Myanmar Government to Let Blacklisted Democracy Activists Return from Exile
Myanmar Government to Let Blacklisted Democracy Activists Return from Exile
Radio Free Asia, 26 May 2016
URL: http://www.rfa.org/english/news/myanmar/myanmar-government-to-let-blacklisted-democracy-activists-return-from-exile-05262016150955.html
The Myanmar government will allow exiled opposition activists who are still on an official “no-entry” blacklist to return to the Southeast Asian country within 100 days, said deputy foreign affairs minister Kyaw Tin on Thursday.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is working on granting full rights and protections to those who return, the same as they have received in the countries where they have been living, as well as remove their names from the country’s immigration blacklist, Kyaw Tin said.
Thousands of Myanmar students, former political prisoners, and war refugees who fled the country as far back as the 1988 pro-democracy protests, which led to a military crackdown and international isolation, reside abroad primarily in the United States, Europe, New Zealand, South Korea, Singapore and Japan.
Naing Aung, who had been living in Thailand, returned to Myanmar briefly in August 2012 after he was removed from the blacklist of potential state enemies under former President Thein Sein. He had tried back then to persuade the government to extend the reprieve to all exiled dissidents.
“We are trying to return home because we want to work with the new democratic government led by Aung San Suu Kyi,” he told RFA’s Myanmar Service. “It would not be a bad idea to let people who have been working on democracy and human rights since 1988 return home.”
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is working on granting full rights and protections to those who return, the same as they have received in the countries where they have been living, as well as remove their names from the country’s immigration blacklist, Kyaw Tin said.
Thousands of Myanmar students, former political prisoners, and war refugees who fled the country as far back as the 1988 pro-democracy protests, which led to a military crackdown and international isolation, reside abroad primarily in the United States, Europe, New Zealand, South Korea, Singapore and Japan.
Naing Aung, who had been living in Thailand, returned to Myanmar briefly in August 2012 after he was removed from the blacklist of potential state enemies under former President Thein Sein. He had tried back then to persuade the government to extend the reprieve to all exiled dissidents.
“We are trying to return home because we want to work with the new democratic government led by Aung San Suu Kyi,” he told RFA’s Myanmar Service. “It would not be a bad idea to let people who have been working on democracy and human rights since 1988 return home.”