Burmese migrant workers escaping Thailand’s worst floods in decades have been seized by the Thai authorities due to problems with their working address or legal status.Some Burmese migrant workers do not have any legal documents while others work legally but are not allowed to leave their province of employment. Many such people have been seized and deported to the Burmese town of Myawaddy on the opposite side of Mae Sot, Thailand.

Myint Wai, the assistant director of Thai Action Committee for Democracy in Burma (TACDB), said that brokers are trying to exploit the situation of those who have fled back to Burma-especially Burmese migrants from Mahachai Province.

If migrant workers do not have legal status, they have to pay 3,000-4,000 baht (US$ 97-130) to the brokers to get back over the border.

“Brokers are cooperating with some officials who send migrants back to Burma under the guise of ‘arrest and deport,'” Myint Wai told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday.

“I want to urge Burmese migrants that if they want to go back to the country, try to do so in a legal way because the exploitation of migrants is very common and presents a huge challenge,” he added.

Hundreds of Burmese migrants have fled back to Myawaddy every day since the start of the floods.

“When migrants arrive on the opposite side of Mae Sot, they also have to face the bullies of the Burmese authorities who arrest them under the charge of illegally crossing the border. They force them to hand over money, etc,” said Myint Wai.

He also said that the TACDB is supporting disaster victims in cooperation with the Thai Labor Solidarity Committee which has been formed by several labor unions.

Andy Hall, the director of the Migrant Justice Program for the Bangkok-based Human Rights and Development Foundation, said that it is a serious violation of human rights to exploit people who are fleeing from a natural disaster.

“The government also doesn’t have a clear policy both regarding how to deal with the migrants affected by the floods and also those migrants who propose to return home. About one-and-a-half million migrants have a work permit which doesn’t allow them to travel out of the province in which they were employed under national security law. How do they get home? In order to get home, they have to leave the province where they work-the disaster areas,” said Andy Hall.

The Migrant Working Group, which is a combination of around 20 NGOs in Thailand, released a statement on Saturday that claimed some migrant workers are still trapped in flooded areas and have not received any aid due to a lack of information, poor communications and limited access to assistance mechanisms.

Thailand’s Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department announced on Saturday that 356 people had died and two were missing in the floods which started on July 25. The University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce said on Monday that the Kingdom’s economic losses due to the floods could reach 500 billion baht.

The Burmese Ambassador to Bangkok went to the rescue camp in Pathon Thani Province on Monday evening to meet flood victims.

By Sai Zom Hseng
Published on October 25, 2011