CHANGING ATTITUDES SLOWLY TAKING HOLD ON THAI-BURMESE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 CHIANG MAI 000049 SIPDIS SIPDIS SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PREL PREF PGOV TH BM SUBJECT: CHANGING ATTITUDES SLOWLY TAKING HOLD ON THAI-BURMESE BORDER CHIANG MAI 00000049 001.2 OF 003 (SBU) SUMMARY. Thai government and refugee camp officials in the Thai border district of Mae Sot increasingly view political, refugee, and immigration problems as long-term issues. While this realization that the more-than two decades-old refugee situation is no longer a "temporary problem" has led to a dramatic shift in Thai policy toward Burmese refugees, this same sense of permanence to the refugees' status in Thailand has compounded the problems exile leaders face in maintaining influence inside Burma. Faced with diminishing contacts inside their home country, many dissidents have become fixated on a misguided hope that the U.S. military will help overthrow the regime. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (U) Mae Sot today is a classic boomtown, with new developments, shops and markets springing up around town, all driven by refugees, illegal immigrants, and one-day permit holders crossing the Friendship Bridge that links Mae Sot with Myawadi in Burma. Burmese nationals of varying ethnicities now make up an estimated 80 percent of the Mae Sot area's population, including refugee camps, and are the muscle behind the area's economy. Embassy Rangoon Charge d'Affaires Shari Villarosa traveled with ConGen PolOff in February to the Mae Sot border district in Tak province to meet with Thai government officials, NGOs, and members of the Burmese dissident community - one of many frequent visits in recent years by USG officials. Over the course of these visits, officers have noted the growing and significant role played by Burmese refugees in the area's economy and culture. ¶3. (SBU) No one expects the flow of refugees into Thailand to slow down any time soon. Col. Kasem Thanaporn, commander of the Royal Thai Army's 4th Infantry Task Force in Mae Sot, observed that Burma's military control over the border area was being consolidated and that armed opposition groups were gradually being surrounded by Burmese military forces. The recent move to a new capital in centrally located Pyinmana was due, in part, to the State Peace and Development Council's (SPDC) effort to better consolidate its grip on the ethnic border states, he suggested. ¶4. (SBU) Representatives of the Karen National Union (KNU) in Northern Thailand have stated that the SPDC's move to Pyinmana has strengthened the regime's hand against rebel forces, noting that the new capital is located in what had been Karen territory. Refugee activists and opposition groups say the Burmese regime is actively driving ethnic groups out of Burma, in part to remove ethnic minorities from the vicinity of Pyinmana and also to provide land to retired Burmese soldiers. These activists say the SPDC is using landmines and destroying bridges and crops to drive refugee movements toward and across the border, eliminating return routes back in to Burma for the Karen and other groups. They expressed gratitude that the Thais had recently been more lenient in giving refuge. The Good News: Thai Government and Refugee NGOs Adapting ¶5. (SBU) After long treating the refugee situation as a temporary problem - one that would eventually be solved when the refugees returned to Burma - Thai government officials involved with operating the Mae La refugee camp have accepted that Burma's economic decline and political conflicts are unlikely to reverse themselves anytime soon. Likewise, officials have begun taking basic steps to address the Burmese population in Mae Sot as more than temporary residents. ¶6. (SBU) Officers from the 4th Infantry Task Force have established productive contacts and communication with their Burmese counterparts on the other side of the border - a positive development when contrasted with the threats of armed skirmishes or Burmese shelling of refugee camps in Thailand a few years ago. Officers estimated that nearly 2,000 Burmese cross into Mae Sot from Myawadi each day on one-day passes, and that given the bustling, Burmese-centric economy in town, there was no doubt many more are coming in and staying. Col. Kasem said he did not personally see the situation in Burma improving soon and expected more refugees to find their way into Thailand. ¶7. (SBU) The Thai government's decision to begin teaching Thai language in the Mae La camp, an effort begun just in the past year, is a further encouraging sign that officials are looking at the refugee situation in a new light. Despite having become an overwhelming majority of the local workforce, Burmese ethnic groups and their children have had very little access to Thai language schooling. By teaching refugee children Thai, Thai officials are finally admitting that the refugees will be here for a while and taking steps to facilitate their assimilation. CHIANG MAI 00000049 002.2 OF 003 ¶8. (U) Also encouraging is the extent to which civil society is active in Mae La. With some 50,000 residents, the camp counts as one of the North's largest population centers, and within it live various ethnicities, Christians, Buddhists, and Muslims under more or less stable circumstances. Initially a refuge for the Karen, Mae La and other camps in the region are now home to other ethnicities, dissident Burmans, and Muslim Rohingyas, who found their way from western Burma. Karen leaders have seen the numbers of Rohingyas climb from 1,000 to 10,000 in the past five years and say they have been accepted and recognized as good traders. Some groups, such as the Karen Women's Organization, are developing an increasingly stronger base of support for their target populations and finding opportunities for them away from the refugee camps. Charge and PolOff spoke to several young people working on their English in the hopes that they would receive scholarships or be accepted into resettlement programs. ¶9. (SBU) These changing attitudes among Thai officials reflect the important policy shift by the central government that has led to enhanced vocational and educational programs, as well as possible income generating opportunities for camp refugees over the past year. But despite these new attitudes among the Thais, many refugees continue to perceive the Thai government as solely interested in their return to Burma. During a Feb. 4 visit to Mae La with international diplomats, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra reportedly focused some of his questions to the refugees on whether and when they would feel comfortable enough to move back to Burma. Two weeks after his visit, it was the perceptions of these comments - and not the increased Thai funding for educational and economic opportunities - that refugee leaders were discussing. Many refugees made it clear they have no interest in going back until their safety could be guaranteed, relating continued stories of rapes, forced labor, and forced relocations inside Burma. ¶10. (SBU) In addition, talk from Thai military officers that contacts have improved between border units and that cooperation is growing with Burma must be taken with a grain of salt. These warm statements toward their Burmese counterparts, for instance, were made in a room dominated by a statue of King Naresuan, the 16th century monarch who famously liberated the Thais from Burmese invaders, facing toward the border - a noteworthy symbol that the centuries-old Thai-Burmese rivalry is far from forgotten. The Bad News: Dissident Groups Unfocused ¶11. (SBU) Meanwhile, exile groups are struggling with the effects of their long-term presence in Thailand on their overall goals for a future democratic Burma and their potential roles in the country's future. Rangoon Charge visited several organizations, among them the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, the National Council of the Union of Burma, Karen National Union, Karen Refugee Committee, National Democratic Front, Burma Fund, All Burma Students Democratic Front, and Dr. Cynthia Maung's Mae Tao health clinic. These exiles see themselves as fervently working for democracy and assuming leadership roles inside Burma when democracy comes. ¶12. (SBU) After many years in exile, it may be inevitable that Thailand-based opposition groups are losing touch with their counterparts inside Burma and their influence is diminishing. Given the chance to rebut these criticisms during recent meetings, many opposition leaders came off as unduly focused on non-productive or unlikely scenarios. After Charge observed that exiles needed to focus more on a few areas of common agreement and less on unimportant issues, one NGO member replied that such action was proving to be difficult given the inability to agree on a name for an umbrella organization that would satisfy all Burmese ethnicities. Another said people must agree on a flag first. When the Charge asked how exile groups planned to heal ethnic divisions caused by Burmese military divide-and-rule policies, one political dissident responded that exiles worked well with all the opposition groups in Thailand and had not caused those divisions. The Bad News for Them: Sorry Guys, the Cavalry is Not Coming ¶13. (SBU) Many opposition figures place misguided hope in the use of U.S. military assets to support their cause, citing everything from U.S. involvement in Iraq and increased U.S. pressure on the Burmese regime to the recent movie "Stealth" (which features a U.S. Navy airborne attack on terrorists in Rangoon). Nearly every group visited asked either subtly or directly when a U.S. attack would come. One exile leader warned that U.S. military planners would need to take into account rumored plans by the Burmese regime to assassinate Aung San Suu CHIANG MAI 00000049 003.2 OF 003 Kyi and other prominent opposition leaders in Burma in the event of an invasion. Rangoon Charge replied each time that such an invasion was not in the cards and that opposition groups should face the reality that only through uniting themselves could they overcome the current government's hold on power. The reaction was generally "we can't; we don't have guns." What Can Be Done Inside Burma ¶14. (SBU) The National Council of the Union of Burma (NCUB) is a broad-based umbrella organization of ethnic and political opposition groups that has been organizing Thailand-based exiles since 1992. Several leaders from the NCUB, including General Secretary U Maung Maung, outlined some of the organization's SIPDIS recent efforts to coordinate the widespread Burmese dissident community into coherent action, including efforts this past year to build international opposition to Burma's holding of the ASEAN chair in 2006. When Charge asked how the USG could better help those inside Burma, Maung Maung and other leaders responded that they needed increased funding for their National Endowment for Democracy grant ($85,000 in 2006) to build connections in the international community. When pressed about what could be done inside Burma, the NCUB requested 50 satellite phones to distribute inside Burma and recommended establishing more American Centers throughout Burma. ¶15. (SBU) Other Burmese activists working in Mae Sot are also making efforts to assist those inside Burma, such as leaders of the Mae Tao health clinic, which serves more than 50,000 refugees in the border area. Clinic leader Dr. Cynthia described her program of sending trained medical personnel into the areas near the Thai border. She also noted that one-third of her patients now come from inside Burma from as far away as Rangoon and Mandalay. She suggested NGOs be encouraged to provide training for doctors and nurses inside Burma. The Assistance Association of Political Prisoners, an organization that monitors more than 1,500 Burmese political prisoners, described their plans to increase the number of scholarships inside Burma for the children of political prisoners from 75 to 200. They suggested that the U.S. could reach out to educate former political prisoners who cannot come to Rangoon for classes at the American Center. COMMENT: ¶16. (SBU) After nearly 20 years of increased inflows, the impact of Burmese refugees in western Thailand will continue to grow. Thai officials have realized that the economic and political situation in Burma is increasingly grave and unlikely to recover to the extent that refugees will return, as the Burmese economy will need a long time to recover from the damage that has been wrought. In fact, no one denies that more and more will find their way into Thailand. Teaching Thai to refugee camp children is an encouraging first step, as are enhanced educational and vocational training and work opportunities. Programs that focus on greater healthcare access and labor rights could further improve the quality of life and potential for those who have sought shelter in Thailand. ¶17. (SBU) Meanwhile, exile leaders must search for ways to refresh their understanding of and contacts with the opposition inside Burma if they hope to play a role in a future democratic government. Many dissidents rely primarily on family members for information about political developments inside Burma; it is apparent that most have only a surface understanding of recent events inside Burma. Opposition leaders based outside of Burma will face competition from those now on the inside to form a democratic government; a future democratic Burma will need the resources of both groups to succeed. ¶18. (SBU) Much of the exiles' focus concerns their role in a future national government at the expense of other issues, such as re-building the economy and establishing the rule of law in a post-SPDC Burma. Although exiles have had some successes organizing the varied ethnicities and interest groups of the Burmese dissident community in Thailand, the leaders of these organizations place too much faith in outside saviors (U.S. or otherwise) to solve their problems and not enough attention on uniting those to present a common front against the Burmese regime. ¶19. (U) This cable has been coordinated with Embassy Rangoon. CAMP