01/27/2004

Present situation

The United States recently announced that it would consider for resettlement any of the 15,000 refugees from Laos in Wat Tham Krabok in central Thailand who choose to apply. Many of the refugees at the Wat [a Buddhist temple and its surrounding compound] have close ties to the U.S. and, indeed, many were accepted for resettlement years ago but chose to try to stay in Thailand.

Most of these refugees had been residents of Ban Vinai, a camp for Laotian refugees managed by UNHCR. In the early 1990s, the UNHCR and the Royal Thai Government told the Hmong that they had a choice between resettlement in a third country or repatriation to Laos. Faced with this impossible choice, many chose to remain in Thailand and found refuge at the Wat under the patronage of a Buddhist abbot. The Hmong were able to establish a measure of self-sufficiency under the protection of the abbot, but his death two years ago removed their patron and protector, leaving the refugees vulnerable to threats from the Thai military. The U.S. resettlement offer was in response to Thai plans to move the Hmong to a remote military base in eastern Thailand.

What is at stake

The U.S. has limited its resettlement offer to Hmong refugees at Wat Tham Krabok. While welcome, this offer has understandably caused confusion and consternation to Lao Hmong refugees in Thailand outside the Wat. Already, Refugees International has learned of attempts by Hmong refugees to enter the Wat, attempts that may be met with force by the Thai military should they continue. RI believes that it should be possible to extend the U.S. resettlement offer to all Lao Hmong refugees in Thailand based on clear criteria for establishing bona fide refugee status. To ease their concerns about the program being overwhelmed, RI suggests that eligibility for resettlement be based on possessing evidence of a previously issued UNHCR camp residence number or a U.S. resettlement program T#.  RI estimates that the additional number of Lao Hmong able to meet these criteria will be less than the 15,000 currently eligible through their residence at the Wat.

Recommendations for Congressional action

The Hmong community in the United States has been very active recently on this issue, and community leaders from Wisconsin, Minnesota, and California have begun to get in touch with their Congressional representatives. The ideal role for representatives and their staff would be to engage with the State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration (BPRM) to ensure that the implementation of the Hmong resettlement program starts without delay. RI recommends the following specific steps to Congressional representatives and their staff:

• Join forces with colleagues from states with large Hmong refugee populations to engage with the BPRM, urging the Bureau to speed the implementation of this resettlement effort.
• Write to the BPRM urging them to expand the eligibility requirements for the Hmong resettlement program.
• Work with representatives of the Hmong community to hold hearings or an information day on Capitol Hill to raise awareness regarding the resettlement program.
• Organize a Congressional delegation to Thailand to visit the Wat and assess the status of the resettlement program.
• Link the Hmong resettlement program to the need for efforts on behalf of other populations to ensure that the overall target of 70,000 refugee admissions is met in FY04.