By Irving Feng
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia
BANGKOK, Thailand – Over 600 displaced Rohingya Muslims were found by Thai authorities after police raided a warehouse in the town of Sadao in Songkhla province and a rubber plantation in a Malaysian border town of Pedang Besar.
Police suspected that the raid sites were utilized by local human traffickers and discovered the refugees during their operations. Among the Rohingya discovered in Pedang Besar, roughly 20 of the refugees were women and children.
The Thai landowner of the raid sites is now being sought by the local authorities on illegal human trafficking charges. The charge of sheltering illegal migrants has also been tacked on by the officials seeking to prosecute the alleged traffickers.
Reports say that the Rohingya refugees had fled Myanmar and were passing through Thailand en route to a third destination. The migration was entirely voluntary by the Rohingya refugees; however, the migrants had been housed in the warehouse for 3 months prior to discovery.
The refugees were reportedly travelling to a final destination in Malaysia and the camps were temporary holding facilities as they passed through. The landowners were middlemen who were paid to help facilitate the refugees’ journey.
The migrations may have been voluntary because the Rohingya people are currently stateless. The Myanmar government continues to deny the Rohingya people official citizenship status. Myanmar also classifies them as illegal Bangladeshi immigrants.
Nearby Bangladesh also denies the Rohingya people official status creating hostility and persecution for the stateless refugees. The Thai government has refused to grant asylum and plans to force the recently discovered refugees back onto rickety and overcrowded boats for departure, similar to the ones they utilized during their arrival.
Similar incidents in 2008, where Rohingya were forcibly deported from Thailand, generated tragic results. The Thai military put roughly 1000 Rohingya refugees onto boats without food or water causing hundreds of deaths.
The violence in the Rakhine state of Myanmar last June has caused a large displacement of the Rohingya people. Of the 800,000 Rohingya people, an estimated 110,000 people were displaced, many of which were Rohingya.
Rights groups have clamored to the international community about Thailand’s attitude toward the recently discovered Rohingya refugees in the two police raids. Thailand’s refusal of asylum for the stateless refugees and sending them back to sea in rickety boats without food or water is seen as shameful.
Thailand had already deported 73 of the Rohingya people back to Myanmar last week, but the boat landed in the nearby Thai island of Phuket.
For further information, please see:
Al Jazeera – Myanmar Rohingya refugees rescued in Thailand – 11 January 2013
Breitbart – 700 ROHINGYA IN THAILAND TO BE DEPORTED TO MYANMAR – 11 January 2013
Reuters – Over 600 illegal Rohingya migrants held in Thai raids – 11 January 2013
San Jose Mercury News – Rohingya boat people found adrift near Thai resort – 1 January 2013
