Social development
Ethnic minorities and indigenous people
Burma’s Minorities Fear USDP Election Victory
During nearly seven decades the villages of the Karen have been torched, their men summarily executed and their women raped as the ethnic minority battled Burma’s military regime in the world’s longest-running insurgency. Their homeland has been called the “hidden Darfur,” where some 350,000 people ...
Released documents detail Rakhine State persecution
Broadcaster Al Jazeera on 29 October released a cache of documents detailing the persecution of Muslims in Rakhine State, including an internal UN memo and confidential military training manuals. Keep reading ...
Thai Forest Department department reclaims land for Hmong
Authorities have agreed to draft a master plan for zoning the Phuttubberk forest in Phetchabun’s Lom Kao district to allow hill tribe minorities to live and work there. The plan is also designed to keep resort business operators away. Keep reading ...
As ceasefire signed, president confident more groups will join nationwide pact
More armed ethnic groups will join the nationwide ceasefire if it is implemented successfully with the first eight signatories, President U Thein Sein said at a signing ceremony in Naypyidaw on 15 October. Eight ethnic armed groups, including the Karen National Union and Restoration Council of Shan ...
Little hope for change as IDPs mull elections
International commentators are fond of saying that Myanmar’s 8 November election could bring sweeping changes to the country. But many of the displaced people living in camps in Kachin State do not see it that way. Any hope that an end of conflict might improve matters ...
Rebels reject peace talks in Thailand's deep South
The dominant insurgent faction in Thailand’s southern separatist conflict emerged last week to reject the Malaysian-led peace talks being held with the Thai government. However, the hard-line National Revolutionary Front or Barisan Revolusi Nasional also signalled its willingness to open substantive negotiations, provided international mediation can ...
Chinese in Shan suddenly popular
Chinese-language posters with instructions on how to vote are causing controversy in Myanmar’s Shan State. Lashio town, in northern Shan State where Myanmar borders China, is home to a large number of ethnic Chinese people. Some have lived there for generations. Like elsewhere in Myanmar, a combination of historic ...
Myanmar official accuses China of meddling in peace talks
A top negotiator in Myanmar’s peace talks with ethnic rebels has accused neighboring China of derailing a nationwide ceasefire deal last week that would have brought Japan and Western nations in as observers to monitor an end to decades of conflict. Beijing has denied the accusation but ...
Group of Montagnards heads back to Vietnam
Twenty-four Montagnards are set to return to Vietnam on 8 October, becoming the first group to volunteer for repatriation since the government last month ordered the asylum seekers to leave of their own volition or be forcibly expelled, officials said. Keep reading ...
Refugees in Thailand watch Myanmar election with interest, trepidation
Outside of Nai Soi village in northern Thailand, more than 14,000 refugees from Kayah State debate elections going on just across the border. While there will be no voting for those in Thailand’s largest refugee camp – most lack ID cards – that doesn’t mean they ...
