Should The West Be More Like Thailand In Its Refugee Attitude?

[Brewster67]

I am sure you remembered all the global criticism towards thailand over its attitude towards alledged 'refugees' earlier in the year.

I am talking about the Urghurs and the Rohingha. Which were rounded up, some say abused, some say blocked from moving onwards to other countries, some say economic migrants. Many people have different ways of viewing them.

We have seen the effects of a more liberal and humane approach to what is unfolding in Europe at the moment. Even n the USA (and you have to remember the US have had this going on for decades).

But regarding the European crisis.... Have they been too soft and thus been responsible for aggrivating the problem?

Should the whole world be asked to assist including Thailand? To take a share to spread them out rather than being a huge burdon on other parts of the world?

Very tricky debatable problem, because we all know that only a small amount are actually 'refugees' and I am talking a tiny fraction seeing as they are passing through safe countries to reach rich and generous welfare states.

Should they be allowed to shun coming to Thailand if a certain amout were offered refuge here till their country was sorted?

I am a big believer in 'beggars can't be choosers'. Especially all those who are merely fleeing poverty and nothing else and completely blanking the international immigration laws as though they don't apply to them.

Edited October 31, 2015 by Brewster67

[Supaluke]

You imply that there there is a common and unified responce from the member states of the European Union, but nothing could be further from the truth.

Compare the responses from Germany and Hungry.

[i claudius]

YES,YES,YES YES,YES, WHAT MORE CAN ONE SAY the west will not be the place we knew and loved in 20 to 30 years,it will become a cesspit like the country's those of a certain faith left

[Brewster67]

You imply that there there is a common and unified responce from the member states of the European Union, but nothing could be further from the truth.

Compare the responses from Germany and Hungry.

No, I am not impling hat there is any common refugee policy in the EU.

You would have to be living on the moon not to know the crisis is tearing Europe apart politically.

But there is a definite dominant element including at commission level that is forcing this issue onto other nation states whether they want it or not, and the EU project itself relies heavily in the destruction of the nation state, and what better way to dissolve national identity that by changing the entire face of the culture in those states.

This element are using 'humane' and 'refugees fleeing the horror of war' as an excuse to open the doors and anyone who dares object.... well we have seen the response to that.

Which will backfire in spectacular style, because if anything it is likely going to collapse the whole project.

Edited October 31, 2015 by Brewster67

[CharlieH]

Hardly a Thai related Topic.

Moved to the Pub.

[YeahSiam]

YES,YES,YES YES,YES, WHAT MORE CAN ONE SAY the west will not be the place we knew and loved in 20 to 30 years,it will become a cesspit like the country's those of a certain faith left

Yes, the place you

loved so much, you

emigrated to Thailand

[arunsakda]

What a silly question in the OP, really?. What any country should do is examine whether they take their reponsibilities under international law seriously or not. I suppose here here we are speaking of the UNHCR Refugee convention of 1951 and later protocols and ammendments.

If any signatory does not want to abide by the conventions they should be honest and withdraw from them. None of this rubbish of talking big regarding human rights and doing otherwise.

Edited October 31, 2015 by arunsakda

[PattayaPhom]

What a silly question in the OP, really?. What any country should do is examine whether they take their reponsibilities under international law seriously or not. I suppose here here we are speaking of the UNHCR Refugee convention of 1951 and later protocols and ammendments.

If any signatory does not want to abide by the conventions they should be honest and withdraw from them. None of this rubbish of talking big regarding human rights and doing otherwise.

UNHCR Refugee convention of 1951 but ist that the part that says "first safe country"...well many of the millions that are 90% male between 21-35 years of age have travelled through numerous "safe: countries, in fact most have lived and or worked in Turkey for a few years and have been targeted by human traffickers for the financial gains. Not one single person from Syria, Iran Eritea etc should be anywhere on European soil seeking refuge legally. Face reality, they are all economic migrants and mostly ungrateful for the assistance they are receiving to boot

[steven100]

country shopping is illegal.

[shirtless]

I think they would be better settled in some prosperous country in the middle east .

[Smurkster]

YES,YES,YES YES,YES, WHAT MORE CAN ONE SAY the west will not be the place we knew and loved in 20 to 30 years,it will become a cesspit like the country's those of a certain faith left

Yes, the place you

loved so much, you

emigrated to Thailand

?

maybe his situation is far from the cut and dried way you have assumed..?

[anfh]

One problem of all this, is that the vast majority are muslims, now muslims have been settling in UK for years, the premise being that they will intigrate in the UK multi cultural society.

This has clearly not happened, there are are huge areas of major cities with predominently muslim communities who do not intigrate, and effectively do not want to. They live by thier sharia laws, and indeed are attempting to bring these laws into the mainstream laws of the UK in some cases. There is obviously a huge section who follow the jihad ethic from within the UK etc

There is also the fact that many of these so called refugees are comming from effectivly lawless countries, and being "integrated" into law abiding societiies, which causes more conflict. This can be seen from nunerous footage from thier trek across Europe, the total carnage, rubbish and disregard for the people and countries they are travelling through.

There is huge rising resentment in all the countries that are supposedly offering refuge to these people, ( who are refusing refuge in some countries as it not up to the standard they require ie financial handouts ) as time goes by this will get worse.

Mereley accepting these people into differant societies is not the answer to this situation,

[Smurkster]

Its always amusing to me as an American, whenever I hear any complaints from other Americans about "Sharia law hijacking The USA" I laugh..USA has not the slightest clue as to what happens when those certain types of Muslims infiltrate, they complain, but US has not experienced anywhere near the sort of crap the UK has

Edited October 31, 2015 by Smurkster

[Sutty]

Europe or should I say Germany forcing the rest of Europe have made there bed now they have to lye in it and mighty uncomfortable it's going to be. Whe should Thailand take any not that any would want to come here no benifits to claim. Cynical yes I am feel any sort of pity for the refugees No not one bit look at the news 99% of what I see are fit young men who could fight for there freedom mind most probably will be fighting in EU countries for IS

[duanebigsby]

Its always amusing to me as an American, whenever I hear any complaints from other Americans about "Sharia law hijacking The USA" I laugh..USA has not the slightest clue as to what happens when those certain types of Muslims infiltrate, they complain, but US has not experienced anywhere near the sort of crap the UK has

Of course not.

The US hasn't accepted anyone fleeing from the war that they created.

[duanebigsby]

So a country being overrun, the shit being bombed out of it, in total turmoil and only a fraction are "genuine refugees"?

They are only going to the countries for welfare handouts?

How narrow minded the anti refugee voices are.. There is a problem that was created by the US and Coalition involvement in the Middle East

which needs addressing. But to say people are just coming for welfare cheques is narrow minded.

[sugarcane24]

Should all the countries in the world get together through UNHCR and each take a temporary share of refugees?

1. Yes, they should take some of the strain.
2. No, Let Europe take them all, even if it collapses them.

-----------------------------------------
Why only these two options? It seems that a majority of the so-called refugees are not refugees but simply illegal immigrants looking for a better life in the West. How about all nations take a hard line approach like Hungary? Otherwise, the flood of Africans may well be the end of Europe as we knew it.

[louse1953]

YES,YES,YES YES,YES, WHAT MORE CAN ONE SAY the west will not be the place we knew and loved in 20 to 30 years,it will become a cesspit like the country's those of a certain faith left

No,these people left the cesspit behind,they are running from terror,a lot of it,caused by the west fiddling in something they know nothing about.

[Surasak]

Merkel's mouth is the cause of most of the problem in the EU. She invited the refugess to Germany welcoming the first wave with open arms without thinking of the Concequences. Now the whole of europe has to suffer because she tried to make herself look good. Stupid woma!

[Doc46]

Who gives a shit about International law,Every country knows that it HAS to take care of their OWN people first,,,Stupid question from the OP to ask to vote.

[sugarcane24]

Merkel's mouth is the cause of most of the problem in the EU. She invited the refugess to Germany welcoming the first wave with open arms without thinking of the Concequences. Now the whole of europe has to suffer because she tried to make herself look good. Stupid woma!

You are ignoring the fact that Merkel is just a puppet put in charge of running the US colony referred to as the Federal Republic of Germany and has to do as she is told, and that the refugee crisis has been planned by the psychopaths at the top to finish Europe.

[F4UCorsair]

Compare the responses from Germany and Hungry.

Compare the responses from Germany and HungAry as well.

[Mudcrab]

So a country being overrun, the shit being bombed out of it, in total turmoil and only a fraction are "genuine refugees"?

They are only going to the countries for welfare handouts?

How narrow minded the anti refugee voices are.. There is a problem that was created by the US and Coalition involvement in the Middle East

which needs addressing. But to say people are just coming for welfare cheques is narrow minded.

Certainly is narrow minded if you think they are coming just for welfare cheques.

They want much, much more.

This is the culmination of over a thousand years of ideology coming to fruition, made possible by the oil, and subsequent funds, discovered in the Middle East.

Whether it will work as the Islamic faith desires remains to be seen.

My personal view is that eventually, with no particular time frame in mind apart from sooner rather than later, is that there will be a rise of fascism similar to the Nazis who will try and implement their version of the Final Solution.

[steven100]

stupid poll as most have indicated .............

[bapoboy]

The problem in Europe/EU it's lach of Democracy... The EU force countries to take refugees or face sancations..

[bangon04]

I am old enough to remember when West Germany had a model system which was admired by many European countries. They had a system of "Guest Workers" (Gastarbeiter), who were invited to work and contribute to their own prosperity and at the same time to the prosperity of the host country, but who were clearly informed that they could be sent home at any time if the host country required it. The Gastarbeiter were often but not only (muslim) Turkish, and while Great Britain and France were resettling hundreds of thousands of migrants from former colonies, the West Germans were choosing their workers according to national needs. Not unlike the Thai approach, although the Germans were necessarily better organised in their paperwork.....

The modern progressive Germany seems to have lost the plot.....

[PattayaPhom]

So a country being overrun, the shit being bombed out of it, in total turmoil and only a fraction are "genuine refugees"?

They are only going to the countries for welfare handouts?

How narrow minded the anti refugee voices are.. There is a problem that was created by the US and Coalition involvement in the Middle East

which needs addressing. But to say people are just coming for welfare cheques is narrow minded.

Answer 4 questions, why are only 20% from Syria, the rest from Pakistan, Iran Eritea and sub Africa, 2. Why are 90% males between 21-35 years old 3. why do they risk their lives crossing the Med then trekking through 6 or 7 other countries to reach Germany, Sweden etc when they were safe in Turkey or other countries and 4. why isn't Saudi etc opening there doors to them, they are neigbouring countries of the same culture....Give qualified answers to these questions and maybe then some of us would have sympathy for them

[Joey J]

YES,YES,YES YES,YES, WHAT MORE CAN ONE SAY the west will not be the place we knew and loved in 20 to 30 years,it will become a cesspit like the country's those of a certain faith left

[SteveB2]

What a strange poll. I was expecting the poll to the same as the OP's original question:-

"Should The West Be More Like Thailand In Its Refugee Attitude?" ...but it wasn't; and that's kind of misleading really.

Nevermind. So what is Thailand's attitude to a similar situation to Europe, but with tens of thousands of true refugees(entering into the first country of refuge) fleeing a well documented horrific genocide?

For answer to this question, one does not need to got back to far into history - I was in Uni studying at the time and couldn't believe what was going on over here - its a shocker.

The Preah Vihear refoulment incident - Expulsion of Cambodian refugees

'On June 12, 1979, the government of General Kriangsak Chomanan, who had come to power in Thailand by a military coup, informed foreign embassies in Bangkok that it was going to expel a large number of Cambodian refugees. He would allow the governments of the United States, France, and Australia to select 1,200 of the refugees to resettle in their countries. Lionel Rosenblatt, Refugee Coordinator of the American Embassy, Yvette Pierpaoli, a French businesswoman in Bangkok, and representatives of the Australian and French governments rushed to the border to select the refugees that night. In three frantic hours the foreigners picked out 1,200 refugees for resettlement from among the thousands being held by Thai soldiers behind barbed wire in a Buddhist temple at Nong Chan Refugee Camp and loaded them on buses to go to Bangkok. The remaining refugees were then loaded on buses and sent away, their destination unknown.

It later became known that Cambodian refugees had been collected from many locations and sent to Preah Vihear. An American Embassy official stood beneath a tree along a dirt road leading to the temple, counted the buses, and estimated that about 42,000 Cambodians were taken to Preah Vihear.

Preah Vihear is situated at the top of a 2,000 foot high escarpment overlooking the Cambodian plains far below. The refugees were unloaded from the buses and pushed down the steep escarpment. “There was no path to follow,” one said. “The way that we had to go down was only a cliff. Some people hid on top of the mountain and survived. Others were shot or pushed over the cliff. Most of the people began to climb down using vines as ropes. They tied their children on their backs and strapped them across their chests. As the people climbed down, the soldiers threw big rocks over the cliff.”^[14]

At the foot of the cliffs were minefields, placed by the Khmer Rouge during their rule in Cambodia. The refugees followed a narrow path, the safe route indicated by the bodies of those who had set off land mines. They used the bodies as stepping stones to cross the three miles of mined land to reach the Vietnamese soldiers, occupiers of Cambodia, on the other side. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees later estimated that as many as 3,000 Cambodians had died in the push-back and another 7,000 were unaccounted for. General Kriangsak's objective in this brutal operation apparently was to demonstrate to the international community that his government would not bear alone the burden of hundreds of thousands of Cambodian refugees. If so, it worked. For the next dozen years the UN and Western countries would pay for the upkeep of Cambodian refugees in Thailand, resettling thousands in other countries, and devising means by which Cambodians could return safely to their own country.'

The above quote is from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preah_Vihear_Temple

Another good description is here http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/preah-vihear-mountain-undeniable-fact

The incident represents one of darkest moments in recent Thai history.

So back to the OP original stated question "Should The West Be More Like Thailand In Its Refugee Attitude?"

My answer is definitely NO. Bordering countries should respect the well accepted principle of offering refuge to people fleeing death and persecution, together with obeying the principle of non-refoulment (not returning refugees back to certain persecution and death)

The real issue with Europe right now is not a refugee issue, since that would only normally happen only in the bordering countries to the conflict, or on folk arriving from that conflict by air and claiming refugee status on arrival.

The issue in Europe right now is the problem of mass illegal immigration. hundreds of thousands of undocumented folks marching over many countries on their way to most likely Germany or Sweden with the assumption that it is their right to do so. It isn't. Crossing borders between countries not at war doesn't work like that. There is a procedure to through. European governments have but a relatively short time to sort out this issue in an orderly manner, or the far right fueled by the anger of watching their elected governments and the EC submit to committing cultural suicide will rise up and do the job for them.

Edited October 31, 2015 by SteveB2

[Joey J]

You're so right. If nothing is done soon to steam the flow of Muslims into Europe, you will have an almighty war that will be worst than world for 2.i say this because it will escalate all over the world. Ps can't wait.