REPORTS OF THAI DEPORTATION OF HMONG GROUP

UNCLAS BANGKOK 005061 SIPDIS SIPDIS GENEVA PASS RMA E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PREF PREL PHUM TH LA SUBJECT: REPORTS OF THAI DEPORTATION OF HMONG GROUP ¶1. (SBU) Embassy received reports August 16 from an NGO worker and a Hmong-American contact that some of the approximately 270 Hmong detained at seven police stations in Petchaboon Province for illegal entry into Thailand had been moved to the Lao border. ¶2. (SBU) A Thai Immigration official in Chiang Rai Province and a Petchaboon police official told Embassy on August 16 that five families/31 persons were taken on August 16 from the Lom Kao police station in Petchaboon Province to a remote mountain village called Mu Baan Pitakthai, which is close to the Lao border about 90 kilometers from Chiang Kong City in Chiang Rai Province and about 60 kilometers from Chiang Kham City in Phayao Province. The village is apparently populated mostly by Thai Hmong. The group was given about a week's worth of dried food and walked from Mu Baan Pitakthai to the Thai-Lao border. According to the Petchaboon police official, the group was left at the border and there were no Lao officials on the other side. There are apparently some Lao-Hmong villages across the border on the Lao side and some movement of Hmong in the area back and forth across the border. ¶3. (SBU) On August 18, Embassy received conflicting second-hand reports on the location of this group. The Thai Chiang Kong official said he had heard from the Thai Border Patrol Police that the group had crossed into Laos. (Comment. If the group crossed into Laos it is unclear whether they did so voluntarily or involuntarily. No reports have said that Lao officials were present on the other side of the border. End comment.) A U.S.-based Hmong NGO activist said that witnesses were reporting the group had returned to Thailand after being sent across the border into Laos. Embassy is seeking further information from the Mu Baan Pitakthai village head. ¶4. (SBU) A Petchaboon police official reported on August 18 that none of the other Hmong currently being detained at other police stations in Petchaboon Province had been moved. Separate telephone calls to some of those police stations confirmed this information. BOYCE