Humanitarian aid, conscription and cybercrime are all headaches for the new Thai government and they don’t seem to be handling them too well.
The revolution against the junta’s illegal attempted coup is now over three years old and the tide has certainly turned against the junta with an ever more sophisticated resistance controlling most of the country, with the exception of major cities. Like a wounded animal, the junta is becoming more brutal. While losing on the ground they still have air power and are targeting villages and internally displaced persons (IDP) camps. This has resulted in over 2.6 million IDPs in Myanmar, according to the UN, which is likely a gross underestimate. Of these, about 764,555 IDPs live in southeast Myanmar bordering Thailand, according to the Committee for Internally Displaced Karen People on Feb. 29, and they anticipate that number will further increase in the coming months. The UN estimate is about half of this number but they admit they have very limited access to collect data. Tens of thousands have fled across the border into Thailand for safety where they live in undocumented limbo vulnerable to exploitation. They bring with them trauma from Myanmar and have the added stress of being “illegal” migrants in Thailand. Also, many villagers have fled airstrikes to Thailand. Some stay but many return to Myanmar when it is safe or the Thai authorities tell them it is safe and they should return.
This situation is exacerbated because in desperation the junta is enforcing a 2010 military conscription law for men 18 to 35 years old and women 18 to 27 years. The age range rises to between 18 and 45 for males with specialist expertise, such as doctors and engineers, and to 18 to 35 for females with specialist expertise. They will have to spend at least two years in the military and the penalty for avoidance is five years in prison. There are about 13 million people in this age bracket so even if only 10 percent are targeted it means 1.3 million people. The junta has stated that it will recruit 60,000 a year but textile factories have been told by Min Aung Hlaing to make 140,000 more uniforms. This has caused panic amongst those that previously may not have been directly involved in the resistance. Families of those fleeing conscription risk arrest, so often whole families are fleeing to Thailand. Just today 94 Burmese were arrested in Kanchanaburi, Thailand.
The junta’s objectives are to make money from bribes, to create fear and panic, foster ethnic conflict, bolster falling military numbers, create human shields and force resistance fighters to fight their own people. The military seems to be targeting mainly the urban areas, which will be their last bastions as they continue to lose the war. In Sittwe, Rakhine State, the military took 400 Rohingya from IDP camps to be trained to fight. They will be used as human shields and to cause ethnic conflict. To some extent this is already working, with some ethnic Rakhine accusing the Rohingya of supporting the State Administration Council (SAC) and not the Arakan Army (AA). This is far from the truth, with many Rohingya supplying rice and cash to the AA and volunteering to fight with them. Rakhine people returning to Rakhine State from Yangon have been arrested at Kyaukphyu and Sittwe airports. On Feb. 18, 66 people were arrested at Kyaukphyu airport. In Yangon and other cities youth are taken from tea shops and off buses. It is hardly surprising people are panicking and either joining the resistance or fleeing to Thailand.
The average total cost to travel from Yangon to Mae Sot, Thailand is about 600,000 kyats. These three men in the photo are in their early 20s and all came to Thailand illegally across the Moei River having no other choice. They couldn’t afford a visa and flight, even if it was possible. Even crossing the bridge between Karen State’s Myawaddy and Mae Sot is too risky with the border pass gate strictly monitoring young men under age 35. Two days after the enforcement of the conscription law was declared, four young men were arrested while they extended their border passes. Since then, there has been more news of some being arrested while renewing their border passes. One of the men in the photo spoke for them all:
“ We normally live with our family. We do not want to leave our family. But if we stay in Myanmar, we have to go to the army. We don’t like military, they are not good, doing bad things on civilians. We do not want to do these brutal actions like them. So, we have no option in Myanmar. We have to flee. We do not want to leave our family.”
They want to return to Myanmar when the military junta no longer holds any power but, in the meantime, have to live as best they can in limbo in Thailand. They are illegal so it is very difficult for them to work or even go outside.
The Thai authorities’ response has been to arrest those fleeing conscription and to extract “fines” or deport them. As deporting them is sending them back to persecution, this is contrary to Thai law, and breaks the international law on refoulement, or forced returns. Thailand has a legal mandate under international and domestic law to prevent refoulement. The prohibition of refoulement is considered part of customary international law and binding on all states. Under this principle, states are obligated to assess the risks of torture, persecution, or other serious human rights violations before facilitating the transfer of a person to another country. Section 13 of Thailand’s recently enacted Prevention and Suppression of Torture and Enforced Disappearance Act (Feb 2023) states, “No government organizations or public officials shall expel, deport, or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that the person would be in danger of torture, cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment, or enforced disappearance.”
Unfortunately, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin is a real estate tycoon and not so familiar with international refugee law and with immigration matters, so he responded to the increase of migrants due to conscription by saying that everyone entering Thailand has to do it the legal way with a visa and the law must be enforced. This of course encouraged the arrests and deportations.
From Thailand’s point of view the national security concerns are not only the large number of undocumented migrants crossing the border, but also public health, as the prevalence of infectious diseases like malaria and dengue as well as vaccine-preventable diseases like polio, cholera and measles has increased exponentially in Myanmar since the coup. Disease will cross the border also if not monitored.
Instead of the Thai authorities putting up barbed wire on the border and running around trying to arrest and deport migrants they should issue temporary stay/work permits. This would give the Thai authorities control, ability to monitor them for health issues and gain government tax revenues and stimulate border economies. One argument is that this would be a “pull factor” which is a total misunderstanding of the situation. It is rather a “push factor”. They are fleeing for their lives, so the “pull factor” is not an issue, they are coming anyway. The “pull factor” is also the argument for issuing so few immigration exit permits for those who have already been accepted for resettlement to third countries. Some have been waiting years! By issuing more exit permits they will just be relieving the backlog. It is very unlikely that new arrivals will be accepted for resettlement to a third country. Many of the refugees are professionals such as teachers and doctors who should be able to work with their communities to relieve pressure on the Thai systems. The professional skills of health workers, teachers and engineers who have fled Myanmar could be utilized to assist in stabilizing the border.
Besides conscription the other issue in the Thai news at the moment is the Thai-led humanitarian aid initiative, often referred to incorrectly as a “humanitarian corridor”. This aims to deliver aid across the border through coordination between the Thai and Myanmar Red Cross Societies and monitored by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)’s Coordinating Center for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management (AHA Center). The Thai foreign minister, Parnpree Bahiddha-nukara, has stated that the aim is to engage with the SAC leading to a negotiated peace settlement. The SAC has no interest in sincere negotiation and the people want regime change. The Thai initiative intends to support some local communities and only 20,000 IDPs funded by the Thai taxpayers so it is not clear how they can scale up and have a model that attracts foreign donors to deal with the overwhelming need.
While a large increase in cross-border aid is clearly and urgently needed, this plan has other serious flaws. The Thai humanitarian initiative will have a number of adverse consequences. The SAC will use it for public relations, which ASEAN will happily support and most of the rest of the world will either not know enough to disagree with, or will not care enough about to voice an opinion except the usual, “we support ASEAN”. If the SAC and the Myanmar Red Cross Society, which is under the SAC, are involved, the aid will be weaponized and used for the advantage of the SAC and not those most in need. For example, there is the risk that aid distribution will be used to split the Karen ethnic group. Divide and conquer is an old military strategy.
The AHA Center has no experience or capacity in delivering aid in war zones as stated by Adelina Kamel, who was its head for nearly three decades. It also has the SAC on its board so is not neutral and has not worked with ethnic revolutionary organizations (EROs) or the National Unity Government (NUG).
A far better approach is to deliver aid in coordination with the Thai Border Consortium and local ethnic civil society organizations (CSOs), who have been delivering cross-border aid for decades. They are more efficient and cost effective but so far EROs and CSOs have not been consulted by Thailand. If the aid is delivered as planned the only ones who will gain is the SAC, not the people that need it.
Given that almost all of the border crossings along Thailand’s border are adjacent to ERO administered areas, there is an opportunity to stabilize the border by expediting customs approval processes for cross-border trade and aid. There are natural and informal border crossings where the volume of trade and aid can be increased to assist IDP communities. There are many different, far more effective approaches if the Thai government is interested.
Finally, a serious threat relates to the rise of transnational criminal syndicates including scam centers, unregulated casinos, brothels, online pornography centers, money laundering and the illegal wildlife trade, which are primarily located in areas administered by militia. Cybercrime is not only a headache for Thailand but an international issue that brings everyone together except the SAC, border militia and Chinese mafia. Countries either suffer from their citizens being trafficked to the cybercrime centers in Myanmar or they have citizens who are scammed. It seems an ideal issue to bring countries together on a common cause but for some reason this is not happening. Trafficked victims are transported from Bangkok to Mae Sot through three immigration check points and then over the river to crime centers near Myawaddy. Some foreign groups have managed to contact victims and rescue them enroute to the border, so it is hard to believe that the Thai authorities couldn’t intercept them on the way also. This is an opportunity for Thailand to take the lead in an international group to fight transnational crime. It would be far more positive and likely to succeed than their approach to cross-border humanitarian aid.
Another criminal threat relates to the trafficking of methamphetamines through SAC-affiliated militias. This has been one of the only boom industries in Myanmar since the coup, with Thailand a gateway for distribution through the region. While the Thai authorities capture millions of tablets on a regular basis, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
The Thai government evidently wishes to raise its international profile and status but their present policies and insistence on treating the SAC as a legitimate government and ignoring the NUG and EROs is not going to achieve this in any positive way. They have an opportunity to make a positive difference to the border problems of refugees, humanitarian aid and transnational crime, but have done far too little and with the wrong approach.
Paul Greening is an ex-UN senior staff officer with over 20 years of experience in six Asian countries working for six UN agencies and four INGOs. He worked in Sittwe, Rakhine State for the International Organization for Migration from 2017 to 2020 and has been living in Mae Sot for over two years.
