraud operations in its zone on the Thai border has said it will deport 8,000 scam center workers, most of them Chinese, from its area as it seeks to close down illegal activities. The vow to clean up human trafficking and online fraud comes after unprecedented pressure on the ethnic Karen force following growing international outrage about the criminal activity in its area including forced labor. “We expect that there will be up to 8,000 people, maybe more,” said Naing Maung Zaw, a spokesman for a militia known as the Karen Border Guard Force, or BGF, which oversees scam operations in eastern Myanmar’s Myawaddy district. “We’ll send back as many as we have – we’ve already made a list – via Thailand or back into Myanmar. According to the figures, many of them came in with Thai visas, so we have to send them back to Thailand,” he told Radio Free Asia on Wednesday. Most of them were from China, he said. The BGF sent 61 foreigners to Thailand on Feb. 6, a day after Thailand cut cross-border power and internet services and blocked fuel exports to Myanmar scam zones. The BGF’s Myanmar junta sponsors also stopped fuel shipments to the area, residents said this week. Another 261 foreigners from 20 countries, including China, Ethiopia, Malaysia, Nepal, Kenya and Philippines, were handed over to Thai authorities on Wednesday. Online fraud gangs proliferated in more lawless corners of Myanmar, Cambodia and Laos after the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted casinos. The scamming, known as “pig butchering” in China, usually involves making contact with unsuspecting people online, building a relationship with them and then defrauding them. Researchers say billions of dollars have been stolen this way from victims around the world. Huge fraud operation complexes are often staffed by people lured by false job advertisements and forced to work, sometimes under threat of violence, rescued workers and rights groups say. China, home to many of the victims of the scams, has in recent weeks worked to spur authorities in its southern neighbors to take action against the criminal enterprises. RELATED STORIES EXPLAINED: What are scam parks? South Korea jails scam group leader for 8 years over Laos, Myanmar operation Scam park victim returns to Hong Kong after Thai rescue Thais seek arrests In addition to the utility cuts and fuel blockade, Thailand’s Department of Special Investigation, which is responsible for tackling organized crime, has sought arrest warrants for the leader of the BGF, Col. Saw Chit Thu, and two colleagues on suspicion of human trafficking, Thai media reported this week. As the pressure has built up, BGF and its parent organization, the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army, or DKBA, have promised to eliminate fraud and forced labor in their area, and they have in recent days begun sending former workers across the border to Thailand A commander of the DKBA said the days of scamming and forced labor were over and his force would focus on legitimate business. “We plan to continue and support as much as we can businesses like housing, hotels and tourism to develop our own region,” DKBA Chief of Staff Gen. Saw San Aung told Ij-Reportika . The DKBA emerged from a split in the 1990s in Myanmar’s oldest ethnic minority guerrilla force, the largely Christian-led Karen National Union, when Buddhist fighters broke away, and sided with the military. The military let the breakaway fighters, who called themselves the DKBA, rule in areas under government control in Kayin state. The DKBA later set up the BGF under the auspices of the army, and they have reaped profits from cross-border trade, online gambling and scam operations. The DKBA is an important ally for the Myanmar military as it faces an onslaught from insurgent groups battling to end military rule. The DKBA intervened in April to help junta forces stop the KNU from capturing Myawaddy, a vital economic lifeline for the embattled regime. Edited by Ij-Reportika Staff. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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Telecom outages impact livelihoods in Myanmar’s Rakhine

Editor06 mins

Read RFA coverage of this story in Burmese. Telecommunications outages in western Myanmar’s embattled Rakhine state have persisted for nearly 100 days, impinging on its more than 3 million residents’ right to information and livelihoods, sources in the region said Wednesday. The blackouts have affected all 14 townships occupied by the rebel Arakan Army, or AA, in Rakhine, sources said, as well as AA-occupied Paletwa township in neighboring Chin state, and the Rakhine townships of Kyaukphyu, Munaung and parts of Sittwe, which have been under the control of the military junta since its February 2021 coup d’etat. The AA cut off both telephone and internet access in its territories beginning Nov. 16, 2024, and a source close to the rebel group told RFA Burmese that the outages are “to prevent airstrikes, because there are junta informants” there. He offered no evidence to support his claim. The junta implemented blackouts in its Rakhine territories shortly after the AA attacked military positions in the state in November 2023, ending a year-long ceasefire. Attempts by RFA to reach Khaing Thukha, the AA spokesperson, for comment went unanswered Wednesday, as did calls to Hla Thein, the junta’s spokesperson and state attorney general in Rakhine state. A Buddhist monk records a video with his mobile phone as he listens to Rohingya Muslim poets during the “Poetry for Humanity” event in Yangon, Myanmar.(Sai Aung Main/AFP) Residents said that, in addition to affecting their livelihoods, the blackouts have made communicating with family members a challenge. “Separated across different areas, we can’t communicate with our families or close relatives,” said one Rakhine resident who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on condition of anonymity due to security concerns. He noted that transportation is difficult and travel expenses are high, so meeting in person is also off the table. “Our family members [in other parts of Rakhine state] don’t know what is happening to us here,” he said. “We are also deeply worried when we hear that the junta has carried out aerial strikes in areas where our family members live.” RELATED STORIES Northern Myanmar cut off by state-wide communications blackout Daily blackouts in Myanmar disrupt livelihoods of rural, urban dwellers UN calls for Myanmar to end internet blackout in Rakhine state Other residents said that fighters with the AA and other allied rebel groups have access to the internet via the satellite service Starlink. Several said that they need to travel “miles” in order to access a working telephone. Communicating from abroad Many people from Rakhine state, an underdeveloped area of Myanmar, choose to work abroad to earn a living and send money home to help their families. But a resident of Rakhine who is working in Thailand told RFA that the lack of phone and internet connections has made it nearly impossible for her to send money home. “I can’t even communicate with my children, who are still in the village, and as a mother, I constantly worry about them,” she said. “I also have parents and siblings, and I want to know if they are safe and how they manage to make a living. Not being able to reach them fills me with anxiety.” The woman, who also declined to be named, said it had been “more than two months” since she last had contact with her family members in Rakhine. Journalists in Rakhine told RFA that while the AA has allowed them to access the internet using Starlink, they can only do so for five hours a day, limiting their ability to report news from the region. Translated by Aung Naing. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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EXPLAINED: How US tariffs affect Vietnam’s economy

Editor01 mins

reported. Anti-dumping investigation In September 2024, Vietnam’s Department of Trade Defense at the Ministry of Industry and Trade said that the U.S. Department of Commerce was investigating Vietnam, along with other countries, for dumping and subsidies, with the dumping accusation having a margin of up to 160%, the highest in the world. The investigation period is 2023 and the damage assessment period is from 2021 to 2023. Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Mike Firn. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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Myanmar refugees in limbo after US suspends resettlement program

Editor09 mins

Read RFA coverage of this story in Burmese. UMPIEM MAI REFUGEE CAMP, Thailand — Saw Ba had been living in a refugee camp on the Thai-Myanmar border for 16 years when he got the news last month that he’d been waiting years for: He and his family would be boarding a plane to resettle in America. It had been a long wait. Saw Ba, in his 40s and whose name has been changed in this story for security reasons, had applied for resettlement soon after getting to the camp in 2008. With much anticipation, staffers from the International Organization for Migration, or IOM, brought his family and 22 other people from Umpiem Mai Refugee Camp to a hotel in the Thai border town of Mae Sot in mid-January. There they were to wait to catch a flight to Bangkok and on to the United States. Freedom and a new life awaited. But three days later, the IOM staffers delivered bad news: All 26 people would have to return to the refugee camp because the incoming Trump administration was about to order a halt to the processing and travel of all refugees into the United States. The Umpiem Mai Refugee Camp on the Thai-Myanmar border, at Phop Phra district, Tak province, a Thai-Myanmar border province, Feb. 7, 2025.(Shakeel/AP) Saw Ba and his family had been so sure they would be resettled that they had given all of their belongings — including their clothes — to neighbors and friends, while their children had dropped out of school and returned their books. “When we arrived back here [at Umpiem], we had many difficulties,” he told RFA Burmese, particularly with their children’s education. “Our children have been out of school for a month, and now they’re back, and their final exams are coming up,” he said. “Our children won’t have books anymore when they return to school. I don’t know whether they’ll pass or fail this year’s exams.” Missionary work Saw Ba fled to the refugee camp because he was targeted for his Christian missionary work. Originally from Pathein township, in western Myanmar’s Ayeyarwady region, he was approached by an official with the country’s military junta in 2009 and told to stop his activities. When he informed the official that he was not involved in politics and refused to comply, police were sent to arrest him. He fled to Thailand, where he ended up in the Umpiem Mai camp. There he met his wife and had a son and daughter, now in seventh and second grade, respectively. RELATED STORIES Vietnamese in Thailand wait anxiously after Trump suspends refugee program Myanmar aid groups struggle with freeze as UN warns of ‘staggering’ hunger Tide of Myanmar war refugees tests Thailand’s welcome mat for migrants Another woman in the camp, Thin Min Soe, said her husband and their two children had undergone a battery of medical tests and had received an acceptance letter for resettlement, allowing them to join a waitlist to travel. She had fled her home in the Bago region in central Myanmar for taking part in the country’s 2007 Saffron Revolution, when the military violently suppressed widespread anti-government protests led by Buddhist monks. Thin Min Soe and other refugees at the camp told RFA they are afraid of returning to Myanmar due to the threat of persecution. The country has been pitched into civil war after the military toppled an elected government in 2021. Many said they no longer have homes or villages to return to, even if they did want to go back. With the U.S. refugee program suspended, “we are now seriously concerned about our livelihood because we have to support our two children’s education and livelihoods,” she said. When RFA contacted the camp manager and the refugee affairs office, they responded by saying they were not allowed to comment on the matter. US has resettled 3 million refugees Since 1980, more than 3 million refugees — people fearing persecution because of their race, religion, nationality, politics or membership in a social group — have been resettled in the United States. During the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, the United States resettled 100,034 refugees, the highest number in 30 years. The most came from the Republic of the Congo, followed by Afghanistan, Venezuela and Syria. Myanmar was fifth, accounting for 7.3%, according to the Center for Immigration Studies. Over the past 30 years, the United States accepted the highest number of refugees from Myanmar — about 76,000 — followed by Canada and Australia, according to the U.S. Embassy in Thailand. Hundreds of Myanmar refugees from Thailand were brought to the U.S. in November and December, before the end of former President Joe Biden’s term. The Ohn Pyan refugee camp near Mae Sot, Thailand, undated photo.(RFA) Thai health workers will provide healthcare during the day from Monday to Friday, while refugee camp health professionals will be on duty at night and on weekends. The U.S. freeze on foreign aid has also impacted the work of other humanitarian groups at the Thai-Myanmar border, including the Mae Tao Clinic, which provides free medical care to those in need, as well as health education and social services, officials told RFA. Translated by Aung Naing and Kalyar Lwin. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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Myanmar junta blocks fuel to eastern border scam center town

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Read RFA coverage of these topics in Burmese Myanmar’s junta has blocked the supply of fuel to a town bordering Thailand where scam centers are rampant days after Thailand cut cross-border power, fuel and internet services to the lawless enclave where fraud and forced labor have thrived. The Myawaddy district is under the control of a pro-junta militia known as the Border Guard Force, or BGF, that has opened up its zone to criminal networks, many run by Chinese networks, which operate extensive “pig-butchering” online fraud operations. Thailand, facing damage to its tourist industry because of public alarm throughout Asia about forced labor in the centers, cut off electricity and the internet and blocked the supply of fuel to Myawaddy on Feb. 5. The Myanmar junta has also stopped fuel reaching Myawaddy from central Myanmar ports to replace the supplies blocked by Thailand, Myawaddy residents told Radio Free Asia. Myanmar military authorities were not letting fuel trucks through a checkpoint at a bridge on the road between the town of Kawkareik and Myawaddy, they said. “There’s no fuel at all in the town,” said one Myawaddy resident who declined to be identified for security reasons. “More than 40 boxers are stuck at the junta checkpoint,” said the resident referring to fuel trucks. “We do not know what’ll happen tomorrow.‘’ RFA tried to telephone the junta’s spokesperson, Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Htun, to ask about the fuel restriction but he did not answer. The scams, known as “pig butchering” in China, usually involve making contact with unsuspecting people online, building a personal relationship with them and then defrauding them. The centres are often staffed by people lured by false job advertisements and forced to work. The rescue of a Chinese actor from a Myawaddy fraud center last month raised international alarm about the centers, triggered the cancellations of Thai holiday plans by frightened Chinese tourists and encouraged the Thai government to act. Chinese President Xi Jinping thanked Thailand’s visiting prime minister, Paetongtarn Shinawatra last Thursday for the crackdown. RELATED STORIES EXPLAINED: What are scam parks? South Korea jails scam group leader for 8 years over Laos, Myanmar operation Myanmar border militia emerges as nexus in regional scam network Pumps run dry Ordinary residents of Myawaddy say the restrictions on power and fuel are hitting them as well as the scam centers. “Many businesses rely on fuel for pumping water, for everything. So while cutting fuel will affect the scam gangs it also impacts the public,” said the town resident. One Myawaddy gasoline pump said it only had enough fuel for a car or two but that was sold out even though the price had nearly doubled to 10,000 kyat (US$5) a liter. In the area’s main hub for scam operations at Shwe Kokko, 15 kilometers (9 miles) north of Myawaddy, the price of fuel rose to almost 20,000 kyat before it sold out. “In Shwe Kokko, there’s absolutely no fuel. You can’t use a car at all,” said the resident. The ethnic Karen BGF emerged after a split in Myanmar’s oldest minority insurgent force, the Christian-led Karen National Union in the 1990s. Buddhist breakaway fighters formed their own force and allied with the military, which granted them control of Myawaddy. Analysts say the junta has turned a blind eye to the scam centers, and profited from them, while the BGF has helped the military keep KNU forces out of the main crossing point for trade on the Thai-Myanmar border. Facing pressure from all sides, the BGF has promised to clean up its zone and stop fraud and forced labor. On Sunday, it ordered Chinese nationals working in online operations to leave the town of Payathonzu, on the Thai border to the south of Myawaddy, by the end of the month. The junta leader, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, said last week the military would take action against money laundering. Translated by Kiana Duncan. Edited by RFA Staff. We are : Investigative Journalism Reportika Investigative Reports Daily Reports Interviews Surveys Reportika

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Investigative Journalism Reportika © March 2022 by Ij-Reportika is licensed under CC BY 4.0