April 17, 2007
 
HMONG LAO UPDATE: 21 Hmong Lao Refugee Children Found Alive; Laos Refuses to Return Them to Their Parents
 
By David M. Kinchen
Editor, Huntington News Network
 
Less than a month ago Laotian Deputy Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith -- in his additional capacity as the Minister of Foreign Affairs -- launched a massive PR campaign to the international media, bragging that most of the missing Hmong children and teenagers -- after more than a year of denial by Laos – have finally been found and reunited with their parents.
 
But fearing possible loss of control over what the children may say to the outside word, Laos now declines to return them to their parents residing in Thailand’s refugee camp, according to US based Hmong Elder Lo Thao, from the Hmong 18 Clan Council.
 
“Human Rights groups are outraged by the refusal of Laos to work openly and transparently with the international community, and to obey international human rights standards,” said Rebecca Sommer, from the NGO Society for Threatened Peoples International in New York.
 
“We request that the 21 minors be returned to their parents, who are anxiously waiting for them in Thailand’s refugee camp Ban Huay Nam Khao, and we want to know about the rest of the missing children.” Sommer added.
 
The story began in November 28, 2005, when 28 Hmong Lao refugee children and teenagers and one Hmong adult were moved out of the temporary refugee settlement -- “White Water” -- in Petchabun, to a nearby Hmong-Thai village by Christian missionaries.
 
Although Thai authorities had strictly forbidden the refugees to leave the camp, the 29 Hmong Lao refugees accepted the missionaries’ invitation to attend their Christmas Choir outside of the camp borders.
 
Upon returning to the refugee camp, the group of Hmong Lao refugees were arrested by Thai police on their way back to the camp. Police detained the 28 minors and one adult female at the local police station in Khao Khor, until December 3, 2005.
 
The parents who had fled from Laos to Thailand seeking political asylum, claiming severe human rights violations from their country of origin, Laos, never saw their children again.
 
Sommer says the story unfolded with Thai Chief police officer Souk Phachai continuously trying to receive “release fees” from the Hmong parents in order to return their children, but the refugee parents, who barely escaped from Laos, had not enough money to give to satisfy the growing payment requests made by the Thai official. This official, Sommer says, is still today in office, regardless of charges on his unethical behavior which has been made public -- and was never investigated by the Royal Thai Police Department.
 
On Dec. 3, 2005, the Thai police illegally deported 26 of the frightened children back to Laos, without the informed consent by their parents, Sommer said.
 
Numerous reports made by Hmong residents in Laos, and Lao police officers to US based Hmong Lao networks circulated since than, informing that the minors have been held in different prisons in Laos, and moved over and over again to different prisons, Tales of beatings, sex slavery, torture and killings alarmed Human Rights advocacy groups, and the desperate Hmong refugee parents.
 
Sommers notes with irony "that It took well over a year, despite persistent requests to Laos, made by governments, UN agencies and NGOs, to locate and return the children until Laos, which held since a month ago firmly to its position that the children have never been returned back to Laos in an organized manner between Thai and Lao authorities, until they were now -- all of a sudden -- found and presented to the media by Lao officials."
 
“It remains to be seen how the minors, 21 of them girls, have been treated by the Lao authorities, as the well orchestrated media campaign conducted by Laos, with pictures of Lao controlled journalists gathering around the 21 minors, and reporting about their well-being , is not considered a trustworthy information source by outsiders, who remain suspicious." said Hmong Elder Seng Lee, from the US based Hmong 18 Clan Council. "The minors are claimed to be under tight Laotian surveillance, and are awaiting their final release to be forwarded to their Lao based Hmong relatives, which have gathered in Muang Phone Hong."
 
“It is common practice that everyone is severely intimidated not to say one word against the communist Lao government, and we assume that the relatives in Laos, and the minors have received their share of warnings and threats” said Kue Xiong, president of the US based NGO Hmong Lao Human Rights Council, in an interview on April 14, 2007.
 
US based support group Fact Finding Commission received alarming news from credible sources last week, that 2 of the missing Hmong girls have died in Laotian prisons due to poor treatment and severe traumatized anxiety.
 
“We believe that they have been tortured, raped, and starved” said Chue Chou Tchang, president of US based Hmong veteran organization SGU. “Same with the others still missing, don’t tell us that the found minors have been treated well, we hear from our Lao based sources what has been going on, the Lao government will not succeed with their intimidation tactics so that everyone remains silent.”
 
While this new developments of the found minors created a wave of great relief by those who had followed the story closely, the increasing attacks by members of the military against the Hmong still hiding in the jungles of Laos, one of the reasons why so many fled to Thailand, continues in rapid pace.
 
There are reports of a new poison being deployed against the Hmong Lao groups hiding from Lao and Vietnamese military aggressions, and of a growing decline in numbers of Hmong Lao survivors. What had been an estimated number of more than 20,000 Hmong Lao still hiding in the jungle seems today below the 10,000 mark, said Sommers.
 
“So far, no action has been taken to safe the remaining Hmong which are desperately running and hiding from ever increasing military units which are hunting and eliminating them” said Ruhi Hamid, BBC journalist and filmmaker, who visited and documented a Hmong group in hiding, which surrendered with no reports on their whereabouts or well-being, while the rest of the group has been wiped out by the military forces.
 
Some very few survivors had fled to Thailand and were the subjects of alarming incidents of forced deportation attempts by Thai police, which made headlines in the Media. International intervention brought the last deportation attempt by Lao and Thai police to a halt. The survivors held in Thailand’s Detention Center are anxiously waiting to be resettled to Australia and other countries, which Thailand is hindering since many month in fear that resettlement may encourage more refugees to seek refuge in Thailand.
 
CLICK here to see the article on the group which journalist Ruhi Hamid visited, and what happened to them:
 
http://www.hmongtoday.com/displaynews.asp?ID=2384
 
http://www.huntingtonnews.net/national/061005-kinchen-hmong.html
 
Lia Vang, journalist for Hmong Lao Radio: "While some radical Hmong groups based in the US are spreading concerning claims of unrealistic goals of the creation of an independent country for the Hmong, causing great confusion on the actual situation of our people which are hiding in remote mountain areas inside of Laos and are not seeking independence, but try to survive. We as human rights advocates will continue to raise awareness on the realistic situation of the remaining groups-in hiding, who avoid any contact with the main stream society and the military. Trapped and surrounded, attacked and starving, they are too afraid to come out. Those who surrender, face an uncertain fate.“
 
“The US State Department is in a form of denial, and act as if the situation does not exist, while the UN seems to believe that the Hmong are insurgents,” said Ruhi Hamid, a free-lance journalist and filmmaker for BBC. ”If these people are insurgents, I cannot imagine how: They barely have weapons, they have no clothes, they have no food, they have nothing, and the children -- they know nothing but suffering. This is a human crisis --which must be resolved,” Hamid added.
 
“It appears that the US concluded that the Hmong are terrorists, just look at the provision in the USA Patriot Act which defines Hmong refugees as terrorists. It is time that we listen to the affected Hmong, those in hiding, and the refugees, instead of believing radical groups based in the US, and Laotian propaganda,” said rights advocate Rebecca Sommer.
 
“It is time that everyone is looking at the actual situation of living human beings, who are simply trying to live their lives as best they can after a long and tragic history, They need to have their rights protected, and whatever is put forward by outside groups or governments should not be used to distort the reality, which is that the Hmong people deserve to have their basic human rights protected” said Larry Cox, executive director of Amnesty International USA last week.
 
In the meantime, those Hmong who successfully escaped from Laos to the refugee camp Ban Huay Nam Khao, by now holding more than 8,000 people, a resettlement to the new location nearby is on its way. Slowly but surely they will be able to live in less crowded conditions. There are concerns that the new camp at the new location will hold the refugees in further tightened controlled confinement.
 
Not so lucky were newly arriving Hmong refugees, who fled from the military training areas inside of Laos, and belong to a group in hiding.
 
On April 10, 2007, the group of 13 Hmong reported themselves to the Thai camp authorities, and were quickly arrested and removed from the refugee camp.
 
“We hope that the UN will check to find out where they are, we revealed their names to the UNHCR in Bangkok, and hope that they will find way’s to protect them, otherwise the 13 Hmong from the jungle will be deported back to Laos, if it hasn’t already been done - as with many others who where forced back to the very country which they fled in fear and terror by the Thai authorities," added Kue Xiong.