Refugees struggle with freedom

By CEANA PRIEST - Waikato Times

 Arriving as a refugee from Myanmar, Robert Dal feared the New Zealand police – and four years later, he says, he still struggles to express his opinions freely.

His comments come as the first batch of refugees from his home country, formerly known as Burma, is set to arrive in Hamilton. Though Mr Dal settled in Auckland, he said he understood the challenges each family would face.

He spoke at a workshop hosted by Refugee Services Aotearoa at the Waikato Migrant Resource Centre last week in preparation for the refugees' arrival in October.

"It will take a certain period of time for them to understand the concept of freedom of speech," he said. "Even for me, it would be hard to go into town and loudly say `hey, this is my opinion'."

Another Myanmar refugee, Amanda Aye – a volunteer team leader for Refugee Services Aotearoa – said the move to Hamilton would be unsettling.

"They will consider themselves extremely lucky to arrive here into safety, peace and stability but that is such a difference to where they have come from. It will be quite a shock – they are used to a lot of crisis and trauma."

The four families received refugee status by the United Nations after fleeing to Malaysia from Myanmar, to avoid persecution.

They were subjected to slum conditions in a Malaysian urban refugee centre before arriving in New Zealand.

Refugee Services Waikato manager Rachel O'Connor said they had beaten the odds to receive refugee status.

"There are around 11.4 million people who have refugee status with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and only 0.5 per cent will ever be selected for resettlement. The UNHCR oversees around 60 million people of concern around the world.

"The average time in a refugee camp is about 18 years."

The families will spend six weeks at the Mangere Refugee Centre learning English and New Zealand culture, and having medical checks, before their move to Hamilton.

Ms O'Connor said their arrival was exciting for the organisation.

"So far it has been a wonderful challenge for us getting prepared," she said. "We have been learning new greetings and beginning to understand the level of persecution they fled from."

Hamilton-based volunteers will support the families' integrate into the community.

Ceana Priest is a Wintec journalism student

Journalists rewarded for news coverage in Southeast Asia

Kyrgyzstan News.Net
Monday 27th September, 2010

Reporters from Radio Free Asia’s Vietnamese and Myanmar services have been awarded gold and bronze medals respectively at this year’s New York Festivals.

Both winning entries produced pieces exploring the issue of human trafficking in Asia. Additionally, broadcasters from RFA’s Mandarin and Korean services were named as finalists by the competition’s judges.

“The honors bestowed on Radio Free Asia at New York Festivals showcase the journalistic excellence for which our news services consistently strive to achieve in some of the world’s toughest media environments,” Libby Liu, President of RFA said Monday. “Two of our winners reported on the trafficking of women and migrants in Asia, and we hope this recognition underscores the need to continue informing our audience and the world about this prevalent and nefarious issue.”

“We at RFA pledge to continue bringing accurate, objective news to people living in Asian countries that restrict and censor the press.”

Broadcaster Khanh An of RFA’s Vietnamese service earned the top award in the category of Best Ongoing News Story for her three-part series “A New Form of Women Trafficking.” The series, which aired in March 2010, documented an incident of a Vietnamese woman being trafficked to Europe. The series examined some of the local factors and people and their roles in facilitating the woman’s victimization.

RFA Myanmar (Burma) reporter Kyaw Min Htun won a bronze award in the category of Best Coverage of Ongoing News Story for his stories on the human trafficking of Mynamar (Burmese) refugees and migrants in Malaysia, which aired from January to May of this year. For his stories, the reporter interviewed ethnic Rohingya migrants, seeking asylum in Malaysia after being subjected to persecution in Myanmar. Many, however, once in Malaysia, faced exploitation by human-traffickers, abusive employers, and corrupt officials.

Park Songwu of RFA’s Korean language service, was a finalist in the NYF category of Best Human Interest Story for his four-part series on North Korea’s youngest defectors. The series focused on the difficulties and challenges these individuals face once living in South Korea.

RFA Mandarin’s Tang Qiwei was also a finalist in the NYF History category for her piece on the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests, which aired on June 4, 2009. The short audio documentary, which was edited by Feng Xiaoming, used interviews with many leaders, activists, and officials involved with or connected to the Beijing student-led demonstrations.

Partners Relief and Development assists Myanmar refugees

 

 

Courtesy Photo | Partnersworld.orgAccording to the Partners Relief and Development website, this is Zing, a 27-year-old from a people group called Pah Oh. He fled three years ago from Burma to Thailand with his wife, Wan. 

The 9-year-old girl runs for her life. She and her family are fleeing from soldiers driving them and fellow villagers from their homes.

At the top of a hill, soldiers kill her father and grandmother and shoot her in the stomach. She survives but must hide in the jungle with her mother and siblings.

A scene from a movie? No, a real event in Myanmar — formerly known as Burma — and a chillingly common one.

“It happens all the time,” writes Oddny Gumaer in “Displaced Reflections,” a photo chronicle of Burmese refugees. “I wonder why it keeps happening and the story never gets told.”

After hearing her and her husband, Steve, describe the horrors of Myanmar, I wonder, too.

They tell of a medieval dictatorship systematically slaughtering the country’s ethnic minorities and selling their children into the military.

“They are brutal,” Steve told me some time ago on a stop in Grand Rapids. “The people we work with get killed all the time. If you don’t play along with the will of the regime, you are dead — and your wife is raped.”

He and Oddny, along with a few dozen indigenous staff, wage a David-versus-Goliath battle to help a people routinely raped, routed from their homes, tortured and killed. This is the norm in Burma, which its military dictators renamed Myanmar in 1989. Many refuse to recognize the name, including the Gumaers.

Their Christian nonprofit, Partners Relief and Development, works with thousands of the estimated 1 million internally displaced Burmese as well as refugees in neighboring Thailand.

They have support in West Michigan but could use more. Discovery Church, a Christian Reformed congregation in Cutlerville, lends financial and prayer support. Church member Sid Jansma Jr., chairman of Wolverine Oil and Gas, and his wife, Sharin, are strong supporters, taking their cue from the biblical call to lay down their lives for others as Jesus did for them.

“They’re the only group I know of putting themselves at risk to help their brothers for a Christian reason,” Jansma says of Partners Relief. “We felt convicted by the Holy Spirit to do the same thing.”

Jansma went to Burma last year, crossing the border at night and hiking into jungle camps for displaced people. A Burmese guide cared for him after he dislocated his shoulder on a mountain. He was impressed with the schools, food supplies, medical facilities and the gospel teachings that Partners provided, and with the resilience of the Burmese people.

“I was touched by their smiles, their optimism. This is a group of people that does not give up.”

A lesser people would have given up long ago. Pro-democracy forces have been under assault since 1990, when the military refused to recognize a democratically elected party and its leader, Nobel Peace Prize recipient Aung San Suu Kyi. The government brutally put down 2007 protests led by Buddhist monks and since has raided homes and monasteries to arrest activists. Kyi remains under house arrest.

Surrounded by India, China and Thailand, Burma came to the world’s attention in 2008 when Cyclone Nargis killed more than 80,000 people. The government made things worse by hindering international groups from providing aid.

But the headlines are nothing compared to what goes on in the villages and jungles. More than 3,500 villages have been destroyed, according to Partners. Soldiers plant land mines to prevent villagers from returning and use rape as a weapon. Steve Gumaer calls it “the most corrupt country on Earth,” rich in resources but reduced to poverty by its military rulers.

“Their pure and simple ideology is greed,” says Steve, who lives in Norway and Thailand. “They are fantastically rich and they’re not going to let go.”

But neither are the Gumaers and other aid groups, such as Free Burma Rangers. Partners provides schooling for more than 65,000 children and health clinics and agricultural training for people on the run. They also lobby for international political action against human-rights violations.

“God is in hot pursuit of these people,” Steve Gumaer says. “He wants to show them he’s alive.”

God could use some help from people showing the Burmese that they care.

E-mail Charles Honey: honeycharlesm@gmail.com

UMNO is financing the Burmese Junta

By John Doe 

My trip into Burma was riddled with sadness. The general population live below the poverty line, and food, if any, scarce, and expensive. Fuel costs drive prices high, while healthcare, and medical services are almost non-existent. More than 35% of the Population has Fungal problems, and nearly 1.1% of the Population is HIV positive. Lack of education, and lack of any real infrastructure has driven the general well-being of the Populace spiraling downwards.

Yangon looks and feels like one big slum, and a stroll in the city of 5 million people, would either leave you completely covered in dust, or mud, depending whether it rains or not. In fact, you get to see more mud and dirt, than tarred roads in the heart of the (former) capital city.

The Junta limits "Tourists" to "Sanitized Zones", thus severely limiting the opportunity to visit the Nuclear Plants which are being built just outside Napydaw, and 3 other locations. (Napydaw, by the way, is like the PutraJaya of Malaysia) Despite sanctions against the Junta, the Military Leaders continue to relish in great wealth, and are able to splash US$50 million on the wedding of this fat girl.

Watch the full video here: CLICK ON THIS LINK. The above video, is part 1 of 24.

No UMNO person is even capable of a wedding at this kind of cost. No Ketuanan has even come close to spending that amount on their daughter's wedding. Isn't it shy that Ketuanan Burma outshines Ketuanan UMNO? Even worse, UMNO is helping the Junta sell their oil to China. They have been actively repairing the oil lines which feed the richest Oil Wells in Southeast Asia (yes, beating Brunei) to China. And now even the North Koreans are getting into the Burmese Game, by now supplying parts for their Nuclear Plants. The North Koreans use an overland route through China, to bypass any ships which may be stopped by the Embargo.
     
The above picture shows the plant, and the one on the right shows a bunker entrance.

UMNO (via Petronas), The North Koreans, and the Burmese Junta are now new bedfellows. The three are now masturbating each other's Ketuanan. Despite Sanctions, the new bedfellows are now under Ketuanan Cheena as well. You see, China is the main buyer of Burmese oil. Once the pipes enter China, who's to know where it goes? This pipeline is constant attacked by the Shan Liberation Army. And Petronas diligently repairs it all the time for the Junta.

Read here:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/columnists/article2577826.ece

Also read here:
http://www.upstreamonline.com/live/article204406.ece

"Two existing operations, one managed by France's Total and the other byMalaysian state oil company Petronas, provided Burma with about US$1 billion in revenues in 2005..." This US$1 Billion goes nicely to finance the 400,000 Military Troops of the Junta. As well as the Nuclear Weapons which is being built right now.

"They are funding the dictatorship," said Marco Simons, US legal director at Earth Rights International, an environmental and human rights group with offices in Thailand and Washington. "The oil and gas companies have been one of the major industries keeping the regime in power."

The Documentary to watch is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkT7EFSNyKE&feature=channel

The BBC Report is here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10236381

Now, Petronas is mainly government-owned, and by extension, public-owned so this can be interpreted as the Malaysian public giving support to the Myanmar military regime. Not the best scenario, if any Malaysian is to hold their head high anywhere.



The Junta is also showing UMNO how to run it's Government. Firstly, the November 7th Polls are openly declared as "FREE AND FAIR" by the Junta. They have now officially banned Daw Aung San Su Kyi's ENTIRE Party from running. Hence, the Junta will be the ONLY Party standing for elections. The Junta welcomes ALL International Media, and Embassies to witness the OPEN-COUNTING of the votes. Since every single Candidate is from the Junta, there is absolutely no fear of losing this elections. UMNO should learn from this idea. (There is absolutely NO NEED to bring out the mattresses) The Ketuanan Junta still has more Ketuanan than ISA.

Also, should anyone protest (like in 2009), then perhaps they should watch this 10-part Documentary on how the Junta deals with dissatisfied Opposition. Yes, even if they are Monks. And since the Junta are Buddhists, they believe that they have helped these monks achieve their Nirvana by expediting their death. Watch this part 1 of 10:
|http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEwPqNMZIhg

As a result of this, the Malaysian and her Burmese bedfellows have "agreed" to rid themselves of their problems, "so that it is mutually benefiting.." In short the US Senate Report issued on the 3rd of April (click here) details how Malaysian Officials have been selling these Refugees. The Burmese Junta has many times thanked UMNO for getting "rid of their problems". Another Video has highlighted the many numerous official news report (censored in Malaysia) (Click HERE)



The above picture show the RELA detaining Burmese Refugees before they are sold to Human Traffickers in Thailand.

The men will sell for around US$200, the women, US$300, and children are most valuable, because they can be sold as human spare Parts, go for US$400 each.Children are much preferred for organ-harvesting, because they are relatively disease-free. Their Corneas, Livers, Spleen, Heart Valves, etc are much sought after on the black-market. Most recipients never know the identity of their "donors" anyway, as the transactions kept hush-hush.

Al Jazeera has just recently run this other report (Sept 4th 2010) on how it is better for the Burmese to live in a Rubbish Dump, than to live in Burma. This report also states how people are forced to pay the Junta, monthly Bribes, or risk their children being taken away.
Watch it here:

http://www.youtube.com/user/AlJazeeraEnglish#p/search/0/AqsinmogtqY

Dear Malaysians. Your current Government is helping perpetuate these crimes against Humanity. Being anti-UMNO may be seen as being anti-Government. But once UMNO collapses, then you instantly become Pro-Government. Why are sitting on your butts, hoping that someone else would do the work for you? Is this not your country? Tell me. When would it be your turn to "jump" out of the 14th floor then? For now, Burmese blood is on your hands. Petronas is financing this Regime. Stop this madness now. Malaysia severely needs a change of Government!

EDITORIAL: Accepting refugees

Asahi Shimbun

Five ethnic Karen families comprising 27 people who fled Myanmar (Burma) and have been living in a refugee camp in Thailand will arrive in Japan on Tuesday to start a new life.

They represent the first batch of refugees that Japan will accept under a third-country resettlement arrangement.

Under this resettlement option, refugees who have fled their homeland because of conflict or oppression to a neighboring country may legally travel to and settle in a third country.

Japan plans to accept up to 90 refugees over three years under this formula.

There are an estimated 15 million refugees around the world. From a humanitarian viewpoint, countries that are at peace and enjoying prosperity have a moral obligation to provide shelter and protection for these people. But the number of people who come to Japan on their own to seek asylum and are recognized as refugees has totaled no more than several dozens per year.

Will the resettlement of Karen refugees lead to a major change in Japan's traditional reluctance to accept refugees?

The five families will spend their first six months in Japan learning the Japanese language and customs at a training center while living in apartments in Tokyo. Job placement services will also be offered to them. But half a year of orientation may not be enough for foreign families arriving in Japan for the first time.

There are limited job opportunities for foreign nationals without much knowledge of Japanese. Even if they receive support from the Burmese community in Japan, the Karen families will face a tough time landing on their feet.

In European countries that accept hundreds of refugees every year for third-country resettlement, local governments are actively involved in efforts to help them settle down in the local community.

The United States, which accepts tens of thousands of refugees annually, offers only a one-month orientation, but well-financed nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) provide solid support for refugee communities.

Japan should also establish a system to aid refugees based on the viewpoint of human development. The system should ensure cooperation among local governments, NGOs, businesses and educational institutions to provide long-term support so that each refugee can achieve his or her full potential.

Unless such a system is established, the hopes of the 27 refugees will soon turn into disappointment.

The government provides more than 10 billion yen ($118 million) each year to help refugees overseas, including those from Afghanistan. It would do good service to the cause if a portion--even a few percent--of that money went to support refugees in Japan.

The government has not been very kind to people who come to Japan for protection. The procedure to be recognized as a refugee is lengthy, and woefully insufficient livelihood support is provided by the government while people wait for recognition. In recent years, an increasing number of asylum-seekers have been placed in holding facilities, adding to their anxiety.

Japan is not a popular destination among people living in refugee camps because of the prospect that they will face a great deal of difficulty here without any guarantee of a better life. On the other hand, every week several hundred Burmese refugees travel to North America for resettlement via Narita Airport in Chiba Prefecture.

The "Japan passing" by refugees is a national disgrace to this Asian industrial country.

The administration of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan clearly needs a new unit in charge of promoting policies to accept refugees. Ministries and agencies concerned have been trying to shuffle off responsibility onto one another, and the current situation looks like an attempt only to develop a track record on accepting refugees using the third-country resettlements.

With its population of children declining, Japan needs to tackle such questions as what kind of immigrants it should accept and how it should try to improve the environment for their life in Japan.

At the heart of the refugee issue is the lack of a national strategy for making Japanese society more open to outsiders.

The Threat to Burma's Environment

Written by Our Correspondent

Friday, 17 September 2010

NGOs charge multinationals with wrecking the ecosystem in the search for resources More than 20 mega-dams are being constructed or planned on Burma's major rivers, including the Salween and Irrawaddy, by multinationals without consulting local communities, a wide range of NGOs charged in a statement Friday. In addition, the group charged, mining, oil and gas projects are creating severe environmental and social problems. Several papers are to be delivered on Sept. 18 in an all-day seminar in Bangkok on the impact and consequences of overseas investment in large-scale projects in Burma that say as many as 30 companies from China alone are investing in dam projects on the two rivers. The NGOs include Towards Ecological Recovery; the Thai Action Committee for Democracy in Burma, the Shan Women Action Network; the Pa-O Youth Organization, Arakan Oil Watch, the Human Rights Foundation of Monland and the Burma Rivers Network. On the Salween, according to the group, Thai, Burmese and Chinese investors are planning to build at least six dams, including the Ta Sang and Hutgyi dams, which will produce electricity to be sold to the Asean power grid. "It has been well documented that dams in Burma exacerbate conflict, cause forced displacement and threaten biodiversity," the group said in a prepared release. "Several Asean actors, including from Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore, are involved in gas exploration and extraction in Burma. The Yadana and Yetagun gas projects, which provide fuel for 20 percent of Thailand's electricity, have been linked to forced relocation, forced labor, torture and extrajudicial killings." In addition, the activists said, South Korean, Indian and Chinese companies are financing and constructing new trans-Burma oil and gas pipelines that have already led to the loss of peoples' livelihoods and various forms of violence. Large-scale mining of coal, iron and other minerals and gems by foreign investors is devastating areas of agricultural importance and rich biodiversity. Thai companies are planning to import 1.5 million metric tons of lignite annually for 30 years from Mong Kok, an active conflict zone in eastern Shan State, while Russian and Italian companies are involved in a massive iron mining project that will displace thousands of people and pollute agricultural waterways near the Shan capital of Taunggyi. Currently, the largest foreign investors in Burma are Thailand, Singapore, China and the UK, according to the release. "As the largest investor, Thailand invested a total value of US$7.4 billion in 59 projects during the period 1989 to 2008, equivalent to 47 percent of the total foreign direct investment in Burma," the group said. "The UK and Singapore ranked as second and third largest investors, investing US$1.86 billion in 17 projects and US$1.5 billion in 71 projects respectively." China is also emerging as major investor in Burma, with US$1.8 billion invested as of January 2009. Most of the benefits go to the Burmese military regime and investing companies, while the people of Burma gain little, the group argued. In Burma, they said, "there are no accountability or transparency mechanisms. " "The social and environmental costs of these projects are borne disproportionately by the most vulnerable groups of people living near the projects, including women and indigenous peoples, and have caused increased flows of refugees and migrants to neighboring countries." The group called on the international community, particularly Asean, to recognize the social and environmental threat from the development. "Asean needs to review its heavy focus on trade and investment, recognize the differing political and economic situations of Asean member countries," the group said, "and promote equal benefit-sharing and sustainable development, especially with regard to the region's shared natural resource base." The group also called on Asean to develop an effective legal framework that requires full corporate social and environmental accountability to reduce the social and environmental consequences of their investments in natural resource extraction projects, including large-scale hydropower dams, and mining, oil and gas project as well as to develop an extractive industry framework to guide member countries; governance of their resources.

Trafficking: Suspend new provisions of Atip Act

Dear Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak,

Human Rights Watch writes to express serious concern about amendments to the Anti- Trafficking in Persons Act 2007 (Atip Act) that was approved by the Malaysian parliament in August and scheduled to take effect in October. We are concerned that the amendments conflate the serious rights abuse of human trafficking with the immigration violation of people smuggling.

As a result, front-line law enforcement officials will inevitably treat trafficking victims as undocumented migrants subject to immediate deportation, undermining government efforts to counter trafficking and risk exposing trafficked persons, abused migrants, and refugees to further rights violations. We are also concerned that the amendments narrow the legal definition of human trafficking, and by the amended law's failure to include any mechanisms to protect the rights of migrants conveyed by 'people smugglers.'

Should Malaysia wish to strengthen the law against people smuggling, but preserve protections for trafficked persons, the government should rescind all amendments to the Atip Act that relate to people smuggling and revise the Immigration Act and other legislation focused on border control. This would ensure that there are separate legal frameworks for dealing with human trafficking and with people smuggling.

Human Rights Watch monitors human rights in more than 90 countries worldwide. We have conducted in-depth research on human trafficking and forced labor since 1993 in such countries as the US, Saudi Arabia, Guatemala, Guinea, Indonesia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and the United Arab Emirates, as well as Malaysia. We have also encountered the practice of people smuggling in various regions of the world, and documented the abuses suffered by migrants and refugees alike at the hands of people smugglers. Our comments below are drawn from our extensive experience in documenting human trafficking and people smuggling around the world and in identifying strategies to address these serious problems and improve the protection of vulnerable individuals.

We include with the discussion of each issue specific recommendations for the Malaysian government.To prevent future abuses we urge that the recommendations be implemented before the Atip Act amendments go into effect in October.

Separate people smuggling from human trafficking - our principal concern with the amended Atip Act is that it conflates two distinct problems, human trafficking and people smuggling. This unfortunate and ill-considered change in government policy was achieved by the insertion of a new crime of 'smuggling of migrants' into new Part IIIA of the Atip Act, essentially criminalizing the facilitation of irregular migration into or out of Malaysia. International law and practice recognize that smuggling and trafficking are dissimilar and require different law enforcement strategies.

To reflect this, two separate protocols were added to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, specifically the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children (UN Trafficking Protocol), which Malaysia has ratified, and the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, which it has not. Each protocol creates a separate international framework for what are two distinct problems, and each supports a different police response.

The Atip Act amendments reveal the faulty assumption that the crimes of smuggling and trafficking are so closely related that tackling one will help to prevent the other. But international best practice in implementing anti-trafficking efforts demonstrates precisely the opposite: focusing on smuggling is likely to damage efforts to counter trafficking because it shifts the emphasis from countering exploitation of individuals, the hallmark of trafficking, to controlling immigration, thus effectively undermining identification and protection of human trafficking victims.

UN officials and non-governmental organizations in the region have repeatedly identified victim identification and protection as a weak link in Malaysia's anti-trafficking efforts. Human trafficking, as defined under international law, involves the use or threat of force or other forms of coercion and the giving or receiving of payments or benefits for the purpose of exploitation. It occurs not because people can enter Malaysia illegally, but because of exploitation and the difficulty faced by trafficking victims to come forward to report the crime. Trafficking is more closely related to violence against women, child abuse, and severe exploitation of forced labor than it is to irregular migration. Many trafficked people enter destination countries on valid visas or are nationals trafficked internally.

While people smuggling is a violation of a state's immigration laws, human trafficking is better understood as a series of human rights abuses that occur continuously against an individual over a period of time. Ending human trafficking and reducing irregular migration require different skills and diverse strategies. First and foremost, the legal framework for taking effective action against human trafficking needs to recognize that identifying and assisting victims of trafficking is critical to prosecuting a crime that is heavily dependent on evidence from eyewitness testimony. Traffickers often tightly control trafficked persons' movements and seize their passports and other personal identification documents.

Trafficking victims may not know how or where to access help to escape their situation, but unlike irregular migrants, they seek and need external assistance to escape their predicament. Post-rescue best practice emphasizes a 'victim-centric' response. Law enforcement officials must gain the trust of trafficking victims in order to provide assistance to support victims' physical and mental recovery, to ensure their protection from retaliation by traffickers, and to persuade them to testify in complex trafficking prosecutions. But when human trafficking is conflated in law with people smuggling, the frequent result is that front-line law enforcement officials fail to identify trafficking victims and instead treat all persons detained as undocumented migrants, subject to immediate deportation.

Experience in many countries has also shown that cracking down on irregular migrants can increase traffickers' ability to control and intimidate their victims who, fearful that seeking help will lead only to arrest and deportation, remain silent. Furthermore, front-line police and immigration officials become confused about the difference between trafficking victims and irregular migrants. In Malaysia, such confusion may be compounded in instances where local civilian and emergency responders from Ikatan Relawan Rakyat Malaysia (Rela) are given duties in immigration enforcement for which they are neither adequately trained nor sufficiently concerned to identify trafficked persons.

Recommendation: Rescind all provisions on people smuggling in the amended Atip Act. Any revisions to the law against people smuggling should be achieved through amendments to existing law, such as the Immigration Act, or on passage of a new law that focuses solely on people smuggling. The government should ensure in its public pronouncements and programs not to conflate human trafficking with people smuggling.

Amend the Definition of Trafficking in the Atip Act - The definition of trafficking in the amended ATIP Act has been narrowed considerably and no longer complies with international law. The new definition limits the crime to those situations in which a person is exploited by means of 'coercion.' Coercion is defined in the Atip Act as use or threats of physical harm and 'the abuse of the legal process.' This is inconsistent with the UN Trafficking Protocol, which states that trafficking includes not only cases of coercion, but also 'of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person' (article 3).

This broader definition covers in particular cases of child trafficking where adults use their power over children to force them into exploitative work and prevent them from escaping. It is also essential to effectively prosecute traffickers who abuse adult victims by using fear, psychological manipulation and spiraling debt to prevent the victim from seeking help. The law's exclusion of these situations from the definition of human trafficking will exclude many trafficked persons from the protection of the Atip Act.

Recommendation: Amend the definition of human trafficking in the Atip Act to bring it in full compliance with international law, as set out in the UN Trafficking Protocol, by listing all the means of coercion and exploitation listed in the protocol.

Provide comprehensive protections for migrants - The amended Atip Act specifically excludes smuggled migrants from any protection or assistance guarantees unless 'the smuggled migrant is a trafficked person' (new Section 41A), completely discounting the needs of smuggled migrants. Migrants who arrive with the help of smugglers may experience assault, robbery, deprivation of liberty, rape or even death at the hands of smugglers, but may nevertheless not fulfill the definition of being a trafficked person if the smuggler does not coerce the person for purposes of exploitation, as defined in the UN Trafficking Protocol, such as for prostitution, other forms of sexual exploitation, or forced labor.

They may need emergency health care, including maternal and child health. They may require legal advice and support, and should have an opportunity to access justice and seek a remedy for abuses they have suffered. Effective prosecution of people smugglers will ultimately require the voluntary assistance and testimony of the migrants who have been smuggled. The amended Atip Act will allow law enforcement authorities to take measures unrelated to trafficking, such as to arbitrarily detain migrants, to interrogate them about smuggling networks, and to charge them with giving support to people smugglers because they paid for their own journey.

Giving support would even include renting a conference facility for a meeting about undocumented migration. Penalties for the broadly-defined crime of supporting people smuggling are draconian and roughly approximate to those given for human trafficking. For instance, under new article 26F, a person providing 'any premises, room, or place' for the purposes of committing a people smuggling offense is subject to receive up to 10 years in prison and a fine. New article 26H criminalizes the actions of any person who 'conceals or harbors, or prevents, hinders, or interferes with the arrest of any person knowing, or having reason to believe that person is a smuggled migrant,' offenses subject to up to 10 years in prison and a fine.

We also regret that there are no provisions that guarantee humane treatment of smuggled migrants during interception, detention, and deportation proceedings, or that require police and immigration enforcement officers to treat migrants humanely in accordance with international law.

Preventing human trafficking in the future requires a clear and effective legal framework that recognizes and encourages the contribution of undocumented migrants in reporting incidents of human trafficking and in cooperating in the prosecution of traffickers. However, the amended Atip Act will engender fear among migrants, and likely erode nascent cooperation between migrants and anti-trafficking advocates and law enforcement officials.

Recommendations: In addition to removing people smuggling from the Atip Act, revise people smuggling laws to protect the rights of undocumented migrants. Ensure that migrants whose lives or safety have been endangered by smugglers have access to medical care and to justice. Ensure that any law criminalizing smuggling requires officials to treat migrants humanely, and that effective measures are taken to train police and immigration officials.

Ensure respect for non-refoulement obligation - Many individuals smuggled into Malaysia are refugees and asylum seekers fleeing persecution. Malaysia is the destination for the fourth largest number of asylum-seekers globally, with the UN High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) registering 40,000 new asylum applications in 2009. The anti-smuggling amendments to the Atip Act do not recognize the unique needs of refugees and asylum seekers. This omission risks increasing the possibility that refugees will be detained and deported to places where they face further persecution or where their lives or freedom may be threatened in violation of Malaysia's non-refoulement obligations under international law.

Recommendation: Amend the Atip Act to ensure that UNHCR is provided with timely access to all smuggled migrants so that refugees and asylum seekers among them have the opportunity to file asylum claims. Ensure that persons held in detention centers have access to refugee status determination procedures so that refugees can be identified and released, and not returned to places where they face persecution.

Human Rights Watch has serious concerns that the amended Atip Act risks undermining efforts to counter trafficking by subsuming it into efforts to control irregular migration. We also are concerned that the newly revised law excludes many vulnerable trafficked persons from protection and ignores the protection needs of migrants and refugees. We urge that implementation of the new provisions of the Atip Act contrary to international law be suspended and that the government promptly revise the law to remove provisions related to people smuggling and restore to it a definition of trafficking that meets international standards.

Human Rights Watch appreciates your immediate attention to our comments and recommendations. We welcome the opportunity to discuss these matters further with you or your representative.

The writer is deputy director, Asia Division, Human Rights Watch.

Source : malaysiakini.com

Burmese Muslim Refugees Seeking Shelter and Survival

“We know you help Shan people Burma. Please help we. We Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh.”

This was an email I received nearly two years ago. It was accompanied by heart-wrenching photos of people on the brink of starvation. Children with distended bellies, covered in parasites. The “camp” seemed to be submerged in a foot and a half of filthy water.

From September of 2007 to February of 2008, I was embedded with the Shan State rebel army in Burma, documenting human rights abuses and genocide waged by the tyrannical Burmese Junta, lead by Than Shwe. The military government, which is completely in the hands of the Burman ethnic majority has been slaughtering Burma’s many ethnic minorities for decades. Some are fighting back. Some, after forty years of waiting in vein for the US, UK, or UN to come help them, have just given up.

Most of the foreign volunteers, aid workers and journalists who are working in Burma, are working with either the Karen or Shan ethnic groups, as well as smaller ones such as Karenni, Pa-O, Padaung, Lisu, Lahu, and Akha. But the Rohingyas, a Muslim ethnic minority have the misfortune of living in Burma’s Arakan State (Rakhine), which is nearly unreachable from the outside.

The first cry for help that I heard from the Shan people was in 2004, when I was studying in a monastery with Shan refugees whose families had been murdered by the Burmese government. I never forgot the faces or the names of those young monks, and I vowed to help as much as I could. It took me three years to finally get inside of Burma and work with the Shan.

Today, as I sit in Malaysia and write this article about the Rohingya refugees, I stumbled across this old email, and realized it has been three years, and I still haven’t done anything to help. The magazine asked me to write an article about the Rohingya to help educate the public. But I am going to hijack this article and also use it as a cry for help. I really want to launch a health mission into Arakan State, or at least to help the Rohingyas on the border of India or Chin State. If there is anyone out there who would like to help, please contact me.

Who are the Rohingyas?

Burma is home to countless ethnic minorities. The Rohingyas are the only significant group of Muslims in the largely Buddhist country. There are also Indian Muslims, but they are a much smaller group, and they lack a unique ethnic state. The Rohingya population is about three-quarters of a million. They live in their own ethnic state called Arakan State (Rakhine), which borders on Bangladesh.

Their spoken language is called Rohingyalish and has never had a traditional writing system. The language has been written with Latin, Burmese, Hanifi, Urdu or modified Arabic script.

In Burma the SPDC (State Peace and Development Council), the repressive army of the Burmese Junta, has been waging a steady war against all of the minority peoples, who together, comprise nearly 60% of the population. The crimes against the Rohingya have been similar to those against other ethnic groups, namely: forced labor, murder, imprisonment, torture, rape, denying them citizenships, freedom of movement, basic human rights, or even a national ID card. Since 1978, when the government began launching major offensives against the Rohingyas, many have fled to Bangladesh where life in the refugee camps was not much better, and often worse than remaining in the Orwellian-Hell of Burma.

In 2005 the Bangladesh government began forcing Rohingyas to return to Burma. Many refugees believe that they would be jailed or killed if returned to Burma. But remaining in Bangladesh was also horrible because of the rape, torture, extortion and abuses perpetrated on them by the Bangladeshi government soldiers.

Although the Rohingyas always knew about themselves and their suffering the world first heard about the Rohingyas in 2009 when CNN, Aljazeera, and other international news media reported that the Thai military had towed boatloads of Rohingyas out to sea and abandoned them. At least one boat was rescued by Indonesian authorities and all 190 passengers gave testimony of beatings by Thai military and of having been set adrift on the ocean.

In 2004, the government of Malaysia announced that it would extend refugee status to the Rohingyas. Since then, many have sought refuge in the Muslim majority, Southeast Asian nation.

The Rohingya market outside Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

“Back in Burma, if the police saw you with a Koran outside the house they would beat you and take it from you and burn it.” Said a Rohingya man who we will call Asyef. “So, we tried hiding Koran in the house, up in the roof.” He was telling us a long list of reasons why he had to flee Burma.

We were sitting in a small eatery in the Rohingya community which I am told is home to 80,000 Rohingyas and another 30,000 people who the Rohingyas loosely refer to as Buddhist Burmese. My translator and guide is a Malay, named Saya, who seems to know everyone and everything that is happening in his country.

When I asked him to help me get a story on the Rohingyas in Malaysia he told me. “I can take you there. But it is very dangerous. You have to go easy. And maybe you can’t take any pictures.”

Nearly all of the people we spoke to were undocumented aliens, living at the mercy of the gods.

“Last month, the police raided the community and arrested 100 people.” Said Osama, a 22 year old Rohingya man who had been in Malaysia for four years. He proudly showed me his UNHCR card (United Nations High Commission for Refugees). It made him an official refugee and gave him residence and work privileges in Malaysia. He was still unemployed, but at least he couldn’t be arrested.

RELA is the Malay word for “volunteer”. Unfortunately, the Rela corps is a volunteer police force, of more than half a million people, in a country with less than 30 million population. The main focus of Rela corps is to check the documents of foreigners. They are paid a bounty for each undocumented alien they catch. Rela has been the bane of Burmese refugees, particularly non-Muslim refugees who find it more difficult to get a residency permit of any kind. The Rela volunteers act more or less with impunity and have been accused of numerous abuses. Many international bodies have asked the Malaysian government to disband Rela.

The men continued their accounts of atrocities in Burma.

“They burned the mosques.” said one man. Another used the word “broken.”

“On Fridays the police blockaded the way. If they saw us trying to go to prayers they would beat us or put us in jail.”

Saya and I had been sitting alone drinking coffee in this market, which everyone knew was home to a lot of dodgy and down right illegal activities, such as weapons and drug smuggling, and murder. Eventually, he asked the waiter if he could speak Malay enough to give me an interview. Surprisingly, the waiter tried, but finally had to give up. He left the restaurant. The Rohingyas are famous for being sea pirates, and I assumed he was on his way to gather a bully-squad of swashbuckling scallywags who would make us walk the plank for asking too many questions. Instead, he returned with a neatly dressed, well-mannered, young man, named Osama, who spoke Malay passably well.

At first, he was slow about answering our questions, not sure what we wanted. The vast majority of the Rohingyas are unemployed, so the two funny journalist men, one of them a white man, became a diversion for the whole neighborhood. A crowd slowly formed around us. At first, it was all men, and I was getting a bit nervous, but Saya, always the professional continued with his questions.

“Things in my country are so bad.” Said Osama, answering Saya’s question. “If the police catch you, they simply kill you. There was a curfew. Muslims weren’t allowed on the streets past 9:00 PM. In my country we were so poor we worked a whole week and had enough food for one day. I only went to school for two years because we didn’t have money.”

Even with the money Osama sends back to Burma now, it is not enough, and his little sister can’t go to school.

By this point, the restaurant was nearly full of people who had come to look at us. When I saw groups of women and children in the back, I breathed a sigh of relief. They probably weren’t going to kill us in front of their families.

I added a bunch of stools to our table and signaled the waiter to get drinks for everyone. The mood began to turn festive, as one by one, the people voiced their feelings about Burma and why they had left. Those that could speak Malay just blurted their stories out.

“If we go back they will arrest us.” Said one man.

“A one way trip. We can never go back.” Agreed another.

Those who couldn’t speak Malay asked friends to interpret for them.

“I walked thirty days across Thailand and twenty through Malaysia to get here.”

Another man said he used to like to call home once per week, but now his phone was out of credit and he had no work.

I asked the men how they sent money home to Burma. They told me there was a Rohingya bank in the grocery store upstairs. They would pay money to the clerk and twenty minutes later, a bicycle messenger would hand deliver the cash to the family in Burma.

Life had been hard for the Rohingyas in Burma. But it wasn’t easy for them in Malaysia either. I asked them what they liked best about living in Malaysia and to a man they all agreed, “attending mosque.” They all said they went five times per day, happy now because they could.

The mood had been very somber, so I told Saya to ask the men what they thought of Aung San Suu Kyi.

“Who is that?” asked Saya. He knew a lot about Malaysia, but decided little about Burma.
“Ask the men to tell you.” I said, with a sly smile.

The minute he mentioned her name, the room lit up. The men couldn’t speak quickly enough, singing the praises of “The Lady.”

“They told me she is in jail.” Said Saya, confused.

“That’s right. She has been for the last ten years.” I said.

“Just because she wanted democracy?” Asked Saya confused.

Malaysia, like many countries, had its good and bad points, but it was a relatively free country, where a significant percent of the population was middle class. And of course, it was a country where Muslims could worship in peace.

“That’s terrible.” Confirmed Saya, shaking his head.

Yeah, it was terrible. The situation of the Rohingya, and any other ethnic minority from Burma is terrible. Of the men in the room, only a few had a UNHCR cards. None of them had a Malay passport. None had a Burmese passport. And only one or two had a Burmese identity card. There was a small chance that a few of them might go on to be Malay citizens and find some kind of peace in their new life in Malaysia.

The others just sit and wait in limbo.

Catholics believe limbo is a place between heaven and hell. Burma is definitely hell. Hopefully some of the Rohingyas will find heaven.

Source : illumemag.com

Burmese Refugees in Malaysia Receive UN Registration

About 6,000 Burmese refugees in Malaysia including Burmese and Arakanese have been registered by the United Nations Higher Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), according to Burmese refugees in Malaysia.

Speaking to The Irrawaddy on Monday, Kyaw Kyaw Win, the general-secretary of Arakan Refugees Relief Committee, based in Malaysia, said, “ Of the total, Arakanese numbered about 3,863 and 1,962 are Burmese.”

The UNHCR began issuing registration documents for Burmese refugees on Aug. 17 and the process will end on Sept. 19.

Yante Ismail, a spokesperson of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Malaysia, told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday, the overall process is “on-going.”

At the end of June 2010, about 88,900 refugees and asylum-seekers were registered with the UNHCR in Malaysia, according to the UNHCR website.

Of those, 82,200 were refugees from Burma, comprising 38,700 Chin, 10,000 Rohingya, 7,000 Burmese Muslims, 3,800 Mon, 3,600 Kachin and other ethnic minorities from Burma.

The UNHCR said a large number of Burmese refugees remain unregistered. The refugee community estimates that unregistered refugees and asylum-seekers could number 10,000 people.

About 11,000 Burmese refugees in Malaysia including Chin, Mon, Shan and Kachin were registered by the UNHCR in 2009. Burmese and Arakanese were not recognized at that time.

About 50 Arakanese protested on June 6 outside the UNHCR office in Malaysia, saying the UN discriminated against Burmese ethnic groups. After the protest, UNHCR officials told the protesters that UNHCR policy was to provide registration.

“I think they didn't have any plan to give it to us if we didn't protest because we asked them many times, and they did not give it to us,” said Kyaw Kyaw Win. “After we protested, they told us they would give it to us within two weeks. But it took longer than that.”

Registration from the UNHCR is prized by Burmese refugees in Malaysia because it offers them some protection if they are arrested by Malaysian authorities. Registered refugees also pay half price for some medical fees at hospitals in Malaysia, according to Burmese refugees.

Aung Kyaw Satt, the secretary of National League for Democracy (Liberated Area) in Malaysia, said, “The benefit of this registration is that we can increase our security. We hear that they will have a big crackdown on September and October.

“If we are arrested, they (UNHCR) can get us out of the detention camps. There are many people who finish their detention time, but they continue to be detained because they don't have registration,” he said.

In detention camps in Malaysia, critics say there is inadequate medical treatment, and food and water is scarce for detainees in the camps. About nine Burmese detainees died in 2009 at detention camps in Malaysia from May to August due to an outbreak of Leptospirosis (an infectious disease caused by contaminated water or food which has been infected with rodent urine).

Burmese refugees who are registered by the UNHCR are also eligible for resettlement in third countries, but they frequently wait for up to one year or longer for resettlement.

“Many people want to go to third countries because our country is poor. The government oppresses the people, and the people don't think the 2010 election will bring anything good to their life,” said Aung Kyaw Satt.

About 500,000 Burmese migrants work in Malaysia, legally and illegally, according to the Kuala Lumpur-based Burma Workers’ Rights Protection Committee.

The Malaysian government has cooperated with the UNHCR on humanitarian grounds since 1975 even though Malaysia has not signed the UN Convention Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees. Burmese refugees have been sent to third countries including the United States, Canada, Australia, France, New Zealand, Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Norway.

Source : irrawaddy.org

Refugees International calls for international assistance for Chin refugees in India

Chin State

US based advocacy group Refugees International (RI) says the international community along with the UNHCR needs to do more for refugees from Burma’s Chin ethnic group in India.
There are estimated to be between 50,000 and 100,000 predominantly Chin refugees in Northeast India, along the border with Burma and thousands more in New Delhi.
However, India is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention and while it generally tolerates the presence of Burmese refugees, it does not afford them any legal protection.  This leaves them vulnerable to harassment, discrimination and deportation.
Many of the refugees cross the border to escape the ongoing famine in Chin State (See: CSW finds chronic food shortages and human rights abuses in western Burma).  Many Chin stay in the Northeast states of Mizoram and, to a lesser extent, Manipur, where there are large Chin populations.
However, the UNHCR is not allowed to maintain an office in the area. As a result, Chin refugees there receive little assistance or protection. However, there are several Chin community-based organisations in the area that work to support refugees.
The UNHCR does have an office in New Delhi and many refugees travel there in order to register and benefit from assistance programs run by the agency.
However, without legal protection, they are often subject to harassment in the city. RI notes, “Women refugees in particular are vulnerable to extensive assault and harassment in Delhi.”
RI is calling for overseas governments to support the Indian Government in developing and approving domestic refugee law to give legal status and protection to Burmese refugees and others. They also want the Indian Government to allow the UNHCR access to refugee populations throughout the country.
The also want the UNHCR to work with Chin community-based organisations to refine its assistance programs. They note, “International donors including the U.S UK, EU, and Australia should provide additional assistance to UNHCR for these programs.“
RI also wants international donors to provide support to Chin community-based organizations and Indian civil society groups to increase assistance to refugees in Delhi and the Northeast.

Mindat : Chin Christians protest destruction of Cross

source: CHRO

About 120 people marched through Delhi last week calling for religious freedom in Burma.
The protest was organised by Chin Churches and Christian Fellowship in response to the destruction of a 23-foot high concrete cross in Mindat, in Burma’s Chin State in July.

Mindat is a southern chin state of Burma where the K'Cho christians are living. It is known as the K'Cho Land, the Home Of Facial Tattooed Chins.

The cross was erected in 2008 to replace a wooden cross in a 20-acre prayer garden. It was erected with official permission from the local authorities.
However, it was destroyed based an the direct order of the authorities, including the District and Township level Peace and Development Council, the District Religious Affairs Department, and a Mindat abbot from the Hill Region Buddhist Mission, according to Chin Human Rights Organisation (CHRO).

The Chinland Guardian reports that Rev. Vungh Hau Thang told the gathering, “Although the state’s law has given religious freedom to all citizens in Burma, the military junta is still persecuting the Chin Christians through various forms of repressive measures. They have destroyed our Christian crosses, a symbol of our faith. This destruction in Chin State clearly shows the military”s ruthless attempts in dismantling our Christian faith, and eliminating the Christian Chins by means of systematic persecution.”

CHRO says at least nine crosses have been destroyed or dismantled in Chin State’s nine major townships since 1994. They said, “The SPDC claims to respect religious freedom for all faiths in Burma and yet they are actively pursuing a policy to persecute religious minorities in contravention of their own constitution and other international human rights standards, which they claim to observe.”

Destruction of Cross in Mindat, Chin State (Burma) condemned

The Chin Human Rights Organization has strongly condemned the destruction of a Christian cross in Chin State, in Burma recently. The Chiang Mai (Thailand) based rights body claimed that the cross, located on a hill above Khyauk-yaw village of Mkui Circus, Mindat Township was destroyed following orders from the military rulers in Nay Pie Taw.

"We have learnt that the 23-foot high concrete Christian cross in Mindat Township of southern Chin State was pulled down by some goons on July 24. The authorities including the district and township level Peace and Development Council, the District Religious Affairs Department and the Hill Region Buddhist Mission were aware of the incident, but they did not prevent it," said an advocacy member of CHRO.

Approximately 90 per cent of Chin State's population is Christian, making it the single largest Christian-concentrated state in a predominantly Buddhist Burma. Christianity was introduced to the Chin people by the American Baptist Missionaries in 1889 and has since become an integral part of Chin identity. Increased militarization in Chin State since the time of the popular uprising in 1988 has led to a dramatic increase in human rights violations against the local population, including religious persecution. In 2004 CHRO published "Religious Persecution: A Campaign of Ethnocide Against Chin Christians in Burma, documenting the destruction of churches and Christian infrastructure; the arrest, torture and extrajudicial killings of Christian pastors; and restrictions on freedom of assembly and worship.

Since 1994, the regime has destroyed nine Christian crosses in Falam, Hakha, Kanpalet, Mindat, Matupi, Paletwa, Teddim, Tonzang and Thantlang Townships. In some cases, Buddhist religious infrastructure such as pagodas, monasteries and statues have been built on the very sites where Christian crosses were destroyed, sometimes with forced labour exacted from the local Christian population. The regime has also prohibited the construction and renovation of Christian churches. By contrast, according to the regime's own data, eight pagodas and 56 monasteries have been built by the authorities in Chin State in the last 20 years, with full funding from State Ministries such as the Ministry of Religious Affairs, and Ministry for Progress of Border Areas and National Races Development Affairs.

Rachel Fleming of CHRO Advocacy Director however pointed out that the article 34 of the ruling State Peace and Development Council's 2008 Constitution supposedly guarantees freedom of religion, subject to public order, morality or health and to the other provisions of this Constitution. Similarly, he added, article 348 refers to freedom from discrimination on religious grounds, while 354(d) elaborates on religious and other fundamental freedoms.