Mr. Speaker, I recently returned from a trip to Burma and Thailand. While making that trip I learned a lot about human rights and some of the concerns the local people have.
I had an opportunity to visit the refugee camps on the Thailand-Burma border, where there are more than 90,000 Burmese Karens on the border. One of the major concerns they had was the security problem of the military government, the SLORC from Burma, attacking them. More recently I have learned that some of the camps I did visit in fact were attacked and more than 200 houses were burned down.
I made these concerns known to the ambassador of Thailand and to our foreign affairs people.
I would urge this House and all my colleagues to continue to put the pressure on to ensure that the refugees along the Thailand-Burma border are secure and that the Thailand government gets the security it deserves.