Thailand’s “Long Necks” Face Resettlement Obstacles

By VIOLET CHO
The Irrawaddy News
www.irrawaddy.org
February 5, 2008

The Thai government is being accused of barring so-called “long-necked” Padaung people from emigrating to Finland and New Zealand because they are valuable tourist attractions.

About 20 members of Burma’s Padaung ethnic group living in Thailand were offered the opportunity of resettlement in Finland and New Zealand. But they are being denied exit visas, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Bangkok.

Kitty McKinsey, the UNHCR’s regional spokeswoman, said Padaung people approved for resettlement should be treated in the same way as the 200,000 Burmese refugees who have left Thailand since 2005.

“If the Thai government do not want to issue exit visa for them, then it should offer the same rights they would have in New Zealand, which means they should have Thai citizenship and full rights as Thai citizens,” she added.

New Zealand’s Immigration Department has asked Thai authorities to explain why they have refused to allow the Padaung to leave Thailand. A department official said no response had yet been received.

Kevin Third, director of the New Zealand Immigration Department’s Refugee Division, told The Irrawaddy on Tuesday that the Padaung families were included in the 2007/2008 resettlement programme.

“Due to forward planning processes the non-issue of exit permits has resulted in their places being filled by other refugees,” he said. “Further consideration of these families for resettlement will depend on whether it might be possible to obtain the necessary exit permits.”

Some observers say the Padaung families are being kept in Thailand because of the role they play as tourist attractions in northern Thailand.

Phedu, editor of the Karenni newspaper The Kandarawaddy Times, said: “I think the Thai local authorities do not want to allow Padaung people to resettle elsewhere because they do not want to lose tourist business.”

The largest Padaung village in Thailand, Nai Soi, is visited annually by about 1,200 tourists, who pay 250 baht (about US $8) to view the long-necked residents.

The governor of Mae Hong Son Province in the far north of Thailand, Thongchai Wongrianthong, claimed the long-necked people living in the region were happy where they were. He said they lived “like other refugees, under the protection of Thai laws,” according to a report in Thailand’s English language daily The Bangkok Post.

One Padaung woman living in Huay Pu Keng, Mae Hong Son Province, said, however, that she was far from happy with life. She claimed Thai authorities had stopped providing food aid, and tourists had stopped coming to her village. “Our future is not certain,” she said.

About 500 long-necked Padaung live in Huay Pu Keng and two other Mae Hong Son villages, Huay Su Htauk and Nai Soi.

The Padaung people, renowned for the coiled brass rings that many wear around their necks, are native to Burma's Karenni State, but many fled to Thailand in 1990 after reportedly being drafted by the Burmese military for forced labour.