Dec. 9, 2006
 
HMONG UPDATE: Thai Authorities Prepared for Deportation of 152 Hmong Lao Refugees
 
By HNN Staff
 
Although UNHCR (UN High Commissioner for Refugees) officials in Bangkok were confident that the deportation of 152 Hmong Lao refugees was suspended, Thai authorities nevertheless prepared yesterday night for their deportation.
 
The 152 Hmong Lao refugees were part of a group of 194 Hmong refugees, rounded up in Bangkok city, in Thailand, and held as illegal migrants at Suan Phlu Detention Center for the past three weeks.
 
After days of negotiations with relevant UN agencies and supporting governments, who raised their concerns to Thailand on behalf of the 194 Hmong Lao refugees, the forced deportation was understood as suspended.
 
But Thai police trucked last night 152 of the 194 Hmong Lao refugees to Nong Khai --to the police station they fear the most; near to the border Thailand, Laos -- it means deportation, sources told HNN.
 
This very same Nong Khai police station made headlines recently with its forced deportation activities. Nong Khai police recently dumped 52 Hmong refugees and one baby at the Laotian side of the border. The 52 terrified Hmong Lao refugees had begged the Thai authorities not to send them back to Laos. The 52 Hmong forcefully deported refugees were reportedly shot and killed by Lao authorities.
 
See previous stories on the 52:
 
http://www.huntingtonnews.net/national/061031-kinchen-hmong.html
 
http://www.huntingtonnews.net/national/061115-kinchen-hmong.html
 
Sources told HNN that at the Nong Khai police station, the terrified 152 refugees await a similar fate. They are currently aggressively pressured to sign with their thumbprints, to agree to return to Laos. Some were beaten by the Thai police.
 
But the Hmong refugees do not want to return to Laos, and decline to sign with their thumbprints, because they belong to those Hmong refugees in Thailand, who fled a life in terror and fear – hiding in isolated remote mountainous jungle areas in Laos. They have been chased and eliminated by Laotian and Vietnamese military.
 
The Hmong Lao refugee crisis in Thailand is largely connected to the merciless military crack down on the Hmong Lao of more than 10,000 ethnic minority people, hiding for more than 30 years in remote mountains of Laos.
 
Currently, the groups-in-hiding report from various Laotian provinces to endure severe non-stop attacks by Laotian and Vietnamese soldiers. See previous story:
 
http://www.huntingtonnews.net/national/061009-kinchen-hmong.html
 
Since last week, a whole military training area of Laos is considered to be “ethnically cleansed” of Hmong Lao, known to have lived-in-hiding in Bolikhamxay province, avoiding any contact with the Lao authorities.
 
Sources told HNN that Laos successfully eliminated all remaining Hmong Lao and other ethnic minorities who lived, under the circumstances, in voluntary isolation. Only a few refugees have survived the chemical bombs, sources said.
 
Also in Vang Vieng province, and Louang Prabang province, major groups-in-hiding of Hmong Lao, hundreds and hundreds of people, most of them women and children, are surrounded by military battalions, and aggressively attacked with rockets and bombs -- including chemical weapons.
 
Sources said 300 Hmong refugees decided to walk towards Mouang Fueung, and surrender to the authorities. They are expected to arrive soon – to meet the very same soldiers that eliminated many of their people during the attack.
 
One group is known to hide in closed fox holes and caves to hinder inhalation of the smoke of the chemical poison they are bombed with by the military.
 
Many hundreds of Hmong in-hiding have been massacred during the past weeks.
 
The majority of the 152 Hmong refuges are under the protection of the UNHCR, considered to be under serious risk of persecution or loss of life if returned to Laos.
 
If Thailand proceeds with the suspended deportation of the 152 Lao Hmong scheduled on Nov. 17, 2006, it would be in direct violation of international law, respected human rights sources told HNN.