To the Editor:
In Zaire, 100,000 Hutu refugees, fleeing civil war in their native Rwanda find themselves caught in a horrifying situation: sick and starving, they are unable to return to their devastated homes. They are at the mercy of Zairian rebels, who have looted aid transports carrying desperately needed food and medicine and indiscriminately executed refugees in their camps.
Thousands of miles away, on the Thailand/Myanmar border, another 100,000 people, mostly Karen refugees, sit in camps without adequate shelter and supplies, and await their possible forced repatriation to Myanmar by the Thai army. If repatriated, they would face the wrath of the SLORC troops who originally drove them from their homes.
In our own country, asylum seekers from foreign lands are confined to prisons whose conditions are unjust and inhumane, as though they are criminals rather than victims.
Refugees are utterly helpless in the face of such oppression; they are faceless, voiceless. We, however, as American citizens, do have a voice, and a way to help stop this crisis... but it takes action and involvement. But to get involved, people must be aware of what is going on. I know how easy it is to forget about such abuses of human rights while we're here in our little bubble; it is for this reason that Amnesty International has organized its Refugee Action Week. One man who knows first-hand the life of a refugee is Dith Pran, who will be speaking in Oberlin next Tuesday. Pran's life was depicted in the well-known movie, The Killing Fields. Pran lost over fifty of his relatives to the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, and was forced to endure four years of suffering in forced labor camps, until he escaped to Thailand, and then to the US. Speaking of his native country, Pran has said: "I must speak for those who did not survive and for those who still suffer... If Cambodia is to survive, she needs many voices." The same can be said of the 27 million refugees who live all across the world: if they are to survive, they need many voices. I urge everyone reading this to get involved, to find out what you can do to help, and to add your voice to the chorus.
Copyright © 1997, The Oberlin Review.
Volume 125, Number 22, April 25, 1997
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