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The Thai government should swiftly act to end police abuse and
discriminatory laws and policies against migrant workers and their
families, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. The
February deadline for more than a million migrant workers to enter the
"nationality verification" process or face immediate deportation
creates the risk of further abuses and should be postponed until it can
be carried out in a fair manner.
Human Rights Watch's 124-page report, "From the Tiger to the
Crocodile: Abuse of Migrant Workers in Thailand," is based on 82
interviews with migrants from neighboring Burma, Cambodia, and Laos. It
describes the widespread and severe human rights abuses faced by
migrant workers in Thailand, including killings, torture in detention,
extortion, and sexual abuse, and labor rights abuses such as
trafficking, forced labor, and restrictions on organizing.
"Migrant workers make huge contributions to Thailand's economy, but
receive little protection from abuse and exploitation," said Brad
Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "Those from Burma,
Cambodia, and Laos suffer horribly at the hands of corrupt civil
servants and police, unscrupulous employers, and violent thugs, who all
realize they can abuse migrants with little fear of consequences."
Human Rights Watch said that migrant workers face an imminent threat
from the Thai government's decision that all migrants must enter the
national verification process by February 28, or face arrest and
deportation. Eighty percent of the migrant workers in Thailand are from
Burma. They are particularly at risk, as they face ethnic and political
conflict in their home country. The costs of the nationality
verification process, which can amount to two or three months of
salary, are unacceptably high for these migrant communities.
Human Rights Watch said that unrealistic demands set by the Thai
government, coupled with a complicated and unregulated nationality
verification process, could lead to mass deportations of migrants from
Thailand to Burma and situations that could result in fundamental human
rights and labor rights violations.
Police abuse migrants with impunity. A Burmese migrant told Human
Rights Watch that she witnessed two Thai policemen in Ranong repeatedly
kick a Burmese youth in the chest, killing him, because he did not
reply to their inquiries in Thai.
"Many Burmese were watching and nobody went and helped because all
of the people were afraid of those police, so nobody said anything
about this killing, and nobody informed the police station," said the
witness. "When I saw this [killing], I felt that we Burmese people
always have to be humble and have to be afraid of the Thai police. I
feel that there is no security for our Burmese people [in Thailand] or
for myself."
Local police and officials frequently ignore or fail to effectively
investigate complaints. Provincial decrees and national laws prohibit
migrants from establishing their own organizations to assert their
rights, while restrictions in policy on changing employers, moving
outside designated areas, and convening meetings with more than a
handful of persons leave migrants vulnerable to exploitation and
ill-treatment.
Another migrant worker told Human Rights Watch how two armed men
approached her in the rubber plantation where she worked, shot her
husband dead in front of her, and then both men raped her. Despite a
suspect being named in a police report, the police did not pursue the
case.
"I am Burmese and a migrant worker. That is why the police don't
care about this case," she said. "My husband and I are only migrant
workers and we have no rights here."
Migrants reported constant fear of extortion by the police, who
demand money or valuables from migrants held in police custody in
exchange for their release. It is not uncommon for a migrant to lose
the equivalent of one to several months' pay in one extortion incident.
"Many officials and police treat migrant workers like walking ATMs,"
said Adams. "They are just part of a system that robs and mistreats
migrants wherever they turn."
Human Rights Watch found that in several provinces decrees by
provincial governors have increased migrants' vulnerability by
enforcing prohibitions on use of mobile phones and motorcycles,
imposing harsh restrictions on movement, outlawing migrant gatherings,
and enforcing nighttime curfews. These repressive decrees reflect the
treatment of migrants as a national security problem instead of as part
of a global phenomenon of the movement of people for economic,
environmental, and political reasons.
"If the Abhisit government really is reformist, it should
immediately abolish the provincial decrees that keep migrants
effectively held under lock and key, bound to their job sites, and cut
off from the outside world," said Adams.
Human Rights Watch called on the Thai government to establish an
independent and impartial commission to investigate allegations of
abuse by police and other authorities against migrants. Such a
commission should have the power to subpoena, require presentation of
evidence, and recommend criminal and civil charges against abusers. It
should make public reports on a periodic basis.
"Life is extremely uncertain and unsafe for migrants in Thailand as
they flee one difficult or deadly situation into another," said Adams.
"They are a living example of the Thai proverb which describes how the
vulnerable 'escape from the tiger, but then meet the crocodile.'"
Human Rights Watch is one of the world's leading independent organizations dedicated to defending and protecting human rights. By focusing international attention where human rights are violated, we give voice to the oppressed and hold oppressors accountable for their crimes. Our rigorous, objective investigations and strategic, targeted advocacy build intense pressure for action and raise the cost of human rights abuse. For 30 years, Human Rights Watch has worked tenaciously to lay the legal and moral groundwork for deep-rooted change and has fought to bring greater justice and security to people around the world.
The court "ripped the heart out of the law we depend on to protect American waters and wetlands," said one critic, warning that the ruling "will cause incalculable harm."
This is a breaking story… Please check back for possible updates...
The U.S. Supreme Court's right-wing majority on Thursday severely curtailed protections for "waters of the United States."
The decision in Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is "unanimous in result but very split in reasoning," explainedSlate's Mark Joseph Stern. "The upshot of Sackett is that, by a 5–4 vote, the Supreme Court dramatically narrows" which wetlands are covered by the Clean Water Act (CWA).
The majority opinion—authored by Justice Samuel Alito and joined by all of the court's other right-wing members except Justice Brett Kavanaugh—concludes that the CWA only applies to wetlands with "a continuous surface connection" to larger bodies of water, excluding those that are "adjacent."
Earthjusticedeclared in response to the ruling that "this is a catastrophic loss for water protections across the country and a win for big polluters, putting our communities, public health, and local ecosystems in danger."
Manish Bapna, president and CEO of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), was similarly critical, saying that "the Supreme Court ripped the heart out of the law we depend on to protect American waters and wetlands."
"The majority chose to protect polluters at the expense of healthy wetlands and waterways. This decision will cause incalculable harm. Communities across the country will pay the price," Bapna warned.
"What's important now is to repair the damage," he added. "The government must enforce the remaining provisions of law that protect the clean water we all rely on for drinking, swimming, fishing, irrigation, and more. States should quickly strengthen their own laws. Congress needs to act to restore protections for all our waters."
Elizabeth Southerland, former director of science and technology in EPA's Office of Water, noted that "since 1989, the U.S. government has used Clean Water Act authority to either prevent the filling of wetlands or to permit filling only when an equal acreage of wetlands is reclaimed or restored."
"Wetland preservation is critical for providing flood control, absorbing pollutants, preventing shoreline erosion, storing carbon, and serving as a nursery for wildlife," stressed Southerland, now a volunteer with the Environmental Protection Network.
The court's decision, she said, "is a big win for land developers and miners, who will now be free to destroy certain types of wetlands without paying for wetland reclamation," and "a big loss for communities who will have to pay more to treat their drinking water and respond to increased flooding and shoreline erosion."
Five U.S. senators wrote that the Pentagon "can no longer expect Congress or the American taxpayer to underwrite record military spending while simultaneously failing to account for the hundreds of billions it hands out every year."
Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday led a group of senators in urging the Pentagon to investigate price gouging by military contractors after a CBS Newsprobe that aired on "60 Minutes" earlier this week confirmed that private corporations are drastically overcharging the Defense Department for weaponry and other equipment, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in excess taxpayer spending and huge profits for the arms industry.
"The six-month investigation by CBS News, including extensive interviews with former DOD contracting officials, uncovered massive overcharges from defense contractors accounting for hundreds of millions of dollars," reads a letter that Sanders and four of his Senate colleagues—Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Mike Braun (R-Ind.), and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa)—sent to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
"As CBS reported, DOD's fixed price contracts would often provide for private profits of 12-15%," the letter continues. "Pentagon analysts found overcharges that boosted total profits to nearly 40% and sometimes as high as 4,000%. Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, and TransDigm are among the offenders, dramatically overcharging the department and U.S. taxpayers while reaping enormous profits, seeing their stock prices soar, and handing out massive executive compensation packages."
The senators also fault the Pentagon for staggering oversight failures, noting that the "60 Minutes" investigation "underlines longstanding concerns around the department's inability to pass an audit, accurately track its finances, or mitigate against fraud risk in the hundreds of billions of dollars in contracts it awards every year."
In 2021, Sanders, Wyden, Grassley, and other lawmakers teamed up to introduce legislation that would require the Pentagon to pass a full, independent audit. The bill did not get a floor vote in either chamber of Congress.
"The DOD can no longer expect Congress or the American taxpayer to underwrite record military spending while simultaneously failing to account for the hundreds of billions it hands out every year to spectacularly profitable private corporations," the letter reads. "We ask that you please provide us an update on the department’s efforts to implement outstanding GAO recommendations related to financial management and fraud risk reduction, as well as your efforts to investigate the price gouging uncovered by CBS' recent reporting."
"Proposals to push weapons out the door more quickly with less scrutiny, coupled with the sheer volume of systems being produced, will open the way to additional price gouging."
The senators' letter comes as the Pentagon is requesting $842 billion for fiscal year 2024 and as Republicans are pushing for higher military spending in debt ceiling talks with the Biden White House, even amid fresh evidence of wasteful spending that they claim to oppose.
The U.S. currently spends more on its military than over 144 countries combined, and roughly half of the Pentagon's annual budget ends up in the coffers of private corporations which—according to a recent Defense Department-backed study—are "profitable" and "generate substantial amounts of cash beyond their needs for operations or capital investment."
William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, wrote earlier this week that the Pentagon's systematic and persistent oversight lapses will likely "be exacerbated by the push to rapidly expand production to deal with supplying Ukraine and stockpiling systems relevant to a potential conflict with China."
"Proposals to push weapons out the door more quickly with less scrutiny, coupled with the sheer volume of systems being produced, will open the way to additional price gouging," Hartung warned.
"As spending rises and vetting decreases, the prospects for fraud, waste, and abuse will grow," he added. "And the arms industry and its allies in Congress and the Pentagon are intent on making any changes made to deal with the Ukraine emergency permanent, which could supersize the weapons industry while reducing oversight and accountability—a recipe for relentless, unnecessary price increases that could continue well beyond the end of the Ukraine war."
"Two Democrats voted with Republicans to say that not only should student debt relief be repealed, not only should the pause on payments end, but that you should make retroactive payments from previous months."
Two House Democrats—Reps. Jared Golden of Maine and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington—faced backlash on Wednesday after voting for a GOP resolution that would repeal President Joe Biden's student debt relief program, which is currently on hold as the U.S. Supreme Court weighs a pair of deeply flawed legal challenges.
The resolution, led by Rep. Bob Good (R-Va.), aims to make use of a law called the Congressional Review Act (CRA), which allows members of Congress to overturn rules issued by federal agencies. The GOP's student debt measure passed the House by a vote of 218 to 203.
Debt relief campaigners warned that the resolution's impact would be disastrous.
In addition to blocking the potential cancellation of up to $20,000 in student debt per eligible borrower, the measure would roll back "at least four months of paused payments and $5 billion per month in waived interest charges, requiring the U.S. Department of Education to send surprise loan bills to tens of millions of borrowers, even potentially impacting the 8th (and current) payment pause," the Student Borrower Protection Center warned.
A report published earlier this week by the American Federation of Teachers and the Student Borrower Protection Center says the Republican measure would "reinstate the debt of more than 260,000 public service workers who have achieved [Public Service Loan Forgiveness] since September 2022, restoring a debt burden that amounts to more than $19 billion overall and more than $72,000 per person."
The Debt Collective, the United States' first debtors' union, decried the Republican resolution and its two Democratic supporters, both of whom represent tens of thousands of people who would benefit from student debt cancellation.
"Jared Golden represents Maine-02. We know there are at least 100,975 student debtors in his district that he voted against today," the Debt Collective tweeted following Wednesday's vote. "Marie Gluesenkamp Perez represents Washington-03. There are at least 93,749 student debtors in her district that she voted against today. Shame."
"Today," the group wrote, "two Democrats voted with Republicans to say that not only should student debt relief be repealed, not only should the pause on payments end, but that you should make retroactive payments from previous months."
As of this writing, Golden and Perez—co-chairs of the right-wing Blue Dog Coalition—have not issued statements explaining their votes.
Golden publicly criticized the Biden administration's student debt relief plan last year, calling it "out of touch" even though polling has shown the program is popular.
\u201cToday, two Democrats voted with Republicans to say that not only should student debt relief be repealed, not only should the pause on payments end, but that you should make *retroactive* payments from previous months.\n\nIntroducing Jared Golden and Marie Gluesenkamp P\u00e9rez:\u201d— The Debt Collective \ud83d\udfe5 (@The Debt Collective \ud83d\udfe5) 1684984087
Republican backers of the resolution dismissed advocates' claims that repealing the Education Department's student debt relief program would hit borrowers with surprise bills, brushing aside such concerns as "not based in reality."
But critics of the resolution stress that it would both block Biden's student debt relief plan and nullify the most recent federal student loan payment pause.
According to the Congressional Research Service, any rule revoked by a CRA resolution of disapproval "would be deemed not to have had any effect at any time, and even provisions that had become effective would be retroactively negated."
Thus the warnings of retroactive interest payments and other consequences for those who have benefited from programs that are "intertwined with the payment pause," such as Public Service Loan Forgiveness.
"Right-wing proponents have gone to great lengths to mislead their own colleagues and deny the truth—this effort would push hundreds of thousands of public service workers back into debt and require the government to charge tens of millions borrowers for interest that has already been canceled," Mike Pierce, executive director of the Student Borrower Protection Center, said in a statement Wednesday.
"Should this become law, it will cause irreparable damage to the student loan system and undermine Americans' trust in their government," said Pierce. "This is exactly what extreme conservative lawmakers want, they are just afraid to say it."
The resolution now heads to the U.S. Senate, where—under the CRA—Republicans can force a vote despite being in the minority.
The measure would require just a simple majority to pass the narrowly Democratic upper chamber, though President Joe Biden has threatened to veto the resolution if it reaches his desk.
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) is leading the Senate resolution, which currently has 47 Republican co-sponsors.
The Washington Postreported Wednesday that "although Sens. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) and Jon Tester (D-Mont.) have criticized the debt relief plan, it's unclear whether they will join the Republican effort to dismantle the program."
"Tester's office said he is taking a look at the resolution, while Manchin's office declined to comment," the Post added.
In a floor speech ahead of Wednesday's vote, Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said it is "unconscionable but unsurprising" that Republicans are attempting to overturn the Biden administration's student debt relief program.
"Rather than work to alleviate the burden of the student debt crisis," Pressley said, "Republicans are advancing a cruel proposal that would harm 43 million people, hit tens of millions of borrowers with surprise loan bills, and reinstate the debt of over 260,000 public service workers—including our nurses, educators, firefighters, and servicemembers."
"The Senate must vote down this measure," Pressley continued. "The president has made clear he would veto this harmful resolution and stands by his decisive action on student debt relief. Millions of people, from all walks of life, stand to benefit from the president's plan, and we won't stop fighting to deliver the relief the people demand and deserve."