UNPO Secretary General Condemns Violence Against Hmong
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Showing posts with label Lao. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lao. Show all posts
US - Laos Policy, Memorial Events, Held in Congress
Friday, May 25, 2012
National veterans' memorial ceremonies and policy events are being held in Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Congress, to highlight the service, and ongoing plight, of Lao and Hmong veterans who served in Laos during the Vietnam War. Thousands of Laotian and Hmong-American veterans, and their refugee families from across America, are participating along with U.S. veterans of the Vietnam War. Laotian and Hmong-Americans from across the United States are attending with delegations traveling from California, Arizona, Nevada, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Florida, Texas, Oklahoma, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgie, Alabama, Louisiana, and other states. “We have come from across the United States to pay tribute and remember our fallen soldiers who have died to secure the freedom that we all enjoy today,” said Colonel Wangyee Vang, President of the Lao Veterans of America Institute (LVAI). The LVAI and the Lao Veterans of America are the nation's largest Lao and Hmong veterans organization with chapters across the United States. “It is also important to remember that our people, who were left behind in the jungles of Laos, are still suffering from the causes of the Vietnam War,” Colonel Wangyee Vang stated further. Meetings and special events are continuing in the U.S. Congress this week, regarding domestic and international policy matters of concern, including veterans, human rights, refugee, religious persecution, trade and economic issues. On May 11, a wreath-laying and memorial service, was conducted at the Lao Veterans of America (LVA) monument in Arlington National Cemetery to honor the Lao and Hmong veterans, their families, as well as the American clandestine advisors, who served in defense of the Kingdom of Laos, and U.S. national security interests, during the Vietnam War. “I am very honored and pleased that we are once again gathered here today at Arlington,” said Dr. Jane Hamilton-Merritt, Ph. D., a Southeast Asia scholar, former Vietnam War-era journalist and author. At events in Arlington, Dr. Hamilton-Merritt read excerpts from her book "Tragic Mountains: The Hmong, The Americans and the Secret Wars for Laos" (Indiana University Press) and served as a keynote speaker at the Arlington National Cemetery Memorial events. “A U.S. Department of Defense Joint Armed Forces Honor Guard, U.S. Army wreath-bearer, and bugler, participated in the ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery to assist in honoring the Lao and Hmong veterans and their families,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director of the Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) in Washington, D.C. http://www.cppa-dc.org “Following the official wreath-laying ceremony at the Lao Veterans of America memorial in Arlington, the U.S. Department of Defense’s (DOD) honor guard also posted colors, and the bugler played ‘Taps’, in memory of the Lao and Hmong veterans and their American military and clandestine advisors…,” Smith observed. “With covert American assistance, Lao and Hmong special forces operated in defense of the Kingdom of Laos and U.S. national security interests,” Smith commented. Flowers were laid at a veterans' memorial ceremony held at the Vietnam War Memorial on May 12. Event speakers are highlighting the importance of legislation (H.R. 3192), introduced by U.S. Congressmen Jim Costa (D-CA), and Frank Wolf (R-VA), to grant burial benefits to Lao and Hmong-American veterans at U.S. national cemeteries. Event cosponsors include the LVAI, CPPA, LVA, the U.S. DOD, Army, Air Force, Arlington National Cemetery, Counterparts, Hmong Advance, Inc., Hmong Advancement, Inc., and Members of the U.S. Congress. Speakers at the veterans’ memorial events include: Wangyee Vang, LVAI; Philip Smith, CPPA; Jane Hamilton-Merritt; Mike Benge, former POW; Hugh Tovar, Former CIA Station Chief, Laos; Toua Kue, LVA.; D. L. Hicks, U.S. Special Forces Association, Texas; Christy Lee, Hmong Advance, Inc.; U.S. Congressman Jim Costa (D-CA); U.S. Congressman Duncan Hunter (R-CA), and, Members of the U.S. Congress. The events also commemorate National Lao and Hmong Recognition Day ceremonies held annually in May in Washington, D.C. and across the United States. Contact: Ms. Maria Gomez, Mr. Phil Marieo or Mr. Philip Smith CPPA - Center for Public Policy Analysis info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org Tele. (202) 543-1444 http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org Source
Read more...Robert Jambon: A Bold Life & Death For Laos and Hmong
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Wednesday, 14 December 2011, 1:20 pm
Press Release: Centre for Public Policy Analysis
December 13, 2011, Washington, D.C., Paris, France, Bangkok, Thailand and Vientiane, Laos
The Center for Public Policy Analysis, and a coalition of Lao and Hmong non-governmental organizations (NGOs), have issued a statement today honoring the life and legacy of retired French Colonel Robert Jambon and his valiant fight for human rights and freedom for the Laotian, Hmong and Vietnamese people. The NGOs also expressed their condolences to the Jambon family. According to his final statements as reported recently by an investigation concluded by French police, Colonel Jambon sacrificed himself in Dinan, France, as a veteran of the Indochina war, where he took his own life in seeking to bring international attention to the ongoing persecution and killing of the Lao Hmong people in Laos, Vietnam and Thailand.
“The Lao and Hmong veterans salute the supreme sacrifice of Colonel Robert Jambon in seeking to offer up his life to help bring international attention to the ongoing military attacks, and human rights violations in Laos and Vietnam, directed against freedom-loving people, including the Hmong,” said Colonel Wangyee Vang, National President of the Lao Veterans of America Institute (LVAI), the largest Laotian and Hmong non-profit veterans organization in the United States ,with chapters and members in France and internationally.
“Colonel Jambon wanted to help to save our Lao and Hmong people and the refugees, and ordinary people, who are being persecuted now in Laos by the military and communist regime,” Colonel Wangyee Vang stated.
“Colonel Jambon is a hero to our Laotian and Hmong people; He recently killed himself in France as an dramatic and important international statement of protest to try to help our people and to try to save those in the jungles and refugee camps in Laos and Thailand who have fled terrible religious and political persecution, genocide and bloody military attacks,” Wangyee Vang said.
“The Laotian and Hmong people will never forget Colonel Robert Jambon for his sacrifices in defense of the Royal Kingdom of Laos during the Indochina war and his efforts to bring awareness about the plight of Laotians and Hmong people who are the victims of human rights violations,” said Bounthanh Rathigna, President of the United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc. (ULDL).
“Colonel Robert Jambon’s life, and recent suicide in France, is an important and symbolic act of selfless love, and of calculated moral war, against systemic injustice and oppression that continues to be directed against thousands of innocent people in Laos, including the Hmong minority,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director of the Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) in Washington, D.C.
“Robert Jambon’s final tragic act of love, and war, for the forgotten nation of Laos, and the persecuted Lao Hmong minority people there, has been heard in Washington, D.C. and has resonated with many in the Laotian community around the world,” Smith observed.
The CPPA continues to document human rights violations in Laos and Southeast Asia regard the Hmong and other peoples. Thousands of Hmong from Vietnam were arrested, or killed, earlier this year by the Vietnam Peoples' Army (VPA) in Dien Bien province after staging peaceful gatherings and protests. Hmong Christians in Laos have suffered increased persecution, atrocities and attacks by the Lao military and VPA forces. http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
“Despite the indifference of the international community, the war in Laos is, unfortunately, not over for the Lao Hmong people,” Smith continued. “The Lao People’s Army, and the secret police of the Stalinist regime in Laos, backed by military leaders in Hanoi, continue to kill and persecute the Laotian and Hmong people in the most brutal and egregious manner resulting in many refugees fleeing to neighboring Thailand and the ongoing deaths and casualties of thousands of innocent civilians as well as political and religious dissidents.”
“Colonel Jambon’s bold death, like the self-immolation of Tibetan and Vietnamese monks, is a fiery monument to heroism and self-sacrifice on behalf of the Hmong people of Laos and Vietnam whom he loved and knew, and served with in combat on behalf of France during the first Indochina war,” Smith commented.
“The violent forced repatriation of tens of thousands of Lao Hmong refugees from Ban Huay Nam Khao in Thailand, back to the communist regime in Laos, where they fled mass starvation and genocide in recent years, remains as a stain upon the international community as well as the hearts and minds of those concerned about human rights in Southeast Asia,” Smith stated.
“Colonel Robert Jambon rightly understood the horrific crimes, and incomprehensible abuses, that are still being violently inflicted upon thousands of innocent Hmong and Laotian civilians and religious and political dissident groups in Laos,” Smith continued.
“Colonel Jambon’s passionate and Gauguin-like suicide at the Indochina monument in Dinan, France, is a powerful symbol of devotion and understanding regarding the suffering plight of the Lao and Hmong people,” Smith concluded. “Robert Jambon’s courage in speaking truth to power to a world that has largely forgotten thousands of Lao Hmong people who have been abandoned by France and the United States in the mountains and jungles of Laos, and the refugee camps in Thailand, speaks volumes; The themes of love, war, betrayal, and the need to address the ongoing social injustice in Laos and Vietnam, resonate in the final gunshot that ended Robert Jambon’s amazing and important life”
Joining the CPPA, LVAI and ULDL in issuing a statement on behalf of Colonel Robert Jambon’s life and legacy include the United Lao for Human Rights and Democracy (ULHRD), Laos Institute for Democracy, Hmong Advance, Inc., Hmong Advancement, Inc., Lao Students for Democracy, Hmong Students Association and others.
Amnesty International, Doctors Without Borders (MSF - Medecins Sans Frontieres), the CPPA and independent NGO and journalists have reported about the forced repatriation, persectution and human rights violations directed against the Lao Hmong people in Thailand and Laos.
http://www.msf.org/msf/articles/2007/07/hmong-refugees-in-thailand-are-a-population-in-danger.cfm
http://www.msf.org/msf/articles/2008/06/thailand-forcibly-returns-hundreds-of-hmong-refugees-to-laos.cfm
a26/003/2007/en
Source
Laos, Vietnam Human Rights Appeal Issued in Washington
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
2011-11-15 18:05:31 - "We have gathered here in Washington, D.C., to memorialize and remember all of the Laotian, Vietnamese, Hmong and Asian people who continue to suffer human rights violations, religious persecution, torture and harsh imprisonment, without due process, and the rule of law; We remember, and are here, to demonstrate against the oppressive corruption and ongoing attacks by the secret police and military forces of the Lao regime in Vientiane, and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, against ordinary Lao and Hmong people who seek political, religious and economic freedom for Laos," stated Bounthanh Rathigna, President of the United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc.
November 15, 2011, Washington, D.C., Vientiane, Laos and Bangkok, Thailand
For Immediate Release
The United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc., (ULDL) has released the text of a seven-point international appeal and statement following events it hosted last week in Washington, D.C., which included representatives of the Laotian, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Hmong and Asian-American community The Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) and other non-governmental organizations (NGO) and policymakers were invited to speak and participate in policy events, Capitol Hill meetings and a human rights rally held in front of the Lao Embassy in Washington, D.C. www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
The following is the text of the statement issued by Bounthanh Rathigna, President of the ULDL:
Statement of Bounthanh Rathigna, President
United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc.
Washington, D.C.
November 5-8, 2011
Laos International Policy Conference &
Demonstration and Protest Rally In Front of the
Lao Embassy in Washington, D.C.
Honored Guests, American policymakers, Members of the U.S. Congress and staff, Fellow Laotian leaders, Lao and Hmong students, fellow NGO and non-profit organization leaders, representatives of the Free Vietnamese Community and other freedom loving people of Asia and America, Ladies and Gentleman, I am Bounthanh Rathigna, President of the United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc. (ULDL) and I welcome you here today at our international policy conference and protest rally and demonstration in front of the Lao Embassy in Washington, D.C.
It is good to see so many friends and supporters from across the country and from Laos gathered here in Washington to discuss the problems of the one-party, corrupt authoritarian regimes in Laos and Vietnam that continue to persecute their own citizens. I deeply appreciate your efforts to discuss and to protest human rights violations in Laos and the dictatorship of the Hanoi-backed Stalinist regime in Laos that continues to imprison and persecute the freedom-loving Laotian people.
We have gathered here in Washington, D.C., to memorialize and remember all of the Laotian, Vietnamese, Hmong and Asian people who continue to suffer human rights violations, religious persecution, torture and harsh imprisonment, without due process, and the rule of law. We remember, and are here, to demonstrate against the oppressive corruption and ongoing attacks by the secret police and military forces of the Lao regime in Vientiane, and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, against ordinary Lao and Hmong people who seek political, religious and economic freedom for Laos. We especially remember the Lao Student Movement for Democracy protesters of October 26, 1999, who peacefully demonstrated in Vientiane for democracy, human rights and political and economic reform but were arrested and continue to suffer in jail. After 12 years they are still suffering in prison in Laos for their beliefs and for their efforts to bring about reform and change in Laos.
We are here to bring attention to and remember the Laotian and Hmong hiding in the jungles and mountains of Laos who continue to suffer military attacks by Vietnam People’s Army Forces and the Lao Army because they wish to live in peace and freedom apart from the Communist regime in Laos’s persecution and religious freedom violations and human rights violations.
We, therefore, are calling for:
1.) An end to the dictatorships in Laos and Vietnam. In Laos, we are calling for the hosting of truly free and fair multi-party elections in Laos monitored by the international community and an end to one-party Communist rule in Laos by the Lao People’s Army, and its military junta, that controls the Politburo in Vientiane;
2.) The immediate withdrawal of all Hanoi-backed army units and secret police of the Vietnam People’s Army that remain on the territory of Laos in support of the Lao communist regime’s (the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party) efforts to oppress and persecute the Laotian and Hmong people and exploit the economic resources of Laos and destroy its environment; We want the Socialist Republic of Vietnam to immediately withdrawal alls its troops, soldiers and police from Laos—as well as its covert security advisors;
3.) An immediate end to illegal logging by Vietnam People’s Army owned companies in Xieng Khouang, Sam Neua, Khammoune, Luang Prabang and other provinces in Laos that is destroying the environment, killing minority peoples such as the Lao Hmong people, and exploiting the natural resources of Laos without just compensation to ordinary Laotians;
4.) Stop the persecution, imprisonment, torture and killing of religious believers in Laos, including dissident Buddhists, minority Catholics, Protestant Christians and independent Animist believers; We, the Laotian people, want true freedom of religion for all Laotians of all religious faiths;
5.) Allow international humanitarian access to, and release, all political prisoners, prisoners of conscience, and foreign prisoners, including the Lao Students for Democracy Movement leaders, Hakit Yang and other two other Lao-Hmong American citizens from St. Paul Minnesota;
6.)Allow international humanitarian access to, and release, the over 8,500 Lao Hmong refugees and asylum seekers who fled persecution in Laos and who were tragically and brutally forced from Huay Nam Khao, Thailand, back to the regime in Laos in 2009 and 2010;
7.) Release the Ban Vang Tao patriots, the Laotian citizens, who were forced back to Laos from Thailand after their courageous efforts to raise the Royal Flag of Laos, the true and traditional flag of Laos, in opposition to the arrest and imprisonment of the Lao Student leaders and in support of freedom for their beloved country of Laos.
At these events in Washington, D.C. and the demonstration and protest in front of the Lao Embassy, we are here to give voice to the millions of suffering people of Laos and Vietnam who continue to live under the brutal Stalinist regimes in Vientiane and Hanoi. We are here to call for freedom and human rights for Laos, Vietnam and all of the people of Asia.
Thank you.
(End Statement by Bounthanh Rathigna, President, the United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc.)
Invited participants and cosponsors included the ULDL, CPPA, United Lao for Human Rights and Democracy (ULHRD), Laos Institute for Democracy, Inc., Lao Students for Democracy, Lao Veterans of America, Inc., Free Vietnam Community, Hmong Advance, Inc., Hmong Advancement, Inc., and other NGOs and Asian-American organizations.
Laotian-American, and Asian-American, delegations from Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, New York, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, California, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Rhode Island and other states, also attended and participated.
Thank you.
###
CPPA -- Center for Public Policy Analysis
Contact: Jade Her or Philip Smith
Tele. (202) 543-1444
info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
2020 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
Suite 220
Washington, DC 20006 USA
www.cppa-dc.org
York, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, California, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Rhode Island and other states, also attended and participated.
Thank you.
###
CPPA -- Center for Public Policy Analysis
Contact: Jade Her or Philip Smith
Tele. (202) 543-1444
info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
2020 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
Suite 220
Washington, DC 20006 USA
www.cppa-dc.org
Hmong 'killed' in forced return to Laos
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
An elderly Hmong man and his son were allegedly killed when the forced repatriation of several dozen hilltribe people to Laos last week turned violent, according to rights advocates in the US.
Yang Chao, 68, and his son Peng Chao, 21, were reportedly beaten by Lao officials because they tried to resist being put on boats to go back across the Mekong to Vientiane on September 28.
Witnesses rang Hmong advocates in the US to say that Yang Chao, who was handcuffed at the time, was knocked senseless, then allegedly dumped from one boat when it was halfway across the river.
They claim his son Peng Chao was also beaten unconscious in Nong Khai while arguing against being forcibly returned. His body was also allegedly thrown into the river, advocates said.
Source
Vietnam, Laos Uprising: 28 Hmong Protesters Killed
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Thursday, 5 May 2011, 5:19 pm
Press Release: Centre for Public Policy Analysis
Vietnam, Laos Uprising: 28 Hmong Protesters Killed
Thousands of Viet-Hmong minority political and religious dissidents along the Laos - Vietnam border, who are staging mass protests demanding religious freedom and land reforms from the communist regime in Hanoi, have been attacked by Vietnam People's Army (VPA) troops and security forces in the remote Dien Bien province of Vietnam. Twenty-eight (28) ethnic Hmong people, protesting against government policies, are confirmed dead in recent days, with hundreds more missing, along the Laos -Vietnam border area of the the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), according to Lao Hmong non-governmental organizations, and the Center for Public Policy Analysis in Washington, D.C.
Large numbers of Vietnam People's Army infantry and mechanized troops, as well as Lao People's Army (LPA) soldiers, were rushed to the Dien Bein border area at the direction of the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the SRV on May 3-5, 2011. Ground attack helicopters were also reportedly dispatched from bases in Laos and Vietnam by the VPA, at the direction of the armed forces Chef of Staff of Vietnam. General Tran Quang Khue, and other VPA generals, who dominate the politburo in Vietnam, have reportedly played a major role in the crack-down, and deployment of the armed forces, against the peaceful Hmong protesters.
“We are concerned about credible reports that many poor and ordinary Hmong people in the Dien Bein area, as well as other people along the Vietnam and Laos border, have been arrested or killed by Vietnamese Army, and Lao Army, soldiers and police because of their protests for land reform to Communist officials in Hanoi, their opposition to illegal logging, or because of their independent Christian and Animist religious beliefs ,” said Christy Lee, Executive Director of Hmong Advance, Inc.(HAI) in Washington, D.C.
Ms. Lee continued: “Ordinary Hmong people, and other highland and forest-dwelling minority peoples in Laos and Vietnam, have also been subjected to a new and increasing injustice by the authorities and Vietnam People's Army-owned companies, which continue their oppressive methods, religious persecution, and to engage in illegal logging in Vietnam and Laos, including the Dien Bien area in Vietnam, as well as the Laotian provinces of Xieng Khouang, Khammoune, Luang Prabang and elsewhere.”
“The Hmong, and other minority Christian and Animist religious believers, are being driven of their lands and killed and persecuted by corrupt Communist party officials and the military elite in Vietnam and Laos,” Ms. Lee stated.
“At least twenty-eight Viet-Hmong are known to have been killed, and 33 wounded, in recent attacks by Vietnam People's Army troops in the Dien Bien area of Vietnam,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director of the Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) in Washington, D.C.
The non-governmental organizations, including the CPPA, HAI, Hmong Advancement, Inc. and others, cite Hmong, Vietnamese and Lao sources inside the area of Dien Bien provice where the Hmong are currently staging mass protests against Vietnam's communist and military authorities.
“The Viet-Hmong people fleeing to Laos from Dien Bien province, during the recent anti-government protests and crackdown in Vietnam, have also been arrested by Lao security forces and VPA troops who are working closely together to jointly seek to arrest, persecute and kill them,.” Smith stated.
“In recent days, significant numbers of Vietnam People's Army troops from Hanoi, and security forces from Laos, have been deployed for special military operations directed against the Hmong minority people, and independent religious believers and political dissidents, along the Vietnam – Laos border and the Dien Bein province area of Vietnam,” Smith observed.
Smith continued: “At least seventeen Viet-Hmong Christians were killed and 33 wounded on May 3rd in the Dien Bien Province, and Dien Bein Phu, areas of Vietnam bordering Laos n attacks by VPA military forces. All of these people were independent Catholic and Protestant Christian believers. Additionally, eleven independent Viet-Hmong animist believers were also known, and confirmed, to have been killed on the same day by Vietnam People's Army forces. .”
“Hundreds of Viet and Lao-Hmong minority peoples are also missing after the attacks directed against the peaceful protesters by the Vietnamese government forces in the Dien Bein area,” Smith stated.
“In addition to the seventeen Hmong Christians, an additional eleven independent Viet-Hmong animist believers were also confirmed killed on the same day by VPA forces because they also were accused of worshiping outside of the communist government's control in Hanoi and because they were standing up for land reform and the religious freedom of the Viet-Hmong and Lao-Hmong people,” Smith continued.
“Lao-Hmong forest and highland-dwelling people who have fled horrific religious persecution as well as illegal logging by Vietnam People's Army-owned companies in Laos continue to flee to Vietnam and Thailand as political refugees by the hundreds each year,” Smith concluded.
In December of 2009, Thailand forced some eight thousand Lao Hmong political refugees back to Laos, despited international protests. They were put under the direction of the Deputy Chief of the Lao Armed Forces who was previously accused by human rights and international humanitarian organizations of taking a leadership role in perpetuating atrocities and egregious human rights violations against Lao Hmong civilians, including the rape, murder and mutilation of Lao Hmong women and children.
Lately, the VPA and SRV have played a significantly increased role in Laos, with hundreds of additional troops and security forces from Vietnam being deployed in Laos in recent years.
Source
APPEASEMENT TOWARD LAOS
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Relatives and supporters of three Americans jailed and tortured in Laos are appealing to the Obama administration to put high-level pressure on the communist government for their release.
However, one of the leaders of the campaign for their freedom suspects that President Obama might ignore their plea, as he seeks better relations with the Southeast Asian nation despite its brutal human rights record.
When they heard that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton sent greetings on behalf of Mr. Obama on the Laotian new year earlier this month, “we were appalled,” said Philip Smith, director of the Center for Public Policy Analysis in Washington.
He added that the new year’s message, which also expressed hopes for expanded bilateral military relations, makes him worry that the White House is drifting toward “total appeasement of a military dictatorship.”
Mr. Smith joined a coalition of organizations representing Laotian-Americans and Laotian Hmong refugees in writing to Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton to seek “higher diplomatic” attention to the plight of the three naturalized U.S. citizens of Hmong descent.
The three Hmong-Americans have been “interrogated, beaten and tortured, according to eyewitness and multiple sources,” Mr. Smith said.
Congshineng Yang, 34, Hakit Yang, 24, and Trillion Yunhaison, 44, visited Laos with valid tourist visas in July 2007. Laotian soldiers and secret police arrested them the next month in northeastern Laos.
“They were arrested without charges and for unknown reasons,” Mr. Smith said.
The secret police later moved the three Americans to Lao’s notorious Phonthong Prison in the capital, Vientiane. Their families believe the three are now being held in a secret military prison in the northeast of the country.
Mr. Smith said the families initially appealed to Ravic Huso, the U.S. ambassador to Laos at the time, and urged him to raise a diplomatic protest to the foreign ministry.
“He did almost nothing,” Mr. Smith said.
Mr. Huso assigned the case to a consular officer, who confirmed the arrests, Mr. Smith said.
“We wants answers now …,” said Shen Xiong, a spokeswoman for the families and the wife of Hakit Yang. The three Hmong-Americans had relocated from Laos to Minnesota, where their families still live.
The State Department cited a privacy act that restricts what they can say about Americans imprisoned abroad.
“We are unable to confirm claims that U.S. citizens were ever or still are in the custody of the Lao government,” an official said.
The Laotian Embassy declined to respond to an e-mail request for comment.
The State Department’s latest human rights report calls Laos “an authoritarian one-party state” where prison conditions are “harsh and, at times, life threatening.”
The Hmong people have long been the target of repression by Laotian communists because they sided with royalist forces, organized by the CIA, in the Laotian civil war, which ended in 1975.
The same day that a top Chinese official praised U.S. Ambassador Jon Huntsman as a friend of China, the outgoing envoy denounced the communist government for imprisoning a prominent artist.
“It is very sad that the Chinese government has seen a need to silence one of its most innovative and illustrious citizens,” Mr. Huntsman wrote in an introduction to a Time magazine profile on Ai Weiwei.
The artist, also an outspoken government critic, was included among Time’s 100 most influential people last week.
On the day of the April 21 publication, Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping expressed his regret that Mr. Huntsman will resign from his position later this month.
“You are an old friend of the Chinese people,” Mr. Xi said.
Mr. Huntsman, a former Republican government of Utah, is considering seeking the GOP nomination to challenge President Obama, who appointed him ambassador in 2009.
Call Embassy Row at 202/636-3297 or e-mail jmorrison@washingtontimes.com
Source
Laos, Obama Urged By Rights Groups, Hmong, to Free 3 Americans
Saturday, April 23, 2011
WASHINGTON & MINNEAPOLIS & ST. PAUL, Minn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--A coalition of Laotian and Hmong non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and the Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA), have joined the families of three Hmong-Americans from Minnesota in issuing an international appeal for the release of their relatives who have been imprisoned in Laos for over three years. The appeal requests that the Lao government, and U.S. President Barack Obama, work at a higher diplomatic level, with urgent priority, to release the three Hmong-American citizens.
In August 2007, for unknown reasons, Lao People's Army (LPA) troops and secret police arrested the three Americans: Mr. Hakit Yang, 24; Mr. Congshineng Yang, 34; and Mr. Trillion Yunhaison, 44.
The Hmong-Americans remain imprisoned in Laos' Sam Neua province by LPA troops and secret police. The three are being held without charges being filed, or due process, according to the Foreign Prisoners Support Service (FPSS), the CPPA, human rights organizations, family members and others.
Mrs. Sheng Xiong, a spokeswoman for the families, and Philip Smith of the CPPA, spoke to Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) about the case.
“I just wish the Lao government would be upfront ...,” Xiong told MPR.
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2011/04/21/hmong-americans-held-in-laos/
“We want answers now from the Lao government about the arrest and continued imprisonment of my husband, Hakit Yang, and the other two Hmong-Americans...,” Xiong, stated further.
“We would like to ask the President, Barack Obama, and the U.S. Government, to please seriously help to press the Lao military and government to cooperate in telling the truth about the arrest and imprisonment of our families in Laos so that they can be released and come home to their loved ones, including their wives and children,” Mrs. Xiong said.
“Our Lao Hmong families, and the community in St. Paul and Minneapolis, are appealing to the Lao government... to release my husband, Hakit Yang, and his colleagues...,” Xiong commented.
“We are grateful to Kay Danes and the FPSS in Australia for helping to bring new and updated information, and evidence, about the arrest and continued jailing of my husband in Laos-- and we appreciate her book 'Standing Ground' regarding... the plight of prisoners at Phonthong Prison, in Vientiane, where my husband was jailed...,” Xiong concluded.
“The LPA, and secret police, later moved the three Americans, including Sheng Xiong's husband Hakit Yang, from Xieng Khouang province, where they were arrested, to Laos' notorious Phonthong Prison, in the capital of Vientiane, where the men were interrogated, beaten and tortured, according to eyewitness and multiple sources...,” said Philip Smith, Director of the CPPA in Washington, D.C.
http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
“In 2009, the three Hmong-American men were again moved... and are now being held in a secret LPA military-operated prison camp in Sam Neua Province, Laos,” Smith stated. “We are urging President Obama to press the Lao military and government, at a higher diplomatic level, to release the three Americans...”
“Additionally, we are also appealing to President Obama, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to assist with the release of other Lao and Hmong political prisoners and religious dissidents in Laos...,” Smith concluded.
“We condemn, in the strongest terms, the continued imprisonment by the Lao military and communist officials in Laos of Mr. Hakit Yang, Mr. Conghineng Yang and Trillion Yunhaison, who are U.S. citizens still being held without charge in horrific conditions in Laos by the LPA and secret police,” said Christy Lee, Director of Hmong Advance, Inc. (HAI) in Washington, D.C.
http://www.hmongadvance.org
The NGOs joining the Hmong-American families in urging Laos, and the White House, to help release the Americans include the CPPA, HAI, Hmong Advancement, United Lao for Human Rights and Democracy, Lao Human Rights Council, Hmong Students Association, Lao Students for Democracy, United League for Democracy in Laos, Laos Institute for Democracy and Lao Veterans of America.
On March 16, the CPPA issued an appeal regarding the imprisoned Hmong-Americans and human rights violations in Laos.
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20110316007171/en/Laos-Hmong-Crisis-Rights-Groups-International-Appeal
CPPA - Center for Public Policy Analysis
info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
Source
Laos: Appeal for Release of 3 Hmong-Americans
Friday, April 22, 2011
Friday, 22 April 2011, 10:14 am
Press Release: Center for Public Policy Analysis
Laos: Appeal for Release of 3 Hmong-Americans
Washington, D.C., Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, April 21, 2011
Center for Public Policy Analysis
info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
The Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) and a coalition of Laotian and Hmong non-governmental organizations have joined the Minnesota families of three Hmong-Americans in issuing an appeal for the release of their relatives being held in Laos for over three years by military and communist party officials. The appeal was issued from Washington, D.C., and the Twin Cities of Minnesota, to the Lao government and U.S. President Barack Obama to request that they work at a higher diplomatic level, with urgent priority, to release three Hmong-American citizens arrested and currently imprisoned in Laos.
The three jailed Americans, of ethnic Hmong descent from the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, have been imprisoned in Laos for over three years-- according to eye-witness sources, human rights groups, prisoner support organizations, and humanitarian activists, including Australian author and humanitarian advocate Kay Danes. . http://www.presszoom.com/print_story_140676.htm
According to the Foreign Prisoners Support Service in Australia, CPPA, family members and other sources, the three Minnesota men were arrested in Laos by Lao military and security forces while they were visiting Laos in the summer of 2007 as tourists and potential investors.. The three Hmong-Americans remained imprisoned in Laos' Sam Neua Province by Lao military and ministry of interior police.. They are currently being held without charges being filed, or due process.
“We want answers now from the Lao government about the arrest and continued imprisonment of my husband, Hakit Yang, and the other two Hmong-Americans traveling with him from Minnesota,” said Sheng Xiong, a spokeswoman for the families of the three Hmong-Americans arrested in the summer of 2007 in Xieng Khouang Province. http://www.media-newswire.com/release_1089564.html
“Our Lao Hmong families, and the community in St. Paul and Minneapolis, are appealing to the Lao government once again to release my husband Hakit Yang and his colleagues immediately, and unconditionally,” Mrs. Xiong further stated.
“We would like to ask the President of the United States, Barack Obama, and the U.S. government to please seriously help to press the Lao military and government to cooperate in telling the truth about the arrest and imprisonment of our families in Laos so that they can be released and come home to their loved ones, including their wives and children,” Xiong said.
“We are grateful to Kay Danes and the Foreign Prisoners Support Service in Australia for helping to bring new and updated information and evidence about the arrest and continued jailing of my husband in Laos and we appreciate her book 'Standing Ground' regarding her experience and first-hand knowledge about the the plight of prisoners at Phonthong Prison in Vientiane were my husband was jailed by the Lao authorities,” Xiong concluded.
Lao People's Army (LPA) troops and secret police arrested the three Americans: Mr. Hakit Yang, 24; Mr. Conghineng Yang,, 34; and Trillion Yunhaison, 44. The three were U.S. citizens from St. Paul, Minnesota and the Twin Cities area of Minnesota where their immediate families remain. A fourth Hmong individual Mr. Pao Vang, of unknown nationality and age, was reportedly acting as tour guide for the group, and was also reportedly arrested and jailed with them according to sources inside Laos.
“The LPA and secret police later moved the three Americans, including Sheng Xiong's husband Hakit Yang, to Laos' notorious Phonthong Prison, in the capital of Vientiane, where the men were interrogated, beaten and tortured according to eyewitnesses as well as numerous and redundant Hmong, Laotian, Australian, and other sources,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director for the CPPA in Washington, D.C. http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org
“In 2009, the three Hmong-American men were again moved a second time in army trucks and vehicles, and are now being held in a secret LPA military-operated prison camp in Sam Neua Province, Laos, “ Smith stated.
“Australian human rights activist and author Kay Danes as well as the Foreign Prisoners Support Service have also uncovered more details of the Lao government's continued imprisonment and mistreatment of the three American's from Minnesota.,” Smith continued.
“We are urging President Barack Obama to press the Lao military and government, at a higher diplomatic level, to release the three Americans from the Twin Cities of Minnesota,” Smith said.
“We are also appealing to President Obama, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to assist with the release of Lao and Hmong political prisoners and religious dissidents in Laos, including jailed Lao student pro-democracy leaders and the Hmong translator for Pastor Naw Karl Mua, of St. Paul, and two European journalists who were also previously arrested and imprisoned in Laos,” Smith concluded.
“We condemn, in the strongest terms, the continued imprisonment by the Lao military and communist officials in Laos of Mr. Hakit Yang, Mr. Conghineng Yang and Trillion Yunhaison, who are U.S. citizens still being held without charge in horrific conditions in Laos by the Lao Peoples Army and secret police,” said Christy Lee, the Executive Director of Hmong Advance, Inc. (HAI) in Washington, D.C.
“Laotian and Hmong-Americans are concerned that this is yet another brutal example of the Lao government's, and LPA military's, institutional violence and endemic racism directed against the Hmong people in Laos who continue to suffer mistreatment, gross human rights violations, extra-judicial killings, religious persecution, the confiscation of their land, and many other terrible abuses from the Lao military and corrupt communist party officials,” Ms. Lee stated from HAI offices in Washington..
On March 16, 2011, the CPPA and others issued and international appeal regarding the plight of the three Hmong-Americans from Minnesota as well as political prisoners and religious dissidents being jailed in Laos.
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20110316007171/en/Laos-Hmong-Crisis-Rights-Groups-International-Appeal
The United Nations' Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) in Geneva has repeated cited the government of Laos, and Lao People's Army soldiers and commanders, for egregious human rights violations and institutional racism, including the rape and killing of unarmed Lao Hmong civilians.
In 2003, the United Nations' CERD passed a resolution in Geneva condemning the Lao Peoples Democratic Republic (LPDR) for atrocities against the Hmong including the rape and murder of Hmong children by LPA forces. Thereafter, it again raised concerns about attacks against Hmong civilians and opposition groups in Laos. http://www.universalhumanrightsindex.org/documents/824/1223/document/en/pdf/text.pdf
http://www.universalhumanrightsindex.org/documents/824/960/document/en/pdf/text.pdf
“We want the one-party communist regime in Laos to abide by international law and release the three Lao Hmong-American citizens from St. Paul who have been jailed in Laos for over three years, ” said Boon Boualaphanh , of the Minneapolis -based United Lao for Human Rights and Democracy (ULHRD). “These America citizens and other prisoners , including prisoners of conscience and political prisoners, should also be released by the Lao military and communist party authorities including the Lao student leaders of the October 1999 Movement for Democracy in Vientiane.”
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The Hmong-Americans currently being jailed in Laos, have no known political or family ties to opposition or dissident factions and had departed the United States for travel to Laos on July 10, 2007, from the Twin Cities of Minnesota as tourists and to potentially seek business and investment opportunities in Laos, prior to their arrest and imprisonment.
Australian Kay Danes, a former political prisoner in Laos, spoke in the U.S. Congress and the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., in April 2009, with Sheng Xiong about the current imprisonment and plight of the three Americans in Laos. Danes is the author of “Standing Ground” a book about her ordeal in Phonthong Prison in Vientiane, Laos, where the three Americans were also imprisoned and tortured before being moved to secret military prison in Sam Neua Province by Lao military and security forces.
Laos is governed by a one-party communist regime whose leadership has repeatedly been deemed as “Press Predators” by the Paris, France-based Journalists Without Borders ( JSF ). Amnesty International and other independent human rights organizations have also raise serous concerns http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?id=ENGASA260022006
For nearly a decade, a Hmong translator with links to the Twin Cities, who assisted Minnesota Hmong-American Pastor Naw Karl Mua (Naw Karl Moua) and two European journalists, Thierry Falise and Vincent Reynaud, is still imprisoned in Laos on allegations regarding their efforts to document human rights violations. The group documented horrific attacks and atrocities committed by the LPA on Laotian and Hmong civilians, independent Animist and Christians communities, and dissident groups.
Over 8,000 Lao Hmong refugees were forced back to Laos in 2009, and were placed in charge of a LPA General, General Bouasieng Champaphanh, who has repeatedly involved with answering serious human rights and religious freedom violations, and atrocity, charges by the United Nations and independent human rights and religious freedom organizations. http://media-newswire.com/release_1108993.html
The non-profit and non-governmental organizations joining the three Hmong-American families in urging Laos to release the three Americans from Minnesota include the CPPA, HAI, Hmong Advancement, Inc., ULHRD, Lao Human Rights Council, Inc., Hmong Students Association, Lao Hmong Students For Democracy, United League for Democracy in Laos, Laos Institute for Democracy, Lao Veterans of America, Inc., and others.
Source
Laos, Vietnam troops kill four Hmong Christians: NGO
Friday, April 15, 2011
WASHINGTON — Laotian and Vietnamese troops have killed four Hmong Christian women after confiscating their Bible, a US rights group said Friday, condemning growing persecutions of people for their faith in Laos.
The Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) said the unarmed highland Hmong women were "summarily executed" on Thursday in northeastern Xieng Khouang province by soldiers from a special 150-member unit of the Lao People's Army (LPA) led by Vietnamese secret police and military advisers.
The government troops confiscated the group's only Bible, "brutally and repeatedly raped" at least two of the younger women before shooting them at point blank range with automatic weapons in the head and torso, it added.
Their husbands and 26 children were forced to witness the killings and have since disappeared after being beaten and tied up.
CPPA executive director Philip Smith denounced what he called a "tragic and major upswing" in religious persecution in Laos at the hands of Vietnamese and Laotian military and Communist Party officials over the past year.
"In a coordinated and expanded fashion, the Vietnam People's Army and LPA troops and security forces are especially determined to hunt down and kill independent Christian and animist believers in the highlands of Vietnam and Laos," he added.
Smith pointed to a "very dramatic" increase in persecution, imprisonment, torture and killing of Lao and Hmong Christians for celebrating Christmas or worshipping independently, as well as independent Buddhist and animist believers in the provinces of Vientiane, Khammoune, Saravan, Xieng Khouang, Luang Prabang and other regions in Laos.
Communist regimes have ruled in Vietnam and Laos since 1975. Many officials in Hanoi consider neighboring Laos an important part of their defense strategy, and the militaries of the two countries have long maintained close ties.
"We want the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the Vietnam People's Army to remove all of its security forces and troops from Laos, and we want the Lao military and communist regime to respect the human rights and religious freedom of the Laotian and Lao Hmong people," said Bounthanh Rathigna of the United League for Democracy in Laos.
Laotian officials are also said to have destroyed crops in February to cut off about 60 impoverished Christians from their food supply in rural Saravan province. CPPA also cited reports of Christians being driven from their village at gunpoint.
Source
Our neighbour Laos: No longer the missing link
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Vientiane's recent decision to allow Laotian students to study for bachelor degrees in the Thai language represents a new benchmark of Thai-Lao relations.
For decades, this has been an off-area for ties across the Mekong. Until recently, students could study only for masters and post graduate degrees with English language instruction in Thai universities, when scholarships were available.
Beyond the Thai-Lao context, the change of heart manifests the growing pragmatism of the new Lao leadership, which has the vision to transform the land-locked country to become a fully developed land-linked hub in continental Southeast Asia - linking Southern China to the Gulf of Thailand.
With several infrastructure projects in the pipeline under Asean Connectivity, as well as the ongoing Kunming-Vientiane high speed train, Laos is linking its north with southern China and south with Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, as part of the network of regional connectivity. To prepare for the future, the government has dispatched its best students overseas for education and training. The Lao Communist Party, which recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, is also recruiting bright students to boost its credentials and relevancy.
According to the World Bank, Laos had the second highest economic performance after China last year with an average economic growth of 7.5 per cent. Such impressive growth - unprecedented in its history - was the result of economic reform and overall efforts to integrate with Asean's economy. In the next five years, Laos also hopes to graduate from the list of least developed countries and is also hopeful of joining the World Trade Organisation.
With a new found confidence, the Lao leadership is becoming more outward looking and engaging, especially with neighbouring countries. Since joining Asean in 1997, Laos' overall relations with China, Vietnam and Thailand, have intensified with strong economic ties. Except for Cambodia and Burma, these three neighbours pursue different patterns of political and economic relations, which has enabled Laos to maintain its overall equilibrium.
Lao-China relations improved dramatically in the 1980's and more steadily afterward, as China's presence in the past 6 years has increased by leaps and bounds with huge investment in infrastructure projects. For instance, in Northern Laos, China's economic and demographic presence in Boten is quite impressive. Although China was considered a late comer in comparison with Vietnam, its larger and high-impact investment and assistant schemes including all round cooperation, have all but overwhelmed Vietnam's long-held dominance. Of late, China has also boosted the defence capacity of the Lao armed forces, delivering new military hardware and training. Diplomats frequenting the northern route linking Luang Prabang and border towns in China, have witnessed long lines of military trucks for delivery to Laos.
Truth be told, as a land-locked nation with over six million population, Laos is extremely sensitive to foreign influence. Any tilt towards any country would be addressed quite readily by party leaders. At the National Assembly meeting at the end of last year, the sudden resignation of prime minister Bouasone Bouphavanh was a good case in point. Officially, family problems were cited as the main reason - but diplomatic insiders in Vientiane held different views. They said disagreement over the scope of China's role and economic influence in the country was one of the major factors.
Less controversial this time around were Thai-Lao ties. They have improved tremendously in the past two years due to the repatriation of Hmong refugees inside Thailand, which remained the thorn in the side for the past three decades. This chapter of bad history has finally been overcome. After the controversial repatriation at the end of 2009, Thailand bore the brunt of foreign criticism for pushing back the refugees against international pressure, especially from the US. Albeit despite repeated reports of irregularities and mistreatment, overall Thailand's actions have been vindicated. Both sides are now working closely and discreetly to wrap up their long acrimonious affairs. UN agencies and third resettlement countries are more collaborative now that the issue is no longer on the political radar.
Following the January death of General Vang Pao, the Hmong resistance leader, Laotian leaders, who long fought against him and his Hmong resistance forces, have gradually opened up to overseas Hmong communities, those living in the US in particular, by inviting them to return to their homeland. The government also targets well-to-do Hmong investors.
From December 19 last year, Thailand and Laos began celebrating the 60th anniversary of their diplomatic relations. Numerous activities are planned, including commemorative stamps and books, joint cultural exhibitions, performance and sports. There is new and ongoing construction of railways, roads, hospitals and public utilities. Her Royal Highness Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn has maintained the most extensive assistance programs inside Laos covering much-needed fields such as education, agriculture, medicine and human resource developments.
Thailand has been very careful in nurturing its new found trust with Laos. Border authorities were given special instructions to prevent trafficking in people, especially along Nakhon Phanom and Nong Khai provinces. Due to the rising cost of living, more and more Laotians have been attracted to work across the border for higher wages. Thai movie stars and singers are being warned to observe and behave within Lao cultural norms and values. Thai tourists flocking to Laos, 1.3 million last year, have a better appreciation of Lao traditions than before. At this juncture, Thailand cannot afford to have any discord with Laos while the Thai-Cambodian ties continue to face uncertainty.
Laos is planning for the upcoming super event as host of the 9th Asia Europe Meeting in November 2012 - the country's biggest diplomatic showcase since its independence. In 2005, Vientiane hosted for the first time the Asean summit. Unbeknown to the public and media, also in 2005, Laos was the first country to offer hosting of the much heralded East Asia Summit, but it was overlooked. However, the possibility of having at least three dozen leaders from Asia and Europe converge on Vientiane
rendered a strong sense of national pride that Laos would be the centre of global attention - no longer merely the land of laid-back people.
Source
Laos: UNPO Presidency Condemns Persistent Persecution Of Hmong People
Thursday, November 18, 2010
From across the world, UNPO Presidency Members have joined together to express their dismay at the disregard being shown to the lives and rights of Hmong communities in Laos, where military activities threaten thousands of people
The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) has been monitoring developments in the Phou Bia region of the Lao People's Democratic Republic with deepening concern over the past months as reports have grown in number – and graphic detail - of the crimes being perpetrated against the indigenous Hmong ChaoFa population.
Military operations, jointly carried out by Lao and Vietnamese troops, appear to be verging on crimes against humanity. But with limited access to the region preventing the scale of the military operation and its human cost from being known the international community is standing by as men, women and children are encircled by what are reported to be four Lao and one Vietnamese battalions.
The UNPO condemns without reservation Vientane’s and Hanoi’s persistent persecution of innocent Hmong people in the LPDR – a people that have previously been the targets of poisonous gas, rocket grenades, machine guns and denial of access to food
American Congressmen have called for a stop to coerced return to the LPDR of Hmong ChaoFa refugees, but the international community must begin – because nothing has been done to date – to stabilise the area, address and investigate gross violations of basic Hmong human rights and to make those acting in the name of the Laotian and Vietnamese governments responsible and accountable for their actions.
The UNPO calls upon Lao authorities to fully implement the recommendations it accepted following the UPR process of the UN Human Rights Council in May 2010 to "[a]dopt and implement the measures necessary to grant the Hmong the same rights and freedoms as the other members of the Lao population in accordance with international human rights standards, including through genuine engagement with the international community on the issue".
Source
UNPO Presidency Condemns Persistent Persecution of Hmong People
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
From across the world, UNPO Presidency Members have joined together to express their dismay at the disregard being shown to the lives and rights of Hmong communities in Laos, where military activities threaten thousands of people
UNPO Presidency Condemns Persistent Persecution of Hmong People
The Hague, 17th November 2010 – The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) has been monitoring developments in the Phou Bia region of the Lao People's Democratic Republic with deepening concern over the past months as reports have grown in number – and graphic detail - of the crimes being perpetrated against the indigenous Hmong ChaoFa population.
Military operations, jointly carried out by Lao and Vietnamese troops, appear to be verging on crimes against humanity. But with limited access to the region preventing the scale of the military operation and its human cost from being known the international community is standing by as men, women and children are encircled by what are reported to be four Lao and one Vietnamese battalions.
The UNPO condemns without reservation Vientane’s and Hanoi’s persistent persecution of innocent Hmong people in the LPDR – a people that have previously been the targets of poisonous gas, rocket grenades, machine guns and denial of access to food
American Congressmen have called for a stop to coerced return to the LPDR of Hmong ChaoFa refugees, but the international community must begin – because nothing has been done to date – to stabilise the area, address and investigate gross violations of basic Hmong human rights and to make those acting in the name of the Laotian and Vietnamese governments responsible and accountable for their actions.
The UNPO calls upon Lao authorities to fully implement the recommendations it accepted following the UPR process of the UN Human Rights Council in May 2010 to "[a]dopt and implement the measures necessary to grant the Hmong the same rights and freedoms as the other members of the Lao population in accordance with international human rights standards, including through genuine engagement with the international community on the issue".
Source
Mangled arms, legs legacy of cluster bombs in Laos
Monday, November 8, 2010
Ki Sybounheuang, prosthetics coordinator at COPE, holds an artificial arm in front of a display of the type of limbs made at the centre, the Cooperative Orthotic and Prosthetic Enterprise, a Lao not-for-profit organisation in Vientiane, on November 7, 2010. Photo courtesy: AFP
VIENTIANE, Monday 8 November 2010(AFP) - Novalee bounces up and down on his new artificial leg.
"Comfortable. Comfortable," he says, smiling.
A cluster bomb blew off his real limb below the knee, leaving Novalee, 38, among the estimated tens of thousands of civilians around the world who have been killed or wounded by the weapons.
The Laotian Hmong man plans to tell his story at a conference that begins in the capital Vientiane on Tuesday. More than 1,000 government officials, charity workers, and survivors of the bombs will be aiming to speed up efforts to rid the world of cluster bombs.
Novalee lost his limb in 1992.
He had gone out to the rice fields of Bolikhamsay province when hunger hit and he decided to shoot a bird. He did not see the "bombie" that exploded at his feet.
As Novalee lay wounded for more than four hours, he thought he would die, he recalls through a translator at a local rehabilitation centre.
Finally his father found him.
Novalee says he spent two-and-a-half years under the care of a village healer, and fashioned a homemade prosthesis out of bamboo.
Only years later did he learn about the free artificial limbs offered by COPE, the Cooperative Orthotic and Prosthetic Enterprise in Vientiane, an eight-hour bus ride from his home.
COPE, a Laotian charity supported by foreign donors, also pays for the transportation, accommodation and food for victims like Novalee who need treatment.
"All the services for one person cost millions of kip (hundreds of dollars)," said Ki Sybounheuang, 30, COPE's prosthetics coordinator.
Victims of unexploded ordnance like Novalee account for 30 percent of COPE's patients, making them the largest group, he said.
Cluster bombs, launched from the ground or dropped from the air, split open before impact to scatter multiple bomblets over a wide area.
The bomblets can resemble a large flashlight battery or a tennis ball. Many fail to explode and can lie hidden for decades, posing a threat to unsuspecting farmers and children.
Thoummy Silamphan says he was eight years old when a bomblet blew off his left hand as he dug for edible bamboo shoots on the way home from school in Laos' Xieng Khuang province.
"Many, many people working on the farm heard it," says Thoummy, 22.
They carried him in a sarong to the main road, where a local tuk-tuk taxi took him to hospital.
"Where is my hand ?" he remembers asking himself every morning after the accident.
The US war in neighbouring Vietnam spilled into Laos from 1964 to 1973, leaving it the most heavily-bombed nation on earth per capita, says the country's National Regulatory Authority (NRA), which coordinates work on unexploded ordnance (UXOs).
Leftover cluster bombs and other UXOs contaminate up to 25 percent of the country's villages, kill or injure somebody almost every day, and create insecurity that hinders economic development, the NRA said in a report.
Even though the prosthesis that Novalee first got in 2008 has helped improve his mobility, it is not what it was before the explosion.
"I cannot work as hard as before," says Novalee, whose T-shirt spreads a warning of the hazard he knows too well.
The shirt pictures a child reaching towards a bomblet buried in bushes. Behind her, someone reacts in horror.
Novalee is still single, and his younger brother is now responsible for taking care of their poverty-stricken family of 12, he says.
Because artificial limbs wear out after at most two years, Novalee has come to COPE for a new one.
The process takes between five and seven days, says Sybounheuang, dressed in a white laboratory coat.
He and two technicians work in an area that seems like a cross between a medical examiner's room and a potter's studio. The limbs are cast in white plaster, which is then covered in brown plastic that has been heated in a large silver oven.
The most difficult part is modifying the final product so the fit is not too loose or too tight, says Sybounheuang, who joined COPE seven years ago.
"When fitting an artificial leg, they need to learn to walk again, like a baby," he says.
A type of playground for the wounded gives them practice walking over a small suspension bridge -- similar to rickety countryside crossings.
Sybounheuang grew up in the rural province of Xieng Khuang, and what he saw there motivated him to help the bomb-damaged.
"I saw a lot of amputees in my province, and most of them are jobless, and they are poor," he said. "I want to help these people."
He hopes that the conference in Laos this week, the first meeting of parties to the convention banning cluster munitions, can help clear up the bombs still left in Laos.
Sybounheuang says he does not want to make legs for any more bomb victims.
Source
Defendants in alleged Laos coup plot enter pleas
Friday, October 15, 2010
ACRAMENTO, Calif.—Ten of the 12 defendants charged with plotting to overthrow the Communist government of Laos pleaded not guilty to amended charges Friday in Sacramento, as a federal judge questioned key allegations in the government's case.
They entered the pleas to an amended grand jury indictment issued in June. Like previous indictments, the revised charges allege the men conspired to send fighters and weapons including machine guns and explosives to Southeast Asia to attack Laos.
All 12 remain free after pleading not guilty to earlier indictments dating to 2007, when they were arrested. Another defendant previously pleaded not guilty, while prosecutors are in the process of dropping charges against the 12th.
One defendant is a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, and 11 are members of California's Hmong community, many of whom fought for the U.S. during the Vietnam War.
Besides the 12, charges were dropped last year against Vang Pao, a national Hmong leader and former Laotian general. Prosecutors said they dropped those charges after reviewing translations of more than 30,000 pages of documents and conversations recorded by an undercover agent.
During Friday's hearing, U.S. District Judge Frank Damrell repeatedly questioned whether the government had presented enough evidence or details to support its charges. For instance, he said the indictment fails to back prosecutors' claims that the machine guns and explosives would have been made or shipped through the United States, a key element of the charges.
"You're on thin ice," the judge told prosecutors. "Where the rubber hits the road, there's no evidence where these weapons were coming from."
Damrell also questioned whether the government can prove the 12 violated the Neutrality Act, which prohibits Americans from interfering with foreign governments, because prosecutors are dropping their case against the two men it originally alleged were the ringleaders. Aside from Vang Pao, the government is deferring its prosecution of a second alleged leader, Youa True Vang, and plans to drop the charges next year.
That in effect leaves the government's own undercover agent as the one orchestrating the plot, Damrell said. The weapons at the center of the allegations never existed, Damrell said, except for samples of weapons and explosives shown by the agent himself.
Some evidence is lacking because federal agents hurried to arrest the men before they could carry out the coup, responded Robert Wallace Jr., an attorney with U.S. Justice Department's National Security Division who is assisting local prosecutors with the sensitive case.
However, he and other prosecutors said they can prove their case.
Damrell did not immediately rule on the defense motions.
Even if the judge throws out some of the charges, lead defense attorney Daniel Broderick said it will not end the government's case. Other charges would remain, and the judge could let prosecutors amend any charges he dismisses.
However, Damrell has also scheduled a hearing next spring on a defense request that the entire case be dismissed because of alleged misconduct and misstatements by the undercover federal agent.
Source
Al Franken: Looking out for a U.S. ally -- the Hmong in Laos
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Last December, when thousands of Hmong in Thailand were forcibly repatriated to Laos, some Minnesotans may not have fully understood why I took the actions of these two foreign governments so seriously.
To explain, a little history is in order. During the Vietnam War, Hmong fought bravely on the side of the United States as members of a secret U.S.-funded army. Hmong men and boys helped rescue downed American pilots and disrupted North Vietnamese troops in Laos, resulting in high Hmong casualties.
It is safe to say that there are thousands fewer American names on the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C. because of the Hmong's heroism.
Because of their alliance with the U.S., many Hmong were persecuted by the Communist Lao regime that remains in power today. Tens of thousands of Hmong fled into Thailand, and many resettled to the U.S., including Minnesota state Sen. Mee Moua.
Today, there are 46,000 Hmong-Americans in Minnesota, the second largest Hmong-American population in the country, and these 46,000 Americans contribute greatly to our state. They run businesses, own homes, attend college and hold elected offices. Two of my Senate staffers are Hmong-Americans.
Last December's forced repatriation of more than 4,500 Hmong to a country and regime that has long persecuted them understandably caused grave concern for Hmong-Minnesotans, many of whom have relatives among the returnees. As a U.S. senator who represents them, it is my concern as well.
And it is my job to use my office to ensure the safety and well-being of the Hmong returnees.
Since January, I have held two large forums with members of Minnesota's Hmong-American community. The first was in immediate response to the crisis - to hear their concerns and share the most current information. In June, I brought Ravic Huso, the U.S. Ambassador to Laos, to a second forum in St. Paul, where he discussed the conditions in the "development village" where most returnees had been resettled.
In July, my wife, Franni, and I traveled to Laos to meet the returnees. Our goal was two-fold: to investigate conditions in the village and to impress upon the Lao government the importance of the returnees' safety to future U.S.-Lao relations.
As we flew into the remote village via a Soviet-era helicopter, we could see the 600 rudimentary homes built for the Hmong returnees. Unfortunately, after we landed, the Lao government severely limited our access to just one two-hour meeting with about 150 obviously pre-selected returnees.
I later expressed my dissatisfaction to Lao officials and pressed for increased access, the delivery of future humanitarian aid, and a complete list of the returnees so family and friends in Minnesota and across the country could be in communication.
Upon my return to the United States, I urged Secretary of State Clinton to raise the issue in her next-day meeting with the Lao Foreign Minister, the highest-ranking Lao official to visit Washington, DC since 1975. Secretary Clinton and I, in separate sessions, both told him that his country's desire to improve U.S.-Lao economic relations depends on the treatment of the Hmong in Laos. I also successfully included language in this year's State Department funding bill to ensure regular international access to the returnees and to assist in their well-being and livelihood.
As the war in Southeast Asia recedes into history, it is important that all Americans remember the special debt we owe the Hmong. And as Laos seeks to improve economic relations with the U.S., it is crucial that we keep the well-being of the Hmong in Laos a central priority.
Al Franken represents Minnesota in the U.S. Senate.
Source
Lao refugee (HMONG) denied exit visa to Australia
Monday, August 23, 2010
So near, yet so far. Photo: Ben Doherty
An asylum seeker granted refugee status by Australia is being kept in limbo by both Laos and Thailand.
TOUA Vang Cheng (not his real name) has spent a lifetime fleeing persecution.
A Hmong tribesman from Laos, he lives every day like those before it, trapped in no-man’s land. He had believed his decades of uncertainty – of being arrested, jailed, and tortured, of paying smugglers to spirit him across borders – were over when he was granted a humanitarian visa to resettle in Australia in 2007. But since then he has languished in refugee camps, unable to move to Australia because neither Thailand nor Laos will grant him an exit visa.
Last December, to international outrage, Mr Cheng and another 150-odd UN-recognised refugees, as well as 4500 asylum seekers, were forcibly deported from Thailand by the Thai army, back into detention camps in Laos.
Australia was furious, saying it was working to resettle 47 of the deported group, and that Mr Cheng and 16 others had already been granted humanitarian visas to live in Australia.
But now, after months in a detention centre in a remote, mountainous, part of Laos, Mr Cheng has again escaped and is back in hiding, in an undisclosed location in central Thailand.
He has, in his words, “no future”. He cannot work in Thailand, and is fearful of leaving the tiny single-room apartment he shares with half a dozen others in daylight, for fear of being caught.
“There is no way out for me,” he told The Age, on condition his identity not be revealed. “Every day it is the same, I am afraid. If they catch me, they send me back. I cannot live in Laos. They will kill me.
“I am a human, too. I would like to live. I would be a good citizen.”
It is understood about 14 Hmong families, comprising more than 70 people, have fled Lao detention camps in recent months, most back into Thailand.
Several families hold visas to move to Australia, while others have permits to resettle in the US, Canada and the Netherlands.
The Hmong, historically a hill tribe from southern China, are an ethnic minority in Laos. They have been persecuted by the communist government there for decades, and Mr Cheng’s story mirrors that of thousands of Hmong.
His began during the Vietnam War, when his father, along with thousands of Hmong men, were trained as a secret army by the CIA, to fight alongside American troops against communist North Vietnam.
But after the war, when the communist Pathet Lao party came to power in Laos, Hmong were systematically driven from their land, had homes burned, and were attacked, raped and killed.
Mr Cheng is in his late 40s, or early 50s – he isn’t certain. He has spent almost all of his life on the run. He fled to China, but was captured, beaten and jailed, including being shackled in leg-irons for two years. He escaped and fled into Thailand.
In 2003, he gained access to the UN’s refugee agency for the first time, and was assessed as having a genuine fear of persecution and a legitimate claim to asylum.
In 2007, in a refugee camp in Nong Khai on Thailand’s border with Laos, he was interviewed by Australian immigration officials and offered resettlement as a refugee.
“I thought all my problems were solved. Finally I can be freely somewhere. I felt like I had a future. I felt I would be safe.
But Thailand refused to give him the exit permit to leave for Australia.
Plane tickets were booked, and abandoned, as pressure from Laos – anxious not to be seen internationally as a country riven with ethnic tensions – meant Thailand wouldn’t let him leave.
Then, in December last year, he was part of the group of asylum seekers deported in army trucks by soldiers.
The Thai army forcibly evicted the Hmong in secret, sealing off a 12-square-kilometre area around the camp, and scrambling mobile phone signals to the area.
Their actions drew international condemnation, including from Australia, which described the action as a breach of international obligations not to send refugees back to where they faced harm.
The Thai and Lao governments declined to comment. But Thai government spokesman Panitan Wattanayagorn has said previously that Thailand regards all Hmong asylum seekers as illegal immigrants and that, if found, they would be sent back to Laos, regardless of UN or third country documentation.
Source
Reason for concern – but not alarm over repatriated Hmong
Thursday, August 12, 2010
U.S. Senator Al Franken (DFL-MN) last Sunday invited press to his Drake Bank Building office to continue updating the progress on the approximately 4,500 forcibly repatriated Hmong in Laos. It was a timely meeting now that President Barack Obama has nominated Karen Brevard Stewart as the next United States Ambassador to the Lao People's Democratic Republic.
Franken noted that he had submitted an Ambassador nomination request for State Senator Mee Moua, who has taken an active role in several efforts related to the Hmong in Laos and Thailand - from the returnees, the oppressed and the grave desecration issue at the Wat Tham Krabok Buddhist monastery in Saraburi, Thailand.
He said the State Department replied that the process to consider Brevard Stewart, a career member of the Foreign Service with the rank of Minister-Counselor, was too far along to consider other applicants.
Franken added that Brevard Stewart, like her predecessor Ravic R. Huso, speaks fluent Lao and has considerable previous experience in Laos and Southeast Asia. He said Huso has done a wonderful job on the returnees issue and has high regards for Brevard Stewart.
Sen. Franken and his spouse, Franny, traveled to the Lao People's Democratic Republic in early July 2010, as part of a Congressional delegation to discuss environmental remediation of dioxin, the funding of medical disabilities services, education initiatives, labor issues, and trade relations in Vietnam.
The two departed from the delegation for two days to investigate the treatment of more than 4,500 Hmong who were forcibly returned to Laos from Thailand last December. They traveled to the village of PhonKham in Borikhamxay province in central Laos to meet with a group of 150 returnees - and expressed disappointment at only meeting with selected returnees and for denied access to parts of the camp.
Franken said that he brought his concerns back to the Laos Capitol of Vientiane, where he said the younger Lao officials were more responsive than the old-guard military and civilian leaders that were likely in power since the War in Southeast Asia.
The Lao Deputy Prime Minister Dr. Thongloun Sisoulith, who is also the Laos Foreign Minister, was in Washington this July meet with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Sisoulith reportedly invited Secretary Clinton on an official visit to the Lao PDR.
Franken said he briefed the State Department on his observations and concerns for the Hmong, and requested that it be brought up in addition to the discussion on bilateral cooperation and common interests in Southeast Asia.
The approximately 4,500 repatriated Hmong, were living in Thai refugee camps until forcefully returned by the Thai government. Some are relatives of Hmong in Minnesota, and are considered to be at risk for their association with the Hmong CIA Army and the Royal Lao government prior to 1975. Approximately 158 of the reurnees were identified as "persons of interest" - and reportedly fled Laos for fear of the government - and are eligible for refugee status. Around 70 of the special group were referred to the U.S. State Department for resettlement. The remaining 88 individuals were referred for resettlement in Australia, Canada and the Netherlands.
Franken said that reports indicated that some of the repatriated Hmong have fled the camps and their whereabouts are as yet unknown.
Franken also said that he was provided with information that he is not at yet at liberty to share with public.
The Lao government has placed the returnees in two settlements: the village of Ban Pha Lak in southwest Kasi district in Vientiane province; and the village of Phonkham in Borikhamxay province.
Both sites are said to have permanent dwellings, farmland and irrigation systems for farming rice. There is running water, electricity, and even cell phone coverage. There is some concern for more adequate health facilities and schools - and documents that would allow the Hmong the same mobility as other Lao citizens.
Franken said that in addition to the Hmong issue in Laos, his visit was also to work on other priority concerns over the search for missing Americans from the Indochina War, the clearance of unexploded ordnance from the war, drug and human trafficking, and pandemic disease prevention.
Source
Bill would give burial rights to Hmong veterans
Thursday, July 29, 2010
FRESNO, Calif.—Members of the country's Hmong community who fought with U.S. forces during the Vietnam War would be eligible for burial in national cemeteries under a bill introduced by a Fresno congressman.
Hmong groups say legislation like the bill Rep. Jim Costa, D-Fresno, introduced Tuesday is long overdue and would give them the recognition they deserve.
"It means a great deal to the community," said Bao Vang, president and chief executive of the Hmong American Partnership, a Minnesota-based community development organization. "Hmong lost many lives due to the war."
The Hmong are an ethnic minority from the mountains of Laos. Thousands of Hmong soldiers fought under CIA advisers—an effort that was not acknowledged publicly by American officials for years—during the war to back a pro-American Lao government. A communist victory in 1975 forced them to flee, with many going to Thailand and the United States.
Census figures show more than 65,000 Hmong live in California, including 48,000 in Fresno. Other large Hmong communities are in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
"Our Hmong veterans fought shoulder to shoulder with American soldiers during the Vietnam War," Costa said in a statement. "Our nation owes a debt of gratitude to these patriotic individuals, and their service should be honored with burial benefits in our national cemeteries."
About 6,900 Hmong around the country would be eligible for the burial privileges if the bill passed, according to Costa. The Department of Veterans Affairs would have to verify their service.
Costa said he was able to finally introduce the bill after garnering the support of 22 other members of Congress, who co-sponsored it.
Will Crain, a spokesman for Costa, acknowledged that time was quickly running out to pass the bill in the current session.
"Looking at the legislative calendar, there's not a huge timeframe under which to move this," he said. "But we're going to continue to build support for it."
Source
Hmong Refugees Live in Fear in Laos and Thailand
Recently U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Laos Foreign Minister Thongloun Sisoulith met in Washington for the highest-level talks between the two countries since the end of the Vietnam War. For the U.S., the meeting was part of a strategy to re-engage with Asia, while Laos hoped the D.C. visit would boost trade. After years of frosty relations following America's carpet-bombing of Laos in the 1960s and '70s, the meeting was overall a symbolic break from the past.
Improved relations with the U.S. would surely benefit most citizens of Laos - though not everyone is so upbeat about the possibility. Meeting TIME at a secret location in Thailand, a Laotian Hmong refugee who recently escaped a repatriation camp in Laos says the Washington exchange will do nothing to help thousands of Hmong still being persecuted in Laos. "They are only talking about imports and exports, not how to help Hmong people who once supported America," said Pao Chang using an alias for security.
During the Vietnam War, the CIA enlisted more than 60,000 Hmong from the Royal Lao Army to form a secret army to disrupt Communist supply lines and rescue American pilots. Fierce mercenaries, the Hmong acted as an effective counter to North Vietnam's growing support base in Laos. When the Communists won and the CIA left, a handful of senior Hmong were flown out, but the majority that remained faced Communist retribution for siding with America. The Pathet Lao publicly announced they would wipe out the Hmong and attacks intensified. Some Hmong groups fled deep into the jungle - where more than 3,000 continue to live to this day - the rest fled to Thailand seeking asylum, where they remained until recently. (See a brief history of the Hmong and the CIA)
On Dec. 28, 2009, Pao Chang and more than 4,000 other Hmong asylum seekers in Thailand were rounded up by local Thai authorities and forcibly sent back to Laos. "We based these actions on our immigration law, which considers them to be illegal migrants, so they were dealt with accordingly," Panitan Wattanayagorn, spokesman for the Thai prime minister, told TIME. Only six years earlier, Thai authorities had helped resettle 14,000 Hmong refugees in the U.S. The Thai about-face on its Hmong population sparked an international furor, with countries including America and Australia condemning Thailand for refusing to protect the minority group. Although Thailand never signed the United Nations Convention on Refugees, the U.N. was outraged the government had involuntarily sent back refugees. "To proceed would not only endanger the protection of the refugees, but set a very grave international example," said the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, AntÓnio Guterres, at the time.
Even more troubling for the United Nations were the 158 Hmong refugees being held in the Nong Kai immigration detention center, who had been granted refugee status and invited to resettle by America, Netherlands, Australia and Canada. "We were ready to leave," said Pao Chang, showing his family's acceptance letter from a third country along with tickets for a flight out. "Then Thai authorities came to us on the day and just said, 'No, you can't go. We have an agreement with Laos that no Hmong are to leave Thailand.'" Asked for comment, Wattanayagorn said the move came only after "Laos had assured Thailand the returning Hmong would not face persecution."
Thailand's involvement in the U.S.'s "Secret War" in Cambodia and Laos is often overlooked. Allied with the U.S. against the Communists in Laos and Vietnam, the Thai military trained many of the senior Hmong leaders. Times have clearly changed. Thailand is now Laos's number one foreign investor, and according to Joe Davy, a Hmong advocate, deporting the Hmong is just another example of political fence-mending following years of border conflict. "The main reason Thailand sent them back was pressure from Laos, which has always accused Thailand of harboring elements of the Hmong resistance," Davy says.
After a series of multilateral meetings in December 2009, the Laotian government agreed that the 158 registered refugees could resettle elsewhere on the condition they spent 30 days in Laos. "They told us if we were still not happy in Laos, we could leave, but it was just a trick," says Pao Chang. A few days later, says Pao Chang, Thai soldiers forced him onto a bus and took him to Laos where authorities ordered him not to tell foreigners he wanted to leave. He says he was then sent to a repatriation camp, where armed guards - many of whom had fought against the rag-tag groups of Hmong fighters who remain in the jungle - had his family under 24-hour surveillance. Pao Chang says he was given a "flimsy house and a tiny plot of bad farmland." Says Pao Chang with tears in eyes: "The conditions were unbearable; there were no schools and only two nurses for thousands of people."(Read "A Blackbird's Song.")
In order to ease the international community's concerns, the Laotian authorities organized two official visits for foreign diplomats. During one visit, Pao Chang says a senior commander gave him a script ordering him to tell diplomats he was being looked after and had no desire to move. Those who refused to abide by the script were denied day passes to leave the camps. After unknown assailants burned down camp farmland, Pao Chang decided he had to escape. "If I stayed, they eventually would have found a way to kill me," he says.
Pao Chang escaped the camp, traveling through Laos at night without identification and illegally crossed the Mekong River. Chang says, "If the authorities would have caught me, I would have been executed." Now in Thailand, the future of Pao Chang and other families who have followed remains unclear. He has papers from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) certifying his refugee status, but he has little faith they will protect them. "Last time I showed this paper to Thailand they hit me on the head," Pao Chang says.
Wattanayagorn says if they are caught, returning Hmong asylum seekers would be treated as illegal migrants and sent back to Laos - regardless of U.N. documents. According to Kraisak Choonhavan, MP of the Democrat Party, Thailand has never signed an international refugee treaty so it is not bound by UNHCR rules, but even Choonhavan didn't know why Thailand wasn't letting the Hmong families invited by third countries leave. "There is something strange going on here," he says.
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