Monday, 3 November 2014

Appeal to World News Medias and Global Civil Societies to save life of Mr. Nur Awal from Buthidaung !

Breaking News from Buthidaung

Appeal to World News Medias and Global Civil Societies to save life of Mr. Nur Awal !

Dear Sir/Madam
       We do hereby appeal to all to save life of Mr. Nur Awal son of U Hla Sein (a Health Assistant ) of ward no 7 ,Buthidung. He was arrested and severely tortured by the Burmese security forces. His situation is very serious among the arrest victims. Some Rohingyas were arrested and inhumanly touring with false accusation of blasting bomb in Buthidaung ,Arakan. Even none was injured at this toy bomb blast .It was learnt that the toy bomb was planted by USDP agent before OBAMA visits Burma. The Burma regime always blame Rohigyas with false accusation . Mr. Nur Awal's parents are very worried of their son's life and appeal to the world to come forwards for rescuing their son's life.

Roughly translated by Maung Kyaw Nu

လူၾကီးမင္းတို ့ကို အေရးၾကီးသတင္း တစ္ခုတင္ျပခ်င္ပါတယ္ ၊၊၊ ၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊ ဘူးသီးေတာင္ၿမဳိ႕နယ္တြင္ ဗုံးေဖာက္ခြဲသည္ဟု မဟုတ္မမွန္ စြပ္စြဲ၍ အျပစ္မဲ့ ရိုဟင္ဂ်ာမ်ားကို မတရားသျဖင့္ဖမ္းဆီးျပီးအလြန္ ရိုင္းစိုင္း ၾကမ္းၾကဳတ္ နိပ္စက္ခံေနရသည့္ အျပစ္မဲ့ရိုဟင္ဂ်ာထဲမွာ ဦး ႏုရ္ရာ၀ါလ္ (ဘ) ဦးလွစိန္ (က်န္းမာေရး ၀န္ထမ္း) ဆိုသူသည္ က်န္းမာေရးဆိုးရြားေနေသာေၾကာင့္ သူမိဘမ်ားက အင္မတန္စိုးရိမ္းေနပါသည္ ...... ၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊ သို ့ျဖစ္ပါရ္် လူၾကီးမင္းတို ့တက္ႏိုင္သမွ်ၾကိုးစားျပီး ၄င္းတို ့လြတ္ေျမာက္ရန္ကမၻာမီဒီယာႏွင့္လက္တဲြျပီး လွူပ္ရွားေပးပါရန္ ေမတၱာရပ္ခံအပ္ပါသည္ ၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊၊ ႏုရ္ရာ၀ါလ္ရဲ ့ပုံကို ေအာက္မွာ ေဖၚျပထားပါသည္

Saturday, 1 November 2014

Thailand's Trafficking Trade Trauma Grows as Officials Avoid the Truth

Maung Kyaw Nu,President of Burmese Rohingya Association in Thailand (BRAT)
Many Rohingyas are on the way to Thailand because of recent Rakhine action plan that force them to change their ancestral Rohingya identity into "BENGALI" which is completely foreign to them. This pro government plan force them to leave for other countries.Otherwise Rohingya will be kept in well guarded CONCENTRATION CAMPS in their own country . There some people from Bangladesh on the boat to Thailand .too. At this genocidal situation ,some greedy people take advantages from the boat people.The traffickers gangs are very organized and strong to run this inhuman slave trade . The have good net work .Comparatively more victims are raped and died this year at the concentration caps of traffickers. If the dedicated authority not come forwards ,the human tragedy will be continued. The Burmese government has not intention to stop it. According to UN GA report ,Burma would like to drive all Rohingyas from their native area. Who will come to help this unfortunate people ? What is the obligation of UN and international community to stop the genocide and human trafficking ? Are they not coming forwards to save the HUMANITY ? At least outside world knows about the human tragedy because of Phukewan's ground repots.
Posted by Maung Kyaw Nu,President of Burmese Rohingya Association in Thailand (BRAT) on November 2, 2014 03:23
Bangladeshis in confinement at the Takuapa community hall yesterday
Bangladeshis in confinement at the Takuapa community hall yesterday
Photo by phuketwan.com

Thailand's Trafficking Trade Trauma Grows as Officials Avoid the Truth

By Chutima Sidasathian and Alan Morison
Saturday, November 1, 2014
Latest International coverage of Thailand's trafficking trade grows more intense each day but inside the country, officials prefer to pretend the country is not being tainted. More »
please read here full----
http://phuketwan.com/tourism/thailands-trafficking-trade-trauma-grows-officials-avoid-truth-21299/

Victims Left in Thailand Traffickers' Jungle Camp as Raiders Carry Out Others

Maung Kyaw Nu,President of Burmese Rohingya Association in Thailand (BRAT) 
When this humanitarian crisis should end? The victims die as in the war Field at the hands of traffickers. Even some drown due to crash of boat. Burma always say not to interfere of their internal affairs . It means they can kill ,drive and force the Rohingyas to become homeless . How the world is completely silence about this ? The tragedy of boat people victims are unbearable.
Posted by Maung Kyaw Nu,President of Burmese Rohingya Association in Thailand (BRAT) on November 1, 2014 13:30


A victim lies in a secret jungle camp, unable to help hmself
A victim lies in a secret jungle camp, unable to help hmself
Click a thumbnail to view more photographs

Victims Left in Thailand Traffickers' Jungle Camp as Raiders Carry Out Others

By Chutima Sidasathian and Alan Morison
Friday, October 31, 2014
PHUKET: Rescuers who raided a secret camp in the jungle of southern Thailand at the weekend were forced to leave behind five men they could not carry.

Four adults and six children were able to flee the camp in the company of the raiders while hundreds of other captives fled into the scrub during the chaos before the raid.

Because the human traffickers are usually armed and capable of bringing in reinforcements, the raiders were forced to leave the five men behind.

They feared the traffickers, who fled with their captives, would return.

The three men who went with the raiders were carried out on poles and hammock-style slings.

It's hoped that the adults will be able to give evidence against the traffickers, who at this camp have been accused of perpetrating many rapes, including one captured in a horrific and graphic video.

The woman who escaped on Saturday night told rescuers the victim in the rape video had bee raped ''many times'' and had since been sold as a wife.

The photographs above were taken inside the jungle camp by the raiders.

Awareness of Thailand's role in being a conduit for the trafficking of boatpeople from Burma and Bangladesh grows with each incident.

Although most of the boatpeople are Rohingya Muslims fleeing persecution in Burma's Rakhine state, more recent arrivals have included Bangladeshis who were either kidnapped or enticed then coerced into seeking jobs in other parts of the country and found themselves on boats sailing south.

Overnight, a group of 17 boatpeople was involved in a crash in the southern province of Surat Thani.

It's believed they were belng trafficked. The group is being held at Thachang Police Station while authorities decide what to do with the men.

http://phuketwan.com/tourism/victims-left-traffickers-jungle-camp-raiders-carry-others-21295/

Friday, 31 October 2014

UN BILL URGES MYANMAR TO DROP IDENTITY PLAN

Al Jazeera AmericaArabic
Draft resolutions urges 'access to full citizenship on equal basis' for Myanmar's Rohingya Muslims.
Last updated: 01 Nov 2014 00:54
The violence has displaced some 140,000 Rohingya Muslims [Reuters]
A new UN draft resolution takes aim at Myanmar's aggressive campaign to have its Rohingya Muslims identify as a term they reject, urging "access to full citizenship on an equal basis."
The European Union-drafted resolution, obtained on Friday by The Associated Press, puts pressure on the Southeast Asian country to change its campaign, preferably before world leaders including President Barack Obama arrive for a regional summit in less than two weeks.
Myanmar's 1.3 million Rohingya have been denied citizenship and have almost no rights. Attacks by Buddhist mobs have left hundreds dead and 140,000 trapped in camps. Others are fleeing the country.
Authorities want to officially categorise the Rohingya as "Bengalis," implying they are illegal migrants from neighbouring Bangladesh.
The Rohingya counter that many of their families have been in Myanmar for generations. Effectively stateless, they are wanted by neither country and say the Myanmar government's campaign feels like an effort to have them systematically erased.
The vast majority of Rohingya live in the state of Rakhine. President Thein Sein, a former general, is considering a "Rakhine Action Plan" that would make people who identify themselves as Rohingya not only ineligible for citizenship but candidates for detainment and possible deportation.
The resolution now before the General Assembly's human rights committee is nonbinding, but a strong vote in its support would send a message that international opinion is not on Myanmar's side.
The resolution expresses "serious concern" about the Rohingya's status. It calls on the government to "allow freedom of movement and equal access to full citizenship for the Rohingya minority" and to "allow self-identification."
Myanmar's plan worries some in the Muslim world, and the Organization for Islamic Cooperation pushed for strong language in the resolution.
The Rohingya have emerged as a sensitive issue as Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist state, tries to move away from decades of repressive military rule toward democracy.
This week, Myanmar's ambassador to the United Nations, Tim Kyaw, told the General Assembly's human rights committee that his country is not "targeting a religion." He warned that "insisting on the right to self-identification will only impose obstacles to finding a lasting solution" to ethnic tensions.
Vijay Nambiar, the UN secretary-general's special adviser on Myanmar, told AP this week that Myanmar's government is facing increasing pressure to allow the Rohingya to identify as something other than Rohingya or Bengali.
But, Nambiar said, "In the immediate future, the government says that's not possible."

UN Resolution Urges Myanmar to Drop Identity Plan

UN Resolution Urges Myanmar to Drop Identity Plan

UNITED NATIONS — Oct 31, 2014, 7:32 PM ET
By CARA ANNA Associated Press
Associated Press
A new U.N. draft resolution takes aim at Myanmar's aggressive campaign to have its Rohingya Muslims identify as a term they reject, urging "access to full citizenship on an equal basis."
The European Union-drafted resolution, obtained Friday by The Associated Press, is one piece of international pressure on the Southeast Asian country to change its campaign, preferably before world leaders including President Barack Obama arrive for a regional summit in less than two weeks.

Myanmar's 1.3 million Rohingya have emerged as a sensitive issue as Myanmar, a predominantly Buddhist state, tries to move away from decades of repressive military rule toward democracy.
The Rohingya have been denied citizenship and have almost no rights. Attacks by Buddhist mobs have left hundreds dead and 140,000 trapped in camps. Others are fleeing the country.

Authorities want to officially categorize the Rohingya as "Bengalis," implying they are illegal migrants from neighboring Bangladesh. The Rohingya counter that many of their families have been in Myanmar for generations. Effectively stateless, they are wanted by neither country and say the Myanmar government's campaign feels like an effort to have them systematically erased.
The vast majority of Rohingya live in the state of Rakhine. President Thein Sein, a former general, is considering a "Rakhine Action Plan" that would make people who identify themselves as Rohingya not only ineligible for citizenship but candidates for detainment and possible deportation.

The resolution now before the General Assembly's human rights committee is nonbinding, but a strong vote in its support would send a message that international opinion is not on Myanmar's side.
A Myanmar diplomat assigned to that committee, reached by telephone Friday for comment, said, "It's too early to say."

The resolution expresses "serious concern" about the Rohingya's status. It calls on the government to "allow freedom of movement and equal access to full citizenship for the Rohingya minority" and to "allow self-identification."
Myanmar's plan worries some in the Muslim world, and the Organization for Islamic Cooperation pushed for strong language in the resolution.
This week, Myanmar's ambassador to the United Nations, Tim Kyaw, told the General Assembly's human rights committee that his country is not "targeting a religion." He warned that "insisting on the right to self-identification will only impose obstacles to finding a lasting solution" to ethnic tensions.

Vijay Nambiar, the U.N. secretary-general's special adviser on Myanmar, told The Associated Press this week that Myanmar's government is facing increasing pressure to allow the Rohingya to identify as something other than Rohingya or Bengali.
But, Nambiar said, "In the immediate future, the government says that's not possible."

The Persecution of the Rohingya

The Opinion Pages | Editorial

By


The government of Myanmar has created a plan to expel the country’s persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority. Under the proposal, all Rohingya who refuse to identify themselves as “Bengalis” (a term used for illegal migrants from Bangladesh) and do not have documentation acceptable to the government will be detained in camps before being driven out of the country. Incredibly, the government appealed to the United Nations last month for assistance with this project. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, not surprisingly, refused to help relocate people being interned by their own government.
Some 140,000 of the estimated 1.1 million Rohingya in Myanmar are already living in internment camps, forced to flee their homes by anti-Muslim rampages incited by the radical Buddhist monk Ashin Wirathu and his extremist group 969. The conditions in the camps are appalling. In addition to malnutrition, a lack of medical care, employment and education, the Rohingya face beatings and torture by local authorities. More than 100,000 Rohingya have fled Myanmar by boat for Malaysia and Thailand. Thousands more have fled overland.
This is only the latest form of persecution. Under a 1982 law, Myanmar denied citizenship to the Rohingya, and last November it rejected a United Nations resolution calling for it to grant them citizenship. Instead, the government of President Thein Sein came up with the new proposal, which falsely holds out the possibility of citizenship at some future time, but only if the Rohingya agree to reclassification as Bengalis and have the required documents, which thousands of displaced people simply don’t have. The plan would result in the enforced segregation and expulsion of a people based on their ethnic and religious identity.
Myanmar is expected to received $5 billion this fiscal year in foreign investments, thanks to the easing of economic sanctions by the United States and Europe on the promise of continued democratic and human-rights reforms. The United States and other governments must make it clear that Myanmar will face consequences if it continues to abuse the Rohingya.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/30/opinion/the-persecution-of-the-rohingya.html?smid=tw-share
source:The New York Times

Thursday, 30 October 2014

Secret Jungle Camp Raided: Women and Children Revealed as Traffickers' Victims

A HANDFUL CHARACTERLESS ROHINGYA OPERATES HUMAN TRAFFICKING !
  
Rohingya flee from their ancestral homes because of new Rakhine Action Plan , random killing ,raping ,arbitrary arrest and forcefully making them foreigners naming Bengali against their will. By taking this advantage ,a few trafficking groups mostly consisting of Rhingya god fathers started barbaric mafia business alongside the Burma-Thailand -Malaysia borders. REMARKABLY  in Thailand ,Rohinyas work  as volunteers of rescue team  ,no doubt, are also partly working with trafficking gangs, too.They pretend as activist ,social workers , helping to the authorities as volunteers for rescue operation ,feeding the rescued or detained victims. This handful characterless Rohingyas also earned good recommendation from a few NGOs and news medias as their interpreters and helpers. By misusing recommendation ,they, by hook and crook, try to reach the victims and start trafficking. This group also sell ,rape ,torture ,kill and steal the victims from the police custody and welfare shelters.Then they confine the victims and start various types of tortures. Even before start rescuing operation ,the Rohingyas volunteers often demand 200 USD per head from main boss of traffickers for sharing advance operation news to traffickers. So ,we can easily witness every rescuing operation only get a few acute sick or disabled people during the operation .  Hundreds managed to run away as per pre planned of Rohingya informers. How it be possible if the traffickers are not get information in advance before the operation ? This so called Rohingya volunteers are in fact working for traffickers and they shareholders too. This handful characterless Rohingyas stop their ROTI SELLING  now and become RICH MEN .If the authority and Civil society of Thailand really would like to decrease or eliminate the trafficking , first they should have fully stop so called Rohingyas using as volunteers .Otherwise ,the trafficking will be going full scale . On other hands , Burma's law breakers /killers /rappists must go for trail and the lost rights of Rohingyas' must be gained . The international community's blind eye on this barbaric trafficking and on going Rakhine action plan will lead another Pol Pot style genocide . The genocide will take thousands of Rohingyas' lives in Arakan ,Burma. Please come forwards to SAVE HUMANITY !
Maung Kyaw Nu

The seven-year-old shows his hand, infected in a secret jungle camp
The seven-year-old shows his hand, infected in a secret jungle camp
Photo by phuketwan.com

Secret Jungle Camp Raided: Women and Children Revealed as Traffickers' Victims

By Chutima Sidasathian and Alan Morison
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
 
PHUKET: Volunteers who raided a human trafficker's secret jungle camp in southern Thailand in search of two rapists failed to catch their targets but found evidence of the harsh treatment of children and other captives.

Ten people, including six children, have been taken into care as a result of the raid. About 300 others in the camp, close to Thailand's border with Malaysia, fled as their trafficker-guards deserted them to escape the raiders.

Three men, who struggled to move, are now being treated in a hospital in the town of Sadao. A woman and six children are being sheltered in a safe house.

The woman, shown a graphic video of a rape that allegedly took place in the camp, said that the female victim was a friend and confirmed she had been in the camp.

The friend, who was single, had been raped ''many times'' and had since been sold as a wife, the woman said. She also identified the two rapists.

Other women in the camp had been raped. Captives sometimes died because conditions in the jungle were so primitive, she said.

The woman has three sons aged seven, five and eight months.

She told her rescuers that the family fled the violence against Rohingya Muslims that erupted in 2012 and her husband died in a UN refugee camp in 2013.


She was pregnant at the time of her husband's death and could not work. The food supply was miserable.

Soon after giving birth, she joined about 600 others on a boat, with all three sons. They were trucked from coastal Thailand to the secret camp.

All three boys are in poor health after spending seven months as captives of the traffickers, rescuers told Phuketwan.

Skin diseases have been triggered because the camps are in the open, with earth as flooring. The eldest boy showed two badly infected hands and lesions on his body and legs.

The woman said she had no relatives capable of paying the ransom demanded by the traffickers in exchange for their captives, which is why she and her children had been in the camp for seven months.

She had not been beaten or abused because she had a reputation as a herbalist, she said.

At one stage, she said, some of the guards in the jungle camp had taken her with them to visit a more important trafficker and to treat his cancer, she said.

The video of the rape is the first visual evidence of the brutality inside the jungle camps that survivors, rescued from the camps, have previously described.

Activists hope that eventually, the traffickers can be arrested and charged as a result of Saturday's raid on the jungle camp.

Thousands of Rohingya are reported to have fled Burma - also known as Myanmar - by boat in the past fortnight.

Observers are puzzled as to whether some have already been deposited in secret in Thailand or are perhaps taking a more direct route to Malaysia.

Obama asked to ‘just say their name’


   MAUNG KYAW NU'S VIEW!
We don't care of anyone utter or not our thousands years old historical name "ROHINGYA ၇ုိဟင္ဂ်ာ",but the history of ROHANG -ARAKAN will reavel it and stand by ROHINGYA. The ancient stone(tablet) writings,archaeological evidences and architectural findings are more than enough to prove our glorious existence of ROHINGYA .Rohingyas were ,are and will be in Arakan since the world exist. NONE of the power can delete our ROHINGYA name from the earth . We know how to defend it . .
It is strongly warned that not to play with our ancestral name ROHINGYA.We will defend it with our lives.If necessary every Rohingya irrespective of women and old men will take GUNS to defend ROHINGYA IDENTITY.This is our rights.
Maung Kyaw Nu.


Rohingya

Obama asked to ‘just say their name’

File photo of US President Barack Obama (PHOTO: Wikimedia Commons) File photo of US President Barack Obama (PHOTO: Wikimedia Commons)
As Burma prepares to welcome US President Barack Obama to Naypyidaw in November, human rights groups and activists have been urging Obama to press Burma’s government to improve the country’s socio-political environment.
US-based activist organization United to End Genocide (UEG), for example, is making extensive efforts to lobby the president to address the plight of the Rohingyas during his visit to Burma.

As part of its lobbying efforts, UEG has launched a campaign called #justsaytheirname, which is designed to encourage President Obama to address the Rohingya issue and thereby reaffirm their right to self-determination and self-identification.
The NGOs campaign is inspired by UN Special Rapporteur Yanghee Lee’s recent decision to use the word “Rohingya” in her report on Burma’s human rights situation—defying pressure from the Burmese government, which prefers to use the term “Bengalis.”
Ms. Lee presented her report on Burma’s human rights situation in a speech to the UN General Assembly on 28 October. During the speech, she said: “I am acutely aware of the sensitivity around the use of the term ‘Rohingya’ that is not recognised by the [Burmese] government.”

Lee also pointed out that being forced to identify as “Bengali” was a violation of their basic rights: “I am concerned about the Rohingyas being required to identify themselves as ‘Bengali’ and if they do not they are excluded from the citizenship verification process that is being rolled out in Arakan state,” she said.
EUG President Tom Andrews said, “As President Obama prepares to make his second trip to Burma in November, he should follow the Special Rapporteur’s lead, speak out against the systematic abuse of the Rohingya and just say their name when he does so.”
Mr. Andrews then added, “It is more than just a name. It is 1.3 million people being persecuted and a culture in danger of being erased in Burma.”

Related Stories

  • File photo of Yanghee Lee, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Burma (PHOTO: Reuters) UN Rapporteur: ‘
Among the many rights denied to Rohingyas in Burma is the right to self-identification and self-determination, both of which are fundamental human rights enshrined in international law.
Ever since March 2014, when the Burmese government back-tracked on an earlier policy and struck the term “Rohingya” out of census list—insisting that the group be referred to as “Bengali” instead—the political conundrum surrounding this issue has escalated.
Subsequently, Presidential Spokesperson Ye Htut said, “It will be acceptable if they write ‘Bengali’—we won’t accept them as ‘Rohingya’.”
Ms. Lee also pointed out that it was the responsibility of the Burmese government to preserve the Rohingya community’s rights. “I note that the right of minorities to self identify is related to the obligation of the state to ensure non-discrimination against individuals and groups,” she said.
UEG is also accusing foreign governments of succumbing to pressure from Naypyidaw on the Rohingya issue, noting that many countries have avoided using the term “Rohingya” in order to maintain favorable diplomatic ties with Thein Sein’s government.
UEG’s Tom Andrews said, “Incredibly, governments of the world are bending to pressure by the Thein Sein government of Burma to no longer use the term ‘Rohingya’ when referring to the Rohingya ethnic minority.”
“Even Secretary of State John Kerry obliged the government by not mentioning the Rohingya by their name when he last visited Burma,” he said.
credit:DVB


Wednesday, 29 October 2014

The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand Events at FCCT

FCCT Logo
The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand
Events at FCCT
 
"Sila Lidskosti - Nicholas Winton" (The Power of Good - Nicholas Winton) - 64 mins, Directed by Matej Minac
Screening Courtesy: Embassy of the Czech Republic
 
 

"Sila Lidskosti - Nicholas Winton" (The Power of Good - Nicholas Winton)
 
64 mins, Directed by Matej Minac
Screening Courtesy: Embassy of the Czech Republic
 
winton-1.jpg
 
 
7pm, Thursday October 30, 2014
FREE ENTRY for Members & Non-Members; Snacks will be served
 
A rare, not-to-be-missed documentary!

Here is the gripping, much-talked-about film that first brought ' Britain's Schindler' to world-view - the man who saved 669 Jewish kids from Nazi camps in Prague, and sent them to Britain.

Nicholas Winton was a young stockbroker, who visited Czechoslovakia in 1938, saw camps full of Jewish refugees, and " had an intuition" of dangers ahead. He used his hotel as an office, and immediately started working on sending Jewish kids abroad.

He found foster-homes for them in Britain, and organized eight 'Kindertransport' trains to take the children to safety, although most would never see their parents again. The last train carrying 250 children was ready to leave Prague, when Hitler invaded Poland, and the train was stopped. No-one saw any of those children again.
What makes the story more amazing is that Winton told no-one about it, not even his wife Grete. 50 years later, in 1988, she came across a scrap-book in the attic full of pictures of the rescued children, with a list of their names. The story was published for the first time, and Winton was knighted by Queen Elizabeth, and honoured by the US House of Representatives.
Meanwhile Jewish-Slovakian Director Matej Minac (who made this docu-film), used him as a fictional character in his 1999 film 'All my Loved Ones', not knowing that the real Nicholas Winton was still alive! That was when he did intensive research on the 'rescued children' through archives around the world.
This incredible film shows it all. Minac uses archival material, film-clips, photographs, powerful music, to capture the trauma of the Jewish families - the tension, and the tears of parting.

Then he moves forward and meets the 'rescued kids' today, who have their own children and grand-children, but who have never forgotten their own, miraculous childhood escapes. Some are famous individuals, like the narrator, Joe Schlesinger of CBS television, writer Vira Gissing, who first wrote about Winton, politician Alfred Dubs, and publisher Tom Schreder.

A reserved and soft-spoken individual, it is extraordinary to meet Sir Nicholas Winton himself, at the age of 99 years when the film is made, with his wife and family. Today he is 105 years old, and still alive!

In a memorable scene Sir Nicholas Winton meets his 'rescued kids', now ageing adults, for the first time on the BBC programme 'That's Life ' in 1988, and is reduced to tears. To quote the Director of the film " It is incredible that all these people live today, due to the heroic deeds of one man !"
The inspirational documentary is now being used in schools and colleges around the world.
The film has won awards, and has inspired many individuals to help in children's causes. Director Minac made another film 'Nicky's Family' in 2011, recounting the many people who were inspired by Sir Nicholas Winton, to take up charity projects in countries as far removed as Cambodia and Africa.
We are proud to present this rare and outstanding docu-film, that recounts the amazing achievements of a living individual, who is a beacon of inspiration to the world around him. At a time of political turmoil and chaos around the globe, we want to celebrate the 'power of good' , of one individual, that made a difference to an entire generation of people.

Don't miss this rare and outstanding docu-film !
 

 
Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand
Penthouse, Maneeya Center Building

Obama Prepares to Travel to Myanmar at a Critical Time

Obama Prepares to Travel to Myanmar at a Critical Time

by Joshua Kurlantzick
October 29, 2014
obama-in-myanmar Crowds hold U.S. flags as President Barack Obama's motorcade drives through Yangon on November 19, 2012. Obama became the first serving U.S. president to visit Myanmar (Jason Reed/Courtesy: Reuters).

In November, President Obama will travel to Myanmar to attend the East Asia Summit, which brings together a broad range of nations from across the Pacific Rim. It will be the president’s second trip to Myanmar, following his landmark 2012 trip, which was the first by a sitting U.S. president to Myanmar since the country gained independence six decades ago. During the East Asia Summit, Obama almost surely will hold bilateral meetings with Myanmar President Thein Sein and other senior Myanmar leaders, including opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The timing of the president’s visit to Myanmar will be important, but the rosy hue of U.S.-Myanmar relations that colored the president’s 2012 trip has dimmed significantly. This will be Obama’s only visit to Myanmar before the landmark 2015 national elections, the first truly contested national elections in Myanmar since 1990, when Suu Kyi’s party swept parliamentary elections and then the military essentially ignored the vote and kept control of the country. In the 2015 elections, Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy is almost sure to win a sweeping majority of seats again. However, both foreign diplomats, Myanmar analysts, and some opposition politicians already are warning that the 2015 elections could be undermined or outright rigged by the military, to favor the military’s de facto party, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP). Myanmar political scientists and many foreign diplomats in Yangon report that the USDP and the military are building up paramilitary squads that could be used for intimidation on election day. The potential intimidation could range from distributing cash to co-opt opposition supporters to purposefully instigating Buddhist-Muslim violence to show the public that an unstable Myanmar cannot be turned over to a political opposition with no experience in governing.
In addition, since the high point of Myanmar’s reform process in 2012 and early 2013, the country’s political opening has stalled and, in my opinion, slid backwards.

The recent murder of a Myanmar journalist while in army custody has highlighted the regression of the country’s media environment since 2012 and 2013. Although the online and print media in Myanmar remains far freer than it ever was under junta rule, journalists are once again being harassed, detained, tried—and apparently, murdered—by the military and police. In addition, journalists who dare the cover the conflict in western Myanmar’s Arakan State, where violence against Rohingya Muslims continues unabated, face severe threat from Buddhist paramilitary groups and their supporters.

The deteriorating media environment is not the only sign of Myanmar’s backsliding. Cease-fires between the government and several ethnic minority insurgencies are collapsing, with the insurgents and the army preparing for war again. Arakan State remains a humanitarian emergency, and Thein Sein’s government has taken few constructive measures to help restore order and rights in Arakan State. The government initially simply denied the violence in Arakan State, pretending that massacres of Rohingya had not happened and tossing foreign aid groups out of Arakan State. Now, the Thein Sein government has come up with a plan for the Rohingya that is unworkable and simply racist: It wants the Rohingya to identify themselves as “Bengali” if they want to be granted Myanmar citizenship. If they do not accept this identification, the government plans to toss more Rohingya into detention camps. (A previous, military government stripped the Rohingya of their citizenship, though many of them had lived in Myanmar for generations.) But self-identifying as Bengali is akin to Rohingya marking themselves as foreigners, since to them—and to other Burmese—the term Bengali suggests that they are not indeed from Myanmar, came to Myanmar illegally, and thus can be discriminated against.

Rohingya have few options. The NGO Arakan Project recently reported that over 100,000 Rohingya have fled Myanmar in the past two years, with many dying at sea or finding themselves at the mercy of pirates, the ruthless Thai navy, and a human slavery trade that runs through Thailand.

Obama thus should use his time in Myanmar to highlight to Naypyidaw that, although the Obama administration has made rapprochement with Myanmar a major goal of its Asia policy, rapprochement increasingly depends on continued political reform in Myanmar. A rigged 2015 election, Obama should warn Naypyidaw, would immediately undermine U.S.-Myanmar relations, and a return to all-out war with ethnic insurgencies also should be a serious impediment to closer ties. Finally, Obama should make clear that the Thein Sein government’s proposed plan for the Rohingya is unsatisfactory and outright racist.
In my next post, I will look at how, despite its rich natural resources and large, untapped consumer market, Myanmar has thus far proven relatively unattractive for U.S. companies. As an article in the Wall Street Journal noted, despite the relaxation of U.S. sanctions on Myanmar, as of August 2014 U.S. companies have committed less than $250 million to investments in the country of fifty million people, a minuscule amount for a market the size of Myanmar.

Thai court dismisses defamation case against UK activist

Thai court dismisses defamation case against UK activist


A Bangkok court has dismissed a defamation charge against a British human rights worker, who is being sued after alleging labour abuses in Thailand’s tinned fruit industry.
The court ruled that the prosecution of Andy Hall was unlawful because the police acted alone and not in partnership with the attorney general, as required for offences committed outside the country.
The case related to an interview Mr Hall gave to Al Jazeera in Burma last year. Natural Fruit Company launched the legal action against Mr Hall following his research into the firm, which detailed trafficking of migrant workers, child labour, forced overtime and violence against staff.
Mr Hall, who turns 35 today, still faces three more criminal and civil defamation cases brought by the Natural Fruit Company, which exports tinned pineapple and juice. If found guilty, he could face up to seven years in prison and be forced to pay millions of pounds in damages. The second, a $10m (£6m) civil defamation case, begins today.
Mr Hall said: “I always felt confident that I would win my case. I don’t feel I did anything wrong. I feel it’s my duty to protect migrant workers and I never had any doubt,” he told The Independent.
Phil Robertson, a Thailand spokesman for Human Rights Watch, said the case “leaves a chilling effect on others wishing to investigate corporate rights-abusing behaviour in Thailand”.

Tuesday, 28 October 2014

Tips on how to find out your child's learning style by Jason Perkins

FCCT Logo
The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand
Events at FCCT
Tips on how to find out your child's learning style by Jason Perkins -


IPN_LOGO.jpg
6.30pm-8.30pm, Tuesday October 28, 2014

This is not an FCCT-sponsored event. It is a paid function and responsibility for program content is solely that of the event organizer
RSVP: ipn@ipnthailand.com or 081-8262399
Cost: FREE for IPN cardmembers and Baht 600 for nonmembers (includes presentation, handouts, light dinner (from a selection of 3), one glass of wine and soft drinks). Attendees are welcomed to email questions they have related to the topic toipn@ipnthailand.com to be answered during the Q&A session.

Does your child have trouble with spellings? Reading? Can't seem to work with numbers or sit still in class?

If yes, then there is absolutely no need to panic. It probably just means that he or she simply has a different learning style.

Every child has a different way of learning and understanding your child's own learning style can help assure academic success.

IPN's talk this month will discuss how theory of multiple intelligence can point out your child's strengths and weaknesses.

During this talk, our guest speaker Jason Perkins, IB Coordinator at St. Andrews International School, will discuss:
What is an Intelligence?

  • Differences between Learning Styles and Multiple Intelligence


  • How to investigate our own Learning Styles


  • Understanding the traditional view of Intelligence and IQ testing


  • Fun activities that combines Multiple Intelligences
  • Sunday, 26 October 2014

    အမ်ဳိးသားစိတ္ရုိက္သြင္းခဲ႔ေသာဆရာၾကီး Thakin Zainuddin (Principle Of National School, Akyab) -A ROHINGYA NATIONAL LEADER

    အမ်ဳိးသားစိတ္ရုိက္သြင္းခဲ႔ေသာဆရာၾကီး thakin Zainuddin (Principle Of National School, Akyab)

    ၁၉၇၊ – စစ္ေတြ အမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္းအုပ္္ ဆရာၾကီးဦးဇုိင္နဒၵိန္ (ဓါတ္ပုံ ၃ ပုံ) မစၥတာေနရူး၊၎၏သမီးမစၥစ္အင္ဒီရာဂႏၵီႏွင္႔တြဲလွ်က္
    Principle Of National School, Akyab
    ၁၉၄၂ ခုႏွစ္ခန္႔က
    အမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္းသားမ်ားႏွင္႔အတူစစ္ေတြအမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္းမွ
    ေက်ာင္းအုပ္ဆရာၾကီးမစၥတာ ေဇာ္ေနာ္ဒိန္ (အလယ္)
    ၁၉၄၂ ခုႏွစ္ခန္႔က
    စစ္ေတြအမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္း၌ မစၥတာေနရူး မတ္တပ္ရပ္၍မိန္႔ခြန္းေၿပာေနစဥ္
    မစၥတာ ေဇာ္ေနာ္ဒိန္ ၊ မစၥတာ ေနရူး ႏွင္႔ သမီး မစၥစ္ အင္ဒီရဂႏၵီ
    ၁၉၄၂ ခုႏွစ္ခန္႔က
    စစ္ေတြအမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္း၌ မတ္တပ္ရပ္၍ မစၥတာေဇာ္ေနာ္ဒိန္မိန္႔ခြန္းေၿပာေနစဥ္
    မစၥတာ ေဇာ္ေနာ္ဒိန္ ၊ မစၥတာ ေနရူး ႏွင္႔ သမီး မစၥစ္ အင္ဒီရဂႏၵီ
    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    Principle Of National School, Akyab
     စစ္ေတြ အမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္းအုပ္္ဆရာၾကီးဦးဇုိင္နဒၵိန္
    ရခုိင္ရုိဟင္ဂ်ာ ညီေနာင္တုိ႔က နယ္ခ်ဲ႔ဆန္က်င္ေရးေတာ္လွန္ေရးတြင္လက္တြဲမပ်က္     ခဲ႔ေပ။   လြတ္လပ္ေရးအတြက္ တုိက္ပြဲဝင္ခဲ႔ရာတြင္ အသက္ ေ သြးေခ်ြး စေတး ခံခဲ႔ၾက သည္။၁၉၂၀ေနာက္ပုိင္းကြ်န္ပညာေရးကုိဆန္႔က်င္၍ စစ္ေတြတြင္အမ်ဳိးသား ေက်ာင္း မ်ား တည္ေထာင္ရာတြင္   ရခုိင္ၿပည္ နယ္၊ ေက်ာက္ေတာ္ၿမဳိ႔နယ္၊ေခါင္းတုတ္ရြာမွ ဆရာၾကီးဦးေဇာ္ေနာ္ဒိန္က ဦးေဆာင္၍အမ်ဳိးသား ေက်ာင္းကုိ ပထမဆုံးဖြင္႔ လွစ္ခဲ႔ သည္။  ဆရာၾကီး ဦးဇုိင္နဒၵင္ (thakinZainuddin) သည္ အမ်ဳိးသားေက်ာင္း၏ ပထမဆုံးေက်ာင္းအုပ္ အၿဖစ္တာဝန္ယူအုပ္ခ်ဳပ္ခဲ႔သူၿဖစ္ၿပီး ဒုတိယေက်ာင္း အုပ္ မွာ ဦးဖုိးၿမစိန္ၿဖစ္သည္။ၿဗိတ္ိသွ်ေခတ္ ကြ်န္ပညာေရးကုိဆန႔္က်င္၍ ေက်ာင္းသား လူငယ္မ်ားကုိအမ်ဳိး သားစိတ္သြင္းေပးခဲ႔ေသာ    ။
           ၁၉၆၈ ခုႏွစ္ထုတ္  ‘’ရခုိင္ညြတ္ဖူး ‘’စာအုပ္တြင္ စာအုပ္ပါအတုိင္းေၿပာရလွ်င္  ‘’ရခုိင္တုိင္း ဖြါး မြတ္ဆလင္ဘာသာဝင္ ဘမစၥတာ ေဇာ္ေနာ္ဒိန္ ‘’သည္ ရုိဟင္ဂ်ာ  တစ္ဦးၿဖစ္ တယ္။ (တုိင္းရင္းသားလူမ်ဳိးစုဘဝသစ္ပါတီ၊ကင္းလြတ္ခြင္႔  အမွတ္  (န/သ-၀၈၅) အရ ၁၉၈၉ ခု ဇႏၷဝါရီလ ၊ပထမ အၾကိမ္ ထုတ္စာအုပ္ ( စာမ်က္ႏွာ – ၅၀ )  တြင္ေဖၚၿပထားသည္။
            ဆရာၾကီးဦးဇုိင္နဒၵင္ (thakinZainuddin) သည္ရခုိင္ၿပည္နယ္၊ ေက်ာက္ေတာ္ ၿမဳိ႔ နယ္၊ ေခါင္းတုတ္ရြာ တြင္ေမြးဖြါး၍ ( B .A .) ဘြဲ႔ ကုိ ကလႅကတၱားမွရယူခဲ႔သည္။ ဆရာၾကီး၏ ဖခင္သည္ ၿဗိတိသွ် ေခတ္က ကြ်န္းအုပ္ ရာထူး ၿဖစ္ၿပီး အဘုိးမွာ ရခုိင္ဘုရင္က ေရႊဓါး ကာဇီ ဘြဲ႔ ကုိ ခ်ီးၿမွင္႔ခံရသူၿဖစ္သည္။
            အသက္ (၅၅) ႏွစ္အရြယ္တြင္ ရခုိင္ၿပည္၊နယ္ ၊စစ္ေတြ ၊သက္ေကၿပင္ ေနအိမ္ `၌ ကြယ္လြန္၍ နာဇီရြာသင္းခ်ဳိ ၤင္းတြင္ သၿဂၤိဳဟ္သည္။

    Friday, 24 October 2014

    Statement on the killing of reporter Aung Kyaw Naing while in military custody in Myanmar

    FCCT Logo
     
    Statement on the killing of reporter Aung Kyaw Naing while in military custody in Myanmar


     
    The professional membership of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand is disturbed to learn of the death of Aung Kyaw Naing, or Par Gyi, a 49-year-old freelance reporter in Myanmar's troubled eastern border states, who contributed to The Voice, a local publication, as well as to newspapers in Yangon.

    According to press reports, Aung Kyaw Naing was detained on September 30. He was shot dead by a guard, allegedly after attempting to seize a gun and running away on the evening of October 4. He was being detained at the time by Light Infantry Battalion 208 at Kyaikmayaw in Mon State.

    A statement attributed to the military in Myanmar has alleged that Aung Kyaw Naing was also working with ethnic Karen insurgents, but this has been disputed by Karen sources.

    The circumstances of Aung Kyaw Naing's killing clearly demand a full and proper investigation. His family's wishes that his body be returned should also be respected.
     

     
    Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand
    Penthouse, Maneeya Center Building
    518/5 Ploenchit Road (connected to the BTS Skytrain Chitlom station)
    Patumwan, Bangkok 10330
    NB: Thank you very much to the FCCT for this precious statement for the honor of our colleague Ko Par Gyi (aka) Ko Aung Kyaw Naing.
     
    Maung Kyaw Nu,
         

    Record numbers of Muslim Rohingya flee western Myanmar after government launches crackdown.


    Update: 14:58, 24 October 2014 Friday
    Mass exodus of Muslims from Myanmar following arrests
    Mass exodus of Muslims from Myanmar following arrests
    File Photo

    Record numbers of Muslim Rohingya flee western Myanmar after government launches crackdown.

    World Bulletin/News Desk
    Unprecedented numbers of Muslim Rohingya have been leaving Myanmar on boats for Thailand and Malaysia following a campaign of arrests, a leading NGO said Friday.
    "In one week we have seen 8,000 Rohingya leaving northern Rakhine state -- the amount of people who left the region for the whole of 2013," Chris Lewa, head of the Arakan Project, told Anadolu Agency. 

    Last week’s flight is believed to be the largest since violence erupted between the Rohingya minority and Buddhists in western Myanmar two years ago.
    "Myanmar police let the boats come to the estuary of the Naf river in daylight and have even stopped asking for money from the Rohingya before they embark," Lewa added, referring to the water frontier between Myanmar and Bangladesh. "It looks as if it is planned."
    While the number of Rohingya escaping persecution in Myanmar increases every year as the rainy season comes to an end, there are other factors that explain the unusually large exodus this year, she said.

    Citing a recent series of arrests of community and religious leaders by local authorities, Lewa claimed some had died under torture, which had "provoked a sort of panic."
    The project believes the government may be using a recent al-Qaeda announcement of a new South Asian branch as a "pretext" for a crackdown on the Rohingya.
    In the video, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri heralded the development as "good news" for Muslims in Myanmar "where they would be rescued from injustice and oppression."
    Since 2012, 200 people -- mostly Rohingya -- have been killed and 140,000 made homeless. Tens of thousands of Muslims have paid large amounts of money to smugglers to flee on cramped boats in the hope of finding work in Thailand, Malaysia or Australia.
    In southern Thailand, some fall prey to human traffickers and corrupt local officials.
    The latest influx to southern Thailand comes as a shocking video purportedly shows the brutality inflicted on Rohingya refugees in trafficking camps.

    The footage, currently being examined by Thai immigration police, appears to show two men raping a Rohingya woman in a jungle camp in the country’s south.
    "If the video is authenticated, it may be the first real evidence of the brutal treatment of captives in the secret camps run by human traffickers in the jungles of southern Thailand," the Phuketwan news website reported Thursday.

    Lewa, who has interviewed hundreds of Rohingya in southern Thailand, was cautious about the clip but added: "We know that the people who cannot pay the sums asked by the traffickers are the object of violence."
    In the past, survivors from traffickers’ camps have shared testimony that violence, rapes and killings were a way of extracting ransom payments from victims’ families.
    The Myanmar government refuses to grant the Rohingya citizenship, claiming they are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

     Maung Kyaw Nu <brat.headoffice@gmail.com>
    Please read here--