Thailand
78 Bangladeshis, foreign nationals arrive from Thailand
A group of 78 Bangladeshis, Thai and other foreign nationals arrived here from Thailand on Saturday.
Bangladesh Embassy in Bangkok facilitated repatriation of the passengers by a special Biman Bangladesh Airlines flight (BG 4089).
The flight was arranged on self-payment basis in line with the Bangladesh government’s commitment to extend all possible assistance and support for repatriation of stranded Bangladeshis abroad, said a media release on Sunday.
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The Biman Bangladesh flight arrived at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, Dhaka at 5am on Sunday.
Ambassador of Bangladesh to Thailand Mohammed Abdul Hye thanked the Thai government for extending their cooperation in repatriation of the stranded Bangladeshi nationals.
Since outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic last year, the Embassy of Bangladesh, Bangkok has so far facilitated 13 special flights from Bangkok to Dhaka in coordination with the authorities concerned in Bangladesh and Thailand.
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Officers of the Embassy saw the passengers off at the Suvarnabhumi International Airport and extended necessary consular and other assistance for their departure formalities.
Bangladesh Ambassador to Thailand presents credentials
Bangladesh Ambassador to Thailand Mohammed Abdul Hye has presented his letter of credence to Thai King Maha Vajiralongkorn at the Ambara Villa, Dusit palace in Bangkok.
While receiving the credentials, the King welcomed the Bangladesh Ambassador to Thailand.
He recalled his fond memories of visiting Bangladesh twice and mentioned the warmth and hospitable nature of the people of Bangladeshi.
The Ambassador conveyed warm regards from the President and Prime Minister of Bangladesh and conveyed the invitation on behalf of the President to visit Bangladesh.
Also read: Abdul Hye new Bangladesh Ambassador to Thailand
The King of Thailand appreciated the Bangladesh Ambassador as he is familiar to Thailand due to his earlier stint in the Kingdom from 2004-2007.
The King wished Abdul Hye the success in his assignment.
Following the presentation of the credentials, a reception was hosted by the King in honour of the new Ambassadors on Tuesday.
The event was broadcast at the national media of Thailand with due importance.
Thailand denies forcing fleeing villagers back to Myanmar
Thailand’s prime minister denied Tuesday that his country’s security forces forced villagers back to Myanmar who had fled from military airstrikes, saying they returned home on their own accord.
Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, nevertheless, said his country is ready to shelter anyone who is escaping fighting, as it has done many times for decades. His comments came a day after humanitarian groups said Thailand has been sending back some of the thousands of people who have fled a series of air attacks by Myanmar's military.
“There is no influx of refugees yet. We asked those who crossed to Thailand if they have any problem in their area. When they say no problem, we just asked them to return to their land first. We asked, we did not use any force,” Prayuth told reporters.
“We won’t push them back,” he said. ’If they are having fighting, how can we do so? But if they don’t have any fighting at the moment, can they go back first?”
The governor of Thailand's Mae Hong Son province, where as many as 3,000 refugees had sought shelter, said later that those still on Thai soil were expected to return to their own country in a day or two.
The weekend attacks, which sent ethnic Karen people to seek safety in Thailand, were another escalation in the violent crackdown by Myanmar’s junta on protests against its Feb. 1 takeover.
At least 510 protesters have been killed since the coup, according to Myanmar’s Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, which says the actual toll is likely much higher. It says 2,574 people have been detained.
Protests continued Tuesday despite the deaths of more than 100 people on Saturday alone.
Engineers, teachers and students from the technology university in the southern city of Dawei marched without incident.
The number of protesters killed in the city rose to eight with the announcement of the death of a teenager who was shot by soldiers on Saturday as he rode a motorbike with two friends. According to local media, a hospital certificate attributed his death to “serious injuries as he fell from a motorbike.”
Medical workers in Mandalay, the country’s second biggest city, honored three of their colleagues who have been killed by security forces. The two doctors and a nurse were remembered in a simple ceremony in front of a banner with their photographs and the words “Rest In Power.”
At a cemetery in the biggest city, Yangon, three families gave their last farewells to relatives killed Monday in a night of chaos in the South Dagon neighborhood. Residents said police and soldiers moved through the streets firing randomly with live ammunition.
The coup that ousted the government of Aung San Suu Kyi reversed the country's progress toward democracy since her National League for Democracy party won elections in 2015 after five decades of military rule.
At Thailand’s Mae Sam Laep village along the Salween River, which forms the border with Myanmar, paramilitary Thai Rangers on Tuesday twice waved off a boat that had come from the other side carrying seven people, including one lying flat and another with a bandage on his head. But ambulances soon arrived on the Thai side and it landed anyway.
Thai villagers helped medical staff carry the injured people on stretchers to a small clinic at a nearby checkpoint. One man had large bruises on his back with open wounds, an injury one medical staffer said could have been caused by an explosion.
An elderly woman in the group had small cuts and scabs all over her face. Thai nurses in protective gear to guard against COVID-19 attended to her, giving her and others tests for the coronavirus.
Another villager from the boat, 48-year-old Aye Ja Bi, said he had been wounded by a bomb dropped by a plane. His legs were hit by shrapnel and his ears were ringing, he said, but he was unable to travel to get help until Tuesday.
The airstrikes appeared to be retaliation for an attack by guerrillas of the Karen National Liberation Army on a government military outpost, in which they claimed to have killed 10 soldiers and captured eight. The group is fighting for greater autonomy for the Karen people.
About 2,500-3,000 refugees crossed into Thailand on Sunday, according to several humanitarian aid agencies who have long worked with the Karen.
They said on Monday, however, that Thai soldiers had begun to force people to return to Myanmar.
“They told them it was safe to go back even though it is not safe. They were afraid to go back but they had no choice,” said a spokesperson for the Karen Peace Support Network, a group of Karen civil society organizations in Myanmar.
The army has restricted journalists’ access to the area where the villagers crossed the border.
Myanmar’s government has battled Karen guerrillas on and off for years — along with other ethnic minorities seeking more autonomy — but the airstrikes marked a major escalation of violence.
Political organizations representing the Karen and Kachin in northern Myanmar have issued statements in recent weeks warning the government against shooting protesters in their regions and threatening a response.
They were joined Tuesday by the Three Brothers Alliance, which represent the guerrilla armies of the Rakhine, Kokang and Ta-ang -- also known as Palaung -- minorities.
The alliance condemned the killing of protesters and said if it did not stop immediately, they would abandon a self-declared cease-fire and join with other groups to protect the people.
Their statement, like those of the Karen and Kachin, seemed to suggest that any military response by them would be in their home areas, not in the cities of central Myanmar where the protests and repression have been the strongest.
Supporters of the protest movement are hoping that the ethnic armed groups could help pressure the junta. Protest leaders in hiding say they have held talks, but there have been no commitments.
The United States on Monday suspended a trade deal with Myanmar, also known as Burma, until a democratic government is restored in the Southeast Asian country.
The office of the U.S. Trade Representative said the country was immediately suspending “all U.S. engagement with Burma under the 2013 Trade and Investment Framework Agreement.″ Under the agreement, the two countries cooperated on trade and investment issues in an effort to integrate Myanmar into the global economy, a reward for the military’s decision to allow a return to democracy — a transition that ended abruptly with last month’s coup.
The announcement Monday doesn’t stop trade between the two countries. Last week, the United States restricted American dealings with two giant Myanmar military holding companies that dominate much of that country’s economy.
Thousands flee into Thailand following Myanmar air strikes
Thai authorities along the country’s northwestern border braced themselves Monday for a possible influx of more ethnic Karen villagers fleeing new airstrikes from the Myanmar military.
Myanmar military aircraft carried out three strikes overnight Sunday into Monday, according to Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian relief agency that delivers medical and other assistance to villagers. The strikes possibly injured one person but caused no apparent fatalities, a member of the agency said.
Also read: 320 killed in Myanmar military's crackdowns on protests, group says
Earlier Sunday, an estimated 3,000 people crossed the river dividing the two countries into Thailand’s Mae Hong Son province following two days of aerial attacks.
Video shot that day shows a group of villagers, including many young children, resting in a forest clearing inside Myanmar, having fled their homes. They carried their possessions in bundles and baskets.
In Sunday’s previous attacks, Myanmar military aircraft dropped bombs on a Karen guerrilla position in an area on the Salween River in Karen state’s Mutraw district, according to workers for two humanitarian relief agencies.
Two guerrillas were killed and many more were wounded in those attacks, said a member of the Free Burma Rangers.
Also read: Myanmar protests continue a day after more than 100 killed
On Saturday night, two Myanmar military planes twice bombed Deh Bu Noh village in Mutraw district, killing at least two villagers.
The attacks may have been retaliation for the Karen National Liberation Army, which is fighting for greater autonomy for the Karen people, attacking and capturing a government military outpost on Saturday morning.
According to Thoolei News, an online site that carries official information from the KNU, eight government soldiers including a second lieutenant were captured in the attack and 10 were killed, including a lieutenant colonel who was a deputy battalion commander. The report said one Karen guerrilla had been killed.
The tension at the frontier comes as the leaders of the resistance to last month’s coup that toppled Myanmar’s elected government are seeking to have the Karen and other ethnic groups band together and join them as allies, which would add an armed element to their struggle.
The airstrikes mark an escalation in the increasingly violent crackdown by the Myanmar government against opponents of the Feb. 1 military takeover.
At least 114 people across the country were killed by security forces on Saturday alone, including several children — a toll that has prompted a U.N. human rights expert to accuse the junta of committing “mass murder” and to criticize the international community for not doing enough to stop it.
Also read: Myanmar crackdown: UN chief demands firm, unified and resolute international response
The Security Council is likely to hold closed consultations on the escalating situation in Myanmar, U.N. diplomats said Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of an official announcement. The council has condemned the violence and called for a restoration of democracy, but has not yet considered possible sanctions against the military, which would require support or an abstention by Myanmar’s neighbor and friend China.
The coup, which ousted Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government, reversed years of progress toward democracy after five decades of military rule. It has again made Myanmar the focus of international scrutiny as security forces have repeatedly fired into crowds of protesters.
As of Sunday, at least 459 people have been killed since the takeover, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, which has tallied deaths it was able to verify. The true toll is thought to be higher.
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