Immigration officials and police in Thailand rounded up over 800 Rohingya migrants last week in raids on a human trafficking ring that brought the migrants from Myanmar through Thailand en route to a third country, according to media reports.
Police arrested and charged eight people in connection with the trafficking and have issued warrants for two more, including a former Thai mayor, the Bangkok Post reports.
The Thai government is under pressure from human rights organizations including the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) as it processes the detained migrants and debates its next move. Thai law requires that illegal immigrants be returned to their country of origin, according to the reports, but for Rohingya refugees, who have been denied citizenship by Myanmar’s government and are seen as illegal aliens in their home region of Rakhine state, deportation means returning to a region of persecution.
"The main thing we're advocating for is that the migrants not be sent back to Myanmar, if they are in fact from Myanmar," said UNHCR's Vivian Tan. "The last thing we want to do is send them back to a situation where their freedom and safety are in jeopardy."
Many Rohingya leave Myanmar in hopes of finding more prosperous lives elsewhere. Persecution by the Myanmar government continues despite gradual relaxation of other domestic policies, and is a major impetus for illegal migrations elsewhere. Once in Thailand, many will be shipped to neighboring countries where they will be sold into a life of menial labor.
Thailand has long been a hub of international human trafficking. It has been on the US government’s Tier 2 Watch List in the Trafficking of Persons for the past two years. The US is set to review Thailand’s status next month, and a third consecutive Tier 2 rating would mean Thailand's reclassification as a Tier 3 state, which would trigger automatic sanctions, which could include the withholding of non-humanitarian, non-trade-related foreign assistance, and no funding for government employees’ participation in educational and cultural assistance programs.