Thai Crackdown on Refugees Defended

Thailand’s recent hard stance against Vietnamese boat people must be seen in light of problems originating in Washington and Hanoi, a former U. S. government official who recently visited Thailand told Vietnamese-American community leaders Sunday.

The current situation, in which Thais have reportedly pushed boats carrying Vietnamese refugees back to sea, stems from the Vietnamese government’s refusal to fully back orderly immigration out of Vietnam and from its support of for-profit smuggling operations that take refugees through Cambodia and onto boats, said Shepard C. Lowman, a former State Department official.

The crisis also stems from the federal government’s reduction in the number of refugees it will accept for resettlement, Lowman said in Westminster at a meeting organized by the San Diego-based Boat People SOS Committee.

“One reason the Thais acted so harshly is the flow of refugees through Cambodia has dramatically increased, and they are afraid the U. S. will reduce its commitment to support those refugees” in Thailand refugee camps, Lowman said.

Lowman, who recently retired as the State Department’s deputy assistant secretary for refugee affairs, said he was in Thailand for three days in mid-February with a delegation of the U. S. Committee for Refugees, a privately operated advocacy group based in Washington. He testified about his trip last week at a hearing of the House foreign affairs subcommittee for Asian affairs.

During his trip, Lowman said, his delegation saw groups of as many as 77 Vietnamese refugees beached on islands just off Thailand’s eastern shore. They had been rebuffed by a blockade of Thai marine police boats and a battery of fishing boats whose owners were deputized in late January, he said. He estimated that 2,000 Vietnamese may have been turned away so far.

Lowman said refugees and fishing boat captains told him they had seen boats of refugees rammed, as well as pushed back to sea. The fishing boat captains also told of seeing bodies floating in the water, he said.

Lowman said there also was evidence that the Thai government was rounding up refugees on the islands and holding them in one spot. Other refugees may have voluntarily tried to make it back to Vietnam, he said.

During the Feb. 24 hearing before the foreign affairs subcommittee, Lowman said, his organization recommended that:

- The U.S. government and the international community strongly condemn the Vietnamese government for what Lowman called its “callous export of its citizens for profit.”

- The Vietnamese government be pressed to expand its U. N.-sponsored Orderly Departure Program and expedite the immigration of thousands of Vietnamese who already have their immigration papers in order.

- The United States consider expanding the number of Vietnamese refugees it will admit in fiscal 1989 and not reduce the number to be admitted this year from 29,500 to 23,000, as proposed in Washington.

- The United States assume an active role in the present crisis.

- The United States’ refugee program continue a “generous” Indochinese refugee resettlement component.

A similar plan was offered the same day by Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove). Dornan’s plan, however, also called for economic sanctions against Vietnam, pressure against the Japanese government to end what Dornan called its “support of Vietnam,” increased U. S. support of the non-communist forces battling the Cambodian government, and increased economic aid to Thailand.

On Sunday, Lowman told his audience of about 35 people that reducing the number of Indochinese refugees allowed in the United States would only encourage harsher measures by Thailand. And he encouraged the members of the audience to rally whatever collective political clout their community has to get that proposal killed.

Lowman also urged them to “have some sympathy” for the Thai government’s situation and to work quietly with its officials to alleviate the problem instead of staging angry public demonstrations, such as one held last week outside the Thai consulate in Los Angeles.

Lowman contended that Thailand cannot, under present conditions, support the increasing numbers of Vietnamese boat people arriving on its shores. That number rose from 3,800 in 1986 to nearly 12,000 in 1987, he said, the largest increase occurring in the last two months of the year. If the Thai government had not taken measures to stop the flow of boat people, he said, the figure would reach at least 20,000 this year.

Lowman told the Vietnamese-Americans that in order to calm the Thai government’s fears, the Cambodia refugee route must be closed, and he suggested that recent and newly arriving boat people be placed in special refugee camps for as long as three years before they are allowed to resettle.

Such a policy, Lowman said, would discourage Vietnamese in Vietnam from using it. Vietnamese now can “go from Saigon to Orange County in six or seven months,” he said.

But that suggestion did not please many in the audience.

Ho van Xuan Nhi, an aide to Dornan who acts as a liaison between Dornan’s office and the Vietnamese-American community in California, and Ky Ngo, president of the International Vietnamese Mutual Assistance Foundation, both said such an action would be unfair.