Ethnic minorities and indigenous people

The cutoff of internet service to conflict-affected areas of western Myanmar’s war-torn Rakhine and Chin states has created a difficult situation for civilians who cannot access donors online to make aid requests, though the state government said it will step in to fill the void ...

On Sunday 23 June, the Rohingya Community in Thailand planned to hand a statement to Myanmar, Thailand as ASEAN’s chair, and the leaders of the ASEAN countries, but the police blocked them. They therefore decided not to go to the ASEAN Summit and Thai Ministry ...

Thailand’s new national parks will impose stricter penalties to further limit the rights of Thai farmers and indigenous people, land rights activists and analysts said on Friday, after a series of convictions highlighted their vulnerability. Under the National Parks Act, which was unveiled by the government ...

The so-called “death jars” of Laos could be more widespread than previously thought. Australian archaeologists and Lao Government officials have reported discovering 15 new sites containing 137 of the massive stone jars, which are believed to be around 1000 years old. Experts believe the jars are related ...

This month, the World Bank published a proposal for a $100 million development project in Rakhine state, the region of western Myanmar that recently saw the systematic ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya Muslim community. The aim of the project is to fund credit for small businesses in ...

Suriyan “Hook” Kla-thalae, a 36-year-old Moken born on Koh Surin, keeps dreaming that he’ll get his community’s boat, known as a kabang, back out on the Andaman Sea.  But it remains anchored on shore on the island, which lies 60 kilometres off the Phang Nga coast, ...

Twelve indigenous communities in Cambodia’s northeastern province of Ratanakiri scored a major victory today when the government announced it was returning to them 20 spirit mountains and dozens of other spiritually significant areas that had been grabbed by the Vietnamese agribusiness giant Hoang Anh Gia ...

Scores of Rohingya detainees inside a Saudi detention centre have gone on a hunger strike for the third time in recent months, activists told Al Jazeera. Almost 650 men, most of whom have been kept at the Shumaisi detention centre in Jeddah since 2012 for not having valid ...

The Cambodian government last week announced an 80-megawatt hydropower dam on the Anlong Krouch river, which flows to the town of Pursat. ANLONG KROUCH VILLAGE, PURSAT PROVINCE — For Khieu Him and Bun Kim Eng, orange trees provide hope. The ethnic Chorng and Por indigenous minority villagers ...

Hundreds of indigenous Karen people in Thailand face evictions from a national park that authorities wish to turn into a World Heritage Site, joining millions in a similarly precarious situation as authorities worldwide push tough conservation laws. The Kaeng Krachan is Thailand’s biggest national park, sprawled ...