Talks next month on refugee problem

[suriya@xxxxxxxxxxxx]

Local & Politics 

Talks next month on refugee problem


THAI and Lao authorities and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) plan to meet next month to resolve the problem of refugees in Nakhon
Phanom's Ban Napho camp, an informed source said yesterday. 


The tripartite meeting will be at the deputy ministerial level to seek
solutions to the issue of some 1,166 Lao refugees who have been
screened-out as
non-refugees. 


Currently 1,346 Lao remain at Napho camp, with 180 screened-in as refugees
awaiting resettlement in third countries such as the US, Canada, Australia and
New Zealand. So far four have been accepted by the US and 35 by New Zealand. 


Although Laos has in principle agreed to take back the remaining refugees
prepared to return on a voluntary basis, the Vientiane government demanded at
the tripartite technical meeting last November that its officials be
allowed to
interview the refugees. 

Thailand was not happy with the conditions then set because Laos had already
agreed to an ''organised return'' of refugees at an earlier technical meeting
held in March 1997. 

The source said the UNHCR is coordinating a tripartite meeting next 
month in Laos at the ministerial level, to help push for a solution. 

Jahanshah Assadi, the UNHCR's Regional Representative to Thailand who paid a
courtesy call to Foreign Minister Surin Pitsuwan on Thursday, said the UNHCR
will continue to fund the Napho camp and help the two countries to reach a
solution. 

He said no time-table has been set for financial assistance to Ban Napho --
whose current budget from January to June stands at Bt15 million. 

Assadi said he discussed with Surin the long-standing cooperation between the
UNHCR and Thailand, a relationship now close to 25 years old. The two sides
reviewed previous achievements, particularly in dealing with more than one
million Indochinese refugees from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, he said. 

Stressing the UNHCR's commitment, Assadi said the UN body will continue
working
together with the Thai and Lao government in finding a solution. 

''We will continue to be involved in Napho camp -- there is no time-table on
this participation but we will endeavour to find a solution in a tripartite
manner,'' he said, pointing out that the Lao problem has been going on for

over
two decades. 

Surin said the problem at Ban Napho should be resolved and that the Lao people
should not be left stranded, as they have proof of origin. 


BY RITA PATIYASEVI 
The Nation