U.N. urges Cambodia to allow hill tribe asylum seekers
PHNOM PENH - The United Nations refugee agency said on Tuesday Cambodia
must
continue giving asylum to hill tribe people fleeing Vietnam, despite an
order by Prime Minister Hun Sen to seal the country's borders.
Hun Sen said on the weekend he would allow 905 Vietnamese hill tribe
refugees who fled to Cambodia over the last year to resettle in the
United
States, but two U.N. refugee camps must then shut and border patrols
would
stop new asylum seekers.
Hundreds of extra Cambodian police have been sent to the Vietnamese
border
in recent days with instructions to arrest "illegal immigrants" and
deport
them, police officials said.
"We expect Cambodia to live up to its international obligations as a
party
to the 1951 refugee convention," Indrika Ratwatte, a U.N. High
Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR) official, told Reuters by telephone.
"That's an important part of Cambodia's responsibility," he said from
the
U.N.'s regional headquarters in Thailand.
The United States last month offered asylum to any of the refugees who
wanted to go there, saying conditions were not safe for their return to
Vietnam.
Hanoi has warned that offering asylum could further encourage people to
leave Vietnam's central highlands.
Over 1,000 mainly Christian minority people fled to Cambodia since last
year, saying they feared persecution and repression in Vietnam after the
government sent troops to the central highlands to quell protests over
land
rights and religious freedom.
The UNHCR recently pulled out of an agreement with Hanoi and Phnom Penh
to
voluntarily repatriate asylum seekers amid reports Cambodia and Vietnam
were
using force and coercion.
Plans are in motion to bring the 905 refugees currently in camps in the
country's northeast to Phnom Penh in preparation for their departure to
the
U.S., or voluntary return to Vietnam.
The ethnic minority hill tribes people, known as Montagnards, have a
long
history of opposition to communist Hanoi and fought with U.S. forces
during
the Vietnam War.
Last year, when Washington granted asylum to 38 Montagnard refugees,
Hanoi
blasted the U.S saying its former foe was interfering in its internal
affairs.
Reuters - April 2, 2002
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