Thailand closes Burmese camp

The camp has played host to thousands of dissidents

By Jonathan Head in Bangkok

Authorities in Thailand have shut down a camp housing Burmese political dissidents after student activists linked to the camp were involved in two hostage-taking incidents

The camp was a focus for opposition to the Burmese junta

The closure of the Maneeloy holding centre about 100km (60 miles) from Bangkok was announced several months ago, and most of the occupants had already been moved.

But the last few hundred occupants were driven away without incident, ending a decade in which the camp played host to thousands of Burmese dissidents.

It was established by the Thai Government to house asylum seekers and over the years became a focus for opposition to the military regime in Rangoon.

That is what proved its undoing and Burmese activists fear the closure of Maneeloy will be the start of a wider crackdown on refugees in Thailand.

Militant history

In October 1999, a militant student group with ties to Maneeloy stormed the Burmese embassy in Bangkok and held the staff hostage.

They were allowed to leave for the border.

There was no violence

But when another group occupied a hospital in January last year, the security forces moved in and shot them dead.

The government then vowed to close Maneeloy down.

The government says it would like to close down other refugee camps, and it still restricts the involvement of the UN Refugee Agency in screening asylum seekers.

But there are more than 100,000 people, most of them displaced by fighting in Burma, who are living along the border.

Many have been in Thailand for years, and there is little prospect of them being able to return to their villages inside Burma in the near future.