Mae La refugee camp - Thailand

Today when looking at some of my pictures I came across pictures I have taken 2 years ago along the border of Thailand and Myanmar at a place not talk about the Mae La refugee camp, the biggest refugee camp in Thailand. The camp was established in 1984 in response to the massive exodus of the Burmese (Myanmar) Karen population that is been exterminated by the Burmese army also called Tatmadaw. This situation wasn't new as it lasted since the year 1949 date of the start of a war between the Karen army (KNU) and the Burmese army and until today the conflict has never been solved, it is the world longest conflict today but little is known about because it is a secret war that happening in the jungle.

In the 80' the Burmese (today Myanmar) government has started a war to exterminate the Karen and other ethnics people from Burma by all dirty means, mass execution, killings, raping, burning villages, putting mines in the crops, stilling the livestock to bring famine among the Karen, everything was allowed by the government resulting in a massive flow of Karen refugee along the Thai border. The Thai government after years and years of refugee flow had decided in 1984 to build a few refugee camps to give shelter to those fleeing Burma. Later in 1988 an even bigger flow of refugee came to Thailand due to the 8888 uprising, its name come from the date 8/8/1988 when took place a Nationwide Popular Pro-Democracy Protests against the dictatorship of Ne Win and the Army, the protest Leader was Aung San Suu Kyi and her party the National League for Democracy (NLD) and it was very famous among the student who was in the first line in the protests. The Burmese government has answered the protest with a massive blood bath nationwide. For the first time in history, Thailand has to accept Burmese citizen as refugees with many students or pro-democracy activists that life was in jeopardy on the Burmese soil. Some of the toughest students have been deciding to join the Karen National Union Army and later to build their own army, the All Burma Students'Democratic Front (ABSDF) and the Student Army and stay next to the Karen to fight a join battle against their common enemy the Burmese Army and Government. Later in 2007, another big flow of refugees arrive from the Saffron Revolution when the monks of Burma decide to surround the protesters in hope to protect them due to the sacred status of the monks, but the government gives the orders to execute the monks as well.

The Mae La camp is situated along the Thai/Burmese border between the city of Mae Sot and Mae Sariang at a place called the Dawna Range area. In 1988 at the beginning of the Mae La camp has been made to shelter about 20 000 people today, it is officially the house for more than 50 000 people but not all the refugees have been counted as many are even illegals inside the camp but had no place to go. The camp is made of thousands of Bamboo houses and the living condition in the camp is really harsh. Many people older than 30 years have never known anything other than the camp as they have spent their entire life inside. Some programs have been made to allow some of them to resettle in a third country such as USA, Canada, Australia but not many can fill the condition required to be eligible. Nowadays, with a better situation in Myanmar, some programs started to bring back refugees to their home country but most of them refuse to go back as they don't want to live in fear as cease-fire are always not lasting. The situation of these people is alarming but countries such as the EU never really think about these real refugees in need of a home and prefer to get people that have nothing to do with refugees who are coming to take advantage of the system.

Foreigner are not allowed to enter the camp but I was able to do it with the permission of the Thai army but they ask me to stay inside the car and not take pictures which I fail to do. Here a glimpse of inside and outside the camp.