Stranded in Thailand, Rohingya Trafficking Victims in Limbo

[Lite Beer]

Stranded in Thailand, Rohingya Trafficking Victims in Limbo

By Khaosod Eng.

The hands of a Rohingya victim of trafficking are seen as he listens to questions during an interview with the Thomson Reuters Foundation at a temporary shelter in Hat Yai, Songkhla province on Sept. 22. Photo: Reuters / Athit Perawongmetha

SONGKHLA — The strapping 23-year-old Rohingya Muslim was matter of fact as he described being forced onto a boat in Myanmar for a tortuous two-month-long journey, beaten and kicked by traffickers as he watched scores die of starvation and thirst along the way.

He said he was abandoned in May in a jungle camp in Thailand's deep south near the Malaysian border, discovered and rescued a few hours later by Thai police and taken to a shelter tucked away amid tropical vegetation and rubber plantations.

But his calm demeanor cracked when he spoke about his wife and one-year-old daughter.

On many evenings in this compound of cement buildings that has become home to 66 male Rohingya trafficking victims from Myanmar and 19 from Bangladesh, the man cried, homesick.

Late last month, the shelter staff took pity on him, granting him a five-minute phone call to his home in Sittwe in western Myanmar's Rakhine state.

"I could hear my baby crying," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation under the wary gaze of the shelter director, who monitored the interview he had reluctantly permitted with the condition that the man's identity was protected.

"I want to go home. I miss them," the Rohingya man added, falling silent and bending over as he crumpled in sadness.

Swept up by trafficking rings taking advantage of the tens of thousands of Rohingya Muslims fleeing violence and apartheid-like conditions in Myanmar, this man may never go back home.

The predominantly Buddhist country does not recognize the Rohingya as citizens and says any trafficking victims must pass nationality verification before being allowed back to Myanmar.

He is now among about 600 Rohingya stranded in limbo in Thai shelters and immigration detention centers, some suffering depression and other mental illnesses after their ordeals, with little access to mental health care.

Read More: http://www.khaosodenglish.com/detail.php?newsid=1444462230

-- Khaosod English 2015-10-10

[seajae]

so he left his wife and daughter there yet he fled because it is too violent, says a lot about the way they think doesnt it, i'll p*ss off and leave you lot here and never see you again but will miss you???????????. They could at least be honest and say they are simply economic refugees, what man in his right mind leaves his own family behind while he flees if it is as bad as they say.

[Emster23]

If Australia Channel program "Four Corners" with title "Journey to Hell" ever pops up on youtube etc, give it a look. Myanmar keeps Rohingya in open air concentration camps, only getting food from UN. Worst part was showing camps in South Thailand and Malaysia. Former inmates reported immigration sold them to traffickers. Hundreds of bodies buried up there. Went to Padangbesar graveyard next to police station and traffickers house to point out bodies buried there. Loved the line "If Thai police wish to look into this, they only need to step outside the station to see it". 800 meters from border checkpoint.

So this guy is lucky. Better to be in limbo than put into hell abetted by officials for profit.

[Mudcrab]

Trafficking victims? Really? Forced on to a boat?

Unless he has been kidnapped and forced to work against his will as a slave, then there is nothing victimlike about this at all.

As seajae notes...wife and child left behind in such terrible conditions..............must sound familiar to those following the current European invasion experience..oooh it is so bad back in my home country, but I left my wife and kids there to fend for themselves....what men!

[simple1]

so he left his wife and daughter there yet he fled because it is too violent, says a lot about the way they think doesnt it, i'll p*ss off and leave you lot here and never see you again but will miss you???????????. They could at least be honest and say they are simply economic refugees, what man in his right mind leaves his own family behind while he flees if it is as bad as they say.

The OP is about people traffickers, not people smugglers. However, I guess you missed the words in the first sentence "he described being forced onto a boat in Myanmar" by traffickers

Edited October 10, 2015 by simple1

[Seastallion]

so he left his wife and daughter there yet he fled because it is too violent, says a lot about the way they think doesnt it, i'll p*ss off and leave you lot here and never see you again but will miss you???????????. They could at least be honest and say they are simply economic refugees, what man in his right mind leaves his own family behind while he flees if it is as bad as they say.

Get real. These are un-educated people in desperate straights.

Firstly, it appears he was abducted...it's slavery. To be sold to fishing boats.

Secondly, if he was complicit in his leaving (eg, he was told, "Come with us, you'll earn some money and you can send for your wife after you settle down". or similar, it still does not alter the fact that he was trafficked.

These people are truly oppressed and taken advantage of.

[Seastallion]

Trafficking victims? Really? Forced on to a boat?

Unless he has been kidnapped and forced to work against his will as a slave, then there is nothing victimlike about this at all.

As seajae notes...wife and child left behind in such terrible conditions..............must sound familiar to those following the current European invasion experience..oooh it is so bad back in my home country, but I left my wife and kids there to fend for themselves....what men!

On the one hand you acknowledge that the conditions are terrible, yet on the other you condemn him for going forth into the unknown to try to make a better life for his baby. (IF in fact he was not simply shanghaied)

Would YOU venture forth into the unknown with your wife and baby? Or would you bravely take the risk first, in the hope that you can send for them later?

[farangmick]

Rightly or wrongly, stick the word "Muslim" in front of "refugee", or "asylum seeker" and attitudes change. Even the mega rich Muslim Gulf States won't have them. Let in more than a very few, and instead of gratitude, the demand that the host country adapt to them, rather than the other way round. Britain has had it for 50 years. Forced marriages, "honour" killings, FGM, sharia law, halal slaughterhouses. Can't complain. "Well it's their (9th century) culture, isn't it?"

[robertthebruce]

so so sad , terrible situation...

[kiwikeith]

so he left his wife and daughter there yet he fled because it is too violent, says a lot about the way they think doesnt it, i'll p*ss off and leave you lot here and never see you again but will miss you???????????. They could at least be honest and say they are simply economic refugees, what man in his right mind leaves his own family behind while he flees if it is as bad as they say.

The OP is about people traffickers, not people smugglers. However, I guess you missed the words in the first sentence "he described being forced onto a boat in Myanmar" by traffickers

And being sold to traffickers, so in the bigger picture who is buying these slaves at the other end???, no mention of that, we forget that America had a civil war to stop exploitation of Negro slaves -- some of them never made it to America as they were beaten, starved, raped and thrown overboard if the boat was in trouble.

Civilization in this world today has not gone forward it has gone backwards, with politicians at the for-front of corruption, look at America today being run by lobyists for drug companies, arms manufacturers and corporate giants.

Same the world over and a sorry state this world is in.

The worst thing that may happen is that these maniacs will start war 3 and expect all of us to become missile fodder to solve the problem.