"We are All Refugees"

By Dr. Tayza

Although Burma cannot produce cars or computers or airplanes, Burma nowadays is mass producing refugees and exporting them to all over the world. This refugee production scheme is efficiently run under superb guidance of Burma’s State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) military regime.

So here we are all refugees, the product of nearly half a century of military rule in Burma.

Only recently, when regime's troops made an offensive on Karen villages forcing tens of thousands of Karens to leave their homes and hide in jungles, Burma's Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) and refugees get international media attention. But Burma's refugee problem has been going on since many decades ago.

There are estimated half a million Karen and Karenni refugees living in miserable conditions in those God-forsaken camps along Thai-Burma border.

Further three hundred thousands of Shan refugees are staying in Thailand with no status, as illegal immigrants or people-without-country.

At the same time, on the western border of Burma, many hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslim minorities had fled the country to escape persecution by military regime. Some of them have been resettled in Muslim countries around the world. But many still remain as refugees living under inhumane conditions along Bangladesh border.

And since current military rulers first came to power in 1988, thousands of Burmese pro-democracy activists had to run away to foreign lands to escape death under torture in military regime's notorious detention and interrogation centers. At first they fled to Thai and India border regions, but later on they got resettlements in western countries as political refugees.

But nowadays, even those areas along Thai border which were previously under control of ethnic resistance forces and regarded safe and liberated areas no longer exist. Military regime has forced ethnic resistance forces to surrender. Even the once prestigious and mighty Karen resistance force, Karen National Union KNU, has been seriously weakened by military regime's frequent attacks on them.

And Burmese military generals have got Thailand and India into their pockets by seducing them with natural gas supply from Burma's off-shore gas-fields. So Thailand and India who were traditionally sympathetic to Burma's pro-democracy movement have changed their attitude and toughened their stance on Burmese refugees.
Recently Thaksin’s government of Thailand forced Burmese political activists to live in those God-forsaken refugee detention camps along Thai-Burma border. Refugees in those camps not only have to live under inhumane conditions, but also have no access to the outside world. Although conditions in those camps are as bad as in Dafaur (Sudan), they do not get as much international media attention as in Dafaur, because Thaksin government is effectively preventing media access into those camps.

Moreover, people in those refugee detention camps along Thai Burma border are vulnerable to be kidnapped by Burmese secret police and disappear quietly to nowhere.

While more and more people are rotting inside refugee detention camps along Thai Burma border, Burma’s military generals have become happier and happier day by day. They have explicitly clarified their ultimate goal; both Senior General Than Shwe and his deputy Maung Aye said that in future Karens (and other ethnic minority races) will be found only in museums. They have already made up their mind to make ethnic minority races become extinct like dinosaurs. In fact, although they said only about extinction of ethnic races, the same thing holds true also for pro-democracy political opposition.

So, to avoid the fate of rotting in refugee detention camps along Thai-Burma border people try to flee directly to western democratic countries where they hope to be treated more humanely.

These days, many a student political activists try to get passports and visas for studies in western countries, and as soon as they reach western countries they apply for asylum on political grounds.

If such asylum seekers are sent back to Burma, Burmese regime will definitely throw them into jail for at least twenty years. Once a western European government sent back a Burmese political asylum seeker to Burma, and as soon as he arrived back in Rangoon airport Burmese authorities arrested him on the spot and gave him nineteen years rough labor and prison sentence. So now, as western democracies do not want to get involved in Burmese military regime's crimes against humanity, they have to let Burmese political asylum seekers stay in their countries.

On the other hand, Russia and China are saying that Burma’s refugee problem is not an international affair. Of course, they can say it because no Burmese political refugee in his right mind will ever try to seek asylum in Russia or China. It will be like a fish jumping out of boiling water and falling instead into fire.

Believe it or not, Burma's refugee problem has become an international affair. As long as military regime is in power in Burma, more and more refugees will arrive in the western countries. There are estimated half a million Burmese in the USA currently, as refugees, as asylum seekers, as legal migrants and as illegal workers. And European countries have also had their fair share of refugees and asylum seekers from Burma. But of course no body will go to Russia or China and they can safely insist that they do not regard Burma's refugee problem as an international affair. And they get Burma's natural resources at knock-down prices from Burmese military regime and can also sell off their old military equipments to Burmese regime at hugely inflated prices.

So apart from Russia and China, other countries especially those countries with democratic governments and human-rights laws have to bear the burden of Burmese refugees and asylum seekers despite rising levels of anti-immigration sentiments among their own people.

So Burma's problems have definitely become an international affair. And removing military rule in Burma has become an obligation for the entire international community.

So governments of the world nowadays have a tough decision to make, i.e., to choose between "short-term gains for their businessmen by doing business engagements with Burma's military regime" and "long-term peace and stability for the whole world by removing military rule and helping democracy and human rights restored in Burma".

Dr. Tayza the author of this article is a medical doctor and a human rights activists from Burma. He submitted this article to “Asian Tribune.”

- Asian Tribune -