More than 2,000 villagers in northern Laos being resettled to make way for the controversial Xayaburi hydropower dam on the Mekong River will receive financial assistance for one year, officials said, amid concerns about how the uprooted villagers will sustain their livelihoods in their new homes.

Some 900 villagers have already been moved as construction proceeds on the dam, which environmentalists say will directly affect the livelihoods of 200,000 people who rely on the river while threatening food security for millions more in the region.

Lao government officials have previously said the 2,184 villagers being relocated for the project, who have relied on fish from the river and riverside gardens, will take an estimated five years to adjust to new livelihoods.

But a local official told RFA that the aid packages totaling 5 million kip (U.S. $670) per family per year to help villagers get a start on their new lives will not last that long.

“The assistance will go on for one year,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“The grants are meant to go toward buying items such as fish, piglets, etc.,” he said, adding that villagers are also encouraged to buy seeds to plant vegetables.

Families will also get a monthly allocation of rice, 20 kilograms (44 pounds) per adult or 15 kilograms (33 pounds) per child, he said.

Under construction

Construction on the U.S. $3.5 billion dam, which will be the first across the main stem of Southeast Asia’s key waterway, resumed last year following delays amid objections from Laos’s neighbors.

Some 450 villagers in Houay Souy village have been resettled to Nar Tor Yai village and another 450 from Pak Nern have been moved to New Pak Nern village.

Officials have promised to provide free electricity to the resettlement villages, but have not said for how long.

The dam’s construction is still in its early stages, with officials saying in March that about 8 percent had been completed.

Once completed in 2018, the dam will generate electricity mostly for export to Thailand, forming a key part of landlocked Laos’s plans to become the “battery of Southeast Asia” by selling electricity to its neighbors.

Resettlement 'poorly managed'

But environmental groups have said Laos is building the dam without enough study of likely socioeconomic impacts.

Last year, representatives from global green group International Rivers who visited the first group of a few hundred villagers relocated to Houay Souy in January 2012 said the resettlement process had been “poorly managed” and left villagers without enough food and income.

Resettled villagers could no longer catch fish from the Mekong, grow fruits and vegetables in riverside gardens, or gather forest products and were struggling with the “sudden shock” of their new lifestyles, the group said.  

Green groups and members of riparian communities in Southeast Asia have also raised concerns that the dam has opened the floodgates for further dam development on the Mekong River following a “flawed” decision-making process.

Poyry study

Also last year, a coalition of 14 civil society organizations said assessments on the dam’s impact provided by Finnish consulting firm Poyry Group were in breach of guidelines for multinational companies in Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, prompting an investigation by the Finnish government.

On Monday, Finland’s Ministry of Employment and Economy said Poyry did not violate the guidelines, but added that the company had “operated within the confines of a relatively limited assignment” and that it should have paid more attention to the dams’ social and environmental impact.

“Poyry should have addressed the ambiguities related to environmental issues and human rights more clearly in its report to the government of Laos,” the statement said.

In 2011, Poyry had said in a report prepared for the Mekong River Commission (MRC)—an intergovernmental body including Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam that manages development along the key waterway—that the dam was “principally in compliance” with the organization’s guidelines.

An earlier study for the MRC by an expert study group had recommended a 10-year moratorium on all Mekong mainstream dams due to a need for further research on their potentially catastrophic impact.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Viengsay Luangkhot. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

The mystery behind the disappearance of respected civil society leader Sombath Somphone in Laos has deepened amid claims by rights group Amnesty International that a gunshot was fired as he was taken away from a police post in a pickup truck by unidentified men six months ago.

Amnesty described it as a "concerning" development which has so far not been mentioned in media reports and statements around Sombath’s disappearance on the night of Dec. 15, when police-recorded surveillance video showed him being stopped at a police post in the Lao capital Vientiane.

Lao authorities have reported little progress on the 60-year-old community worker's case amid concerns for his safety by fellow activists—some of whom fear that his disappearance could be tied to his human rights work and that he may have been abducted by security groups linked to the government.

The Lao government has turned down international requests to provide any assistance in the investigations, including a U.S. offer to provide technical help to enhance the quality of some blurry images of the vital video footage on Sombath's last known moments.

Based on Amnesty's new analysis of the closed circuit television (CCTV) footage, a person riding in the back of a motorcycle ahead of a pickup truck carrying Sombath appeared to fire a shot in the air before speeding away from the police post, Amnesty said in its "Caught on Camera" report.

"The apparent gunshot may have been fired as a warning to witnesses, as a signal for the pickup truck carrying Sombath to leave immediately, or for another reason," it said.

"The fact that this man is armed may also explain why Sombath did not struggle to avoid being taken away, although those who know Sombath say that he would have tried to discuss the situation peacefully to find a resolution, rather than resist," the report said.

'Enforced disappearance'

Amnesty and U.S.-based Human Rights Watch believe Sombath is a victim of "enforced disappearance" —defined under international law as the arrest or detention of a person by state officials or their agents followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty, or to reveal the person’s fate or whereabouts.  

“Based on the evidence, the most plausible conclusion is that Sombath Somphone is a victim of an enforced disappearance, for which Lao officials are responsible,” said Rupert Abbott, Amnesty International’s Researcher on Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.

“The fact that Sombath was taken from a police post in the center of Laos’ capital city and that the police there did nothing to resist raises very serious concerns,” he said.

Abbott termed the Lao police’s proposition that the situation was "normal" as "absurd," when considering the facts, including that a gun appears to have been fired at the scene.

"The Lao authorities’ likely involvement in Sombath’s disappearance is further compounded by the failure of the police to conduct thorough investigations, which suggests a cover-up," he said.

The United States meanwhile chided Laos for not adequately responding to repeated inquiries by the international community into Sombath's disappearance.

"This calls into question Laos’ aspiration to become an internationally respected, rule-of-law-based society,” a U.S. State Department official told RFA, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The official said the United States is "highly concerned for Mr. Sombath’s well-being" and called upon the Lao government "to do everything in its power to ensure his immediate return home to his family.”  

Washington also expressed regret over the latest statement on June 7 by the Lao authorities on the investigations into the case, saying it did not provide additional information about the probe.

“We urge the Lao government to pursue all leads to find the whereabouts of Mr. Sombath,” the U.S. State Department official said.

Personal or business reasons?

Four days after Sombath's disappearance, the Lao Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement confirming the incidents recorded on the security camera —without any gunshot—but claimed that Sombath had been kidnapped for personal or business reasons.

“After six months, the Lao government’s failure to explain the abduction of a prominent social activist at a police checkpoint or account for his whereabouts raises the gravest concerns for his safety,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

“The Lao authorities should realize their cover story is fooling no one, and start telling the truth,” he said.

Human Rights Watch said there was no indication that the Lao authorities had made any follow-up inquiries into the actions recorded on the police security video.

It called on member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), to which Laos belongs, to publicly raise their concerns about Sombath’s "enforced disappearance."

Human Rights Watch had sent a letter to each of the national commissioners of the ASEAN Inter-governmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR) calling for them to investigate the case, saying the group's terms of reference give it the right “to obtain information from ASEAN member states on the promotion and protection of human rights.”

Human Rights Watch said it has not received a response from any of the commissioners or the ASEAN Secretariat in Jakarta.

Strong opposition

Brunei and Thailand attempted to raise Sombath’s disappearance for discussion at the AICHR, but those efforts were strongly opposed by other national commissioners, including Laos, sources who were at the meeting told Human Rights Watch.

“The silence of ASEAN’s human rights commission about Sombath’s case reflects this body’s fundamental inability to protect human rights,” Adams said.

“Instead of trying to help the victims of abuses, ASEAN has chosen to hide behind the excuse of ‘non-interference’ and let human rights violations continue with impunity.”

Reported by RFA's Lao Service. Written in English by Parameswaran Ponnudurai.

The recent deportation by Laos of nine orphaned North Korean defectors back to their country has thrown the spotlight on the plight of parentless North Korean children who escape a life of hardship to China as they seek opportunities to resettle in a third country.

They are often forced to live like animals in caves and beg for food after fleeing across the border to China where they stay hidden from the authorities and find themselves eking out a threadbare existence, according to a defector living in South Korea.

“The orphans are really poor children. In China, they must beg during the daytime and sleep in caves at night,” Kim Jin-myeong, who lost his parents at a young age and lived in China before making his way to South Korea, told RFA’s Korean Service.

Kim said he knew the group of orphans who were forcibly repatriated to North Korea from Laos last month, having met them in China before they fled across the border to the Southeast Asian nation.

Laos said it had handed the nine North Korean defectors directly to the North Korean Embassy without having their asylum claims assessed, putting them at risk of being severely punished.

China, North Korea’s strongest ally, does not recognize defectors as asylum seekers and has been known to return them to Pyongyang, where they can face harsh punishment and even execution.

Kim said that most North Korean orphans traveled across the border to China from the northernmost provinces of Yanggang and North Hamgyeong, seeking food. He said they often gather and live together.

“I made a home by myself,” he said. “There are many ‘nameless’ mountains in China, so I would make use of a cave in the ravine behind a town.”

“If I was found out by police, I moved and slept in another ‘house’.”

Cave living

Also born in Yanggang province, Kim stopped attending school at a young age and fled to China after his father died of a heart attack and his mother succumbed to a terminal illness.

While begging in China, he met other homeless orphans from North Korea, and together they learned to survive on their own.

Kim said members of his group got the idea to make their home in remote valleys and mountain ranges based on stories they had heard growing up about North Korean founder Kim Il Sung repelling Japanese invasion forces.

“In a cave, up to 20 people can stay and live,” he said.

“Many of our cave dwellings likely still exist because they were camouflaged so well.”

Eventually, Kim said, he separated from his friends, making his way through the Chinese cities of Shenyang in Liaoning province and Beijing, before continuing on to Thailand and finally settling in South Korea.

Repatriated nine

Kim said that he was grateful to have found freedom, but lamented the fact that some of his friends had been caught during their defection bid in Laos.

“One of the young North Koreans is my good friend. I remember giving him food once after he was beaten while begging,” Kim said, adding that the two had met in China before becoming “scattered.”

“I feel sad that I can’t even mention his real name because of his safety,” he said, citing fears for his friend’s well-being in North Korea.

Laos said it had also deported two South Koreans caught together with the nine North Koreans, accusing the duo of human trafficking.

The 11 were detained by police in Oudomxay province bordering China, according to the Lao authorities.

The Red Cross of North Korea had also condemned the South Koreans, saying they were discovered in Laos while trying to kidnap the orphans.

Kim rejected claims that the South Koreans were human traffickers, saying the two were missionaries that had helped the orphans in China by providing them with food and shelter.

He also criticized the media for broadcasting the names and faces of the orphans, saying it was “harmful to the defectors,” though he acknowledged that doing so “could help to pressure the North Korean government from the outside.”

Close to 25,000 North Koreans have come to South Korea since the end of the Korean War. The vast majority of them had hidden in China and Southeast Asian countries including Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam before flying to Seoul.

Reported by Young Jung for RFA’s Korean Service. Translated by Goeun Yu. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

Nearly three-quarters of pregnant women in one of Laos’s poorest provinces deliver their babies at home at great risk to their lives due to a scarcity of health centers and midwives in the area, according to local health officials.     

Laos has placed a high priority on reducing its maternal and infant mortality rates, which are among the highest in Southeast Asia. But in rural Sekong province in the south, the difficulty of accessing medical centers is hindering progress on containing the problem, officials said.

More than 70 percent of mothers in Sekong—Laos’s second-most poverty-stricken province—give birth at home, unassisted by medical personnel, a provincial public health official focusing on mothers and children told RFA’s Lao Service.

“The rates of deaths for mothers and children during childbirth at home [in Sekong] are still high,” she said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“It’s because over 70 percent of mothers give birth at home, mostly on their own or with help from other families, and there are still few midwives.”

She said the main reason the mothers-to-be don’t seek medical services for the births is because the centers are too far away, with would-be patients having to spend hours on bumpy roads in order to reach them.  

Even some of the largest villages in Sekong, which is among the most remote areas of Laos, are virtually inaccessible by road for at least half of the year, reports say.

Another provincial health official said there were not enough health centers in the area, and that for patients living in remote areas, reaching them is difficult.  

“Not all areas have a health center, especially not remote areas,” he said.

Patients have trouble accessing roads during the rainy season, and the cost of transportation adds further strain to their meager finances on top of medical costs, he said.  

“There are 20 centers in the province, but there’s not enough medical staff for them,” he added.  

Childbirth-related deaths

According to provincial data, 300 mothers or newborns have died during childbirth in Sekong province since 2005, with 20 of these deaths occurring over the past year.

But the maternal and infant health official said the actual number of deaths could be higher due to unreported cases.

Laos has said it plans to improve medical services at rural health dispensaries and ramp up the number of midwives it trains and sends to remote areas.

Last year, state media reported that there were 300 midwives across the country and that the government planned to create a total of 15,000 midwife positions by 2015.

According to the country’s U.N. Millenium Development Goals, Laos is supposed to reduce the national mortality rate to 260 deaths per 100,000 live births by 2015.

While the rate has improved since 2005, when 450 women out of every 100,000 live deliveries died in the process of giving birth, the latest figures show the ratio is 300 deaths per 100,000 live births, according to state media.

According to World Health Organization (WHO) statistics, which vary from the figures given in state media, Laos has the highest maternal mortality rate in Southeast Asia.

According to WHO and U.N. estimates for 2011, it has the fourth-highest infant mortality rate in the region, after Timor-Leste, Myanmar, and Cambodia.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Somnet Inthapannha and Viengsay Luangkhot. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

Nearly six months after the disappearance of prominent Lao activist Sombath Somphone, police have reported little progress on his case amid concerns for his safety by fellow activists.

Laos’s Ministry of Public Security said at a briefing on Friday that police were still carrying out investigations to locate Sombath after he was declared missing in December last year, including coordinating with international agencies.

But activists, who have raised concerns that Sombath may have been forcibly disappeared and have called for a thorough investigation into his case, said they are disappointed that no new developments were revealed.

“We expected some progress, some leads,” a representative from a nongovernmental organization in Thailand said Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“We haven’t seen any new developments. It seems that was all they could say.”

Officials at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs contacted by RFA’s Lao Service after the briefing refused to comment on Sombath’s case.

Anti-poverty campaigner Sombath, 61, was last seen in video footage stopping at a police checkpoint in the Laotian capital Vientiane, prompting international concern that his disappearance could be tied to his human rights work.

Lao authorities have denied detaining Sombath and suggested he could have been kidnapped over a personal or business conflict.

Still 'focused' on case

Police said at the briefing that the Ministry of Public Security committee tasked with investigating Sombath’s case “remains focused on the issue.”

“The committee in charge of the case will continue to investigate and collect information, check and verify the information sources, and collect information from individuals and organizations from within the country and abroad in accordance with its mandates and duties,” deputy police director Phengsavanh Tiphavongxay said in a statement issued after the briefing.

International police cooperation agency Interpol issued a missing persons alert for Sombath in April after Lao authorities reported the case to them, the statement said.

Since then, Lao authorities have provided Sombath’s passport and ID card details in response to requests from Japan, India, and France, and have exchanged information on him with South Korean, U.S., and Spanish authorities, according to the statement.

Police met with Sombath’s wife, Singapore citizen Ng Shui Meng, in April to discuss the case, it added.

Ng has expressed regret over the lack of vital information on her husband’s case, at one point urging authorities to allow her to see him if he was in official custody.

Investigation raises 'troubling questions'

Last week, a group of more than 40 Australian scholars called on their country’s leaders to pressure Laos to “do everything in its power to account for Sombath’s disappearance,” raising concerns about the “lack of proper process” in the case.

“The official investigation into his case by the Lao authorities has to date been perfunctory at best, and has raised troubling questions,” the scholars said in the letter addressed to Australia’s foreign ministry.

They also called on Laos to speak up in support of civil society groups in order to counter the “serious intimidation” provoked by Sombath’s disappearance.

The former director of the Participatory Development Training Centre (PADETC) in Vientiane, Sombath was the 2005 recipient of the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership, considered Asia’s equivalent of the Nobel Prize.

CCTV video released by police of the traffic stop Sombath made on the night he disappeared showed him being taken away from the police post by two unidentified individuals.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Viengsay Luangkhot. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.

Laos is set to formally launch construction of an ambitious high-speed railway linking the country’s western border with Thailand to Vietnam in August, an official said Thursday, following the completion of a feasibility study by a Malaysian company that will construct and operate the project.

A groundbreaking ceremony for the railway will be held in Savannakhet city’s Kaysone Phomvihane district “sometime in August,” an official from the Lao Ministry of Public Works and Transportation in Vientiane told RFA’s Lao Service, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The ceremony will mark the laying of the “foundation” for the project. but a precise date for construction to proceed full steam ahead has yet to be set.

Malaysian company Giant Consolidated Ltd. has not established a project office in Savannakhet to date.

“About the office, nothing has been said yet,” the official said.

“It’s obvious that when the project kicks off, an office will be needed here in [Savannakhet] province.”

Giant was in early November awarded a contract to construct and operate the 220-kilometer (140-mile) railway from Savannakhet, on Laos’s southwestern border with Thailand, to the Lao Bao border gate with Vietnam in the east.

The company recently completed a mandatory environmental impact assessment needed for construction to begin, but has not yet submitted the study to authorities, the Lao official said, nor had it delivered findings to provincial officials from a survey of the construction site conducted earlier this year.

In April, a Lao railways official told RFA that before launching construction Giant also needs to carry out a project design study, which it expects to complete by August.

Despite the lack of progress, the public works and transportation official expressed confidence that work on the railway would proceed, citing “regular discussions” about project details between a Giant representative and his ministry, “which cannot be revealed yet.”

Construction of the railway, which runs from Savannakhet city in the east to the border town of Lao Bao in the west with an onward link to Vietnam’s Danang port city, is expected to take four years.

New Zealand financial institution Rich Banco Berhad agreed in April to provide a U.S. $5 billion loan to Giant to fund the construction.

Laos is also in negotiations to borrow U.S. $7.2 billion from China to fund a second planned rail line—a 420-kilometer (260-mile) project linking the capital Vientiane to southwestern China.

Laos assumed sole ownership of the project after a Chinese construction company pulled out of a joint partnership because it decided the project would not be profitable enough.

Legislators and the Asian Development Bank have cautioned that the project is “unaffordable” and could sink the country into debt.

Laos has no coastline or seaports, and the rail links are expected to lower the cost of exports and consumer goods and help drive the impoverished country’s socioeconomic development.

The country’s current rail system consists of a 3.5-kilometer (2-mile) link over the Mekong River between Vientiane and Thailand’s Nongkhai.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Viengsay Luangkhot. Written in English by Joshua Lipes.

An Australian-owned gold mine in Laos has been polluting a nearby river with toxic chemicals especially during the rainy season, according to a non-governmental group which claims local authorities are covering up the issue.

But environmental officials at the Phu Kam copper and gold mine 100 kilometers (60 miles) northeast of the Lao capital Vientiane said that based on villagers' complaints, they had jointly monitored the water quality of the Nam Mo River with the Lao authorities and found it was within a "standard" level.

A source with an environmental group, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the toxic chemicals were released occasionally from a treatment plant at the mine, warning that the pollutants could accumulate over the years and put the population nearby at risk.

The local authorities are aware of the problem but have looked the other way, the source said.

"It’s something that they want to keep a lid on. The issue is between the company, the local population, and the government. In reality, we are in no position to say more,” he said.

He acknowledged that the Phu Bia Mining company, the Lao arm of Australian company PanAust, took steps to address the problem in the past but said that it had not dealt with it on a "permanent" basis.

"Gold mining will still go on for at least 10 years and during that period of time, toxic chemicals will accumulate, putting the local population at risk," the source said.

Cyanide spillover

A Vientiane provincial environmental official said pollution at the mine located in Xaysomboun district in Vientiane province occurs during the rainy season.

The current pollution, he said, stems from the spillover of cyanide, a chemical often used in mining to dissolve gold so that it flows out of the rock in a process called leaching.

The cyanide can be leaked into the soil and then into the water supply. Mineral residues from mining operations also release toxic components if left in the open.

“The company has taken safety measures. During the dry season there is not much of a problem," he said.

"But during rainy season, there is an issue if the amount of water [in the treatment plant] is too much," resulting in the spillover of cyanide, he said

When asked whether villagers are aware of the problem and have been notified about the cyanide spillage into the river, he replied, “They have been notified [and] monitoring and protection measures have been taken.”

“The company has taken safety measures but problems occur during the rainy season," he said. "The local population are aware of this, as most of them work at the mine as employees or laborers.”

In 2005, Phu Bia Mining acknowledged it had contaminated a nearby river and agreed to compensate villagers living along it, media reports had said.

Monitoring water quality

Officials at the Phu Kam mine said they had been constantly monitoring water quality in the Nam Mo River and found no traces of toxic pollution as claimed.

When asked if the company had monitored the water quality levels of the Nam Mo River, an official of the mine said, "Yes, yes, every day."

But the official said that any environmental impact on the surrounding areas is not based on Phu Bia Mining's operations alone, citing gold panning activity nearby.

"Phu Bia is just one small part, there is gold panning in the northern part of the Nam Mo river by an unknown group ... who use chemical and mercury to extract gold in a process called alluvial mining,” he said.

Acidic pH

He said the water quality levels at the river were "normal" and that the monitoring was done together with district environment officials and officials from the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry.

In response to a question on charges that pollution in Nam Mo was hazardous, he said the quality of water released from the treatment reservoir "is within the [specified] standard.”

Phu Kam mine officials said the pH test, measuring the alkalinity or acidity concentration in water, on the Nam Mo River showed a level of between 7 and 8. A pH of 7 is neutral, below 7 is acidic, and above 7 is basic or alkaline.

The officials said there was a spill from the treatment reservoir in 2005 during the rainy season but that the problem has been fixed and the water quality is "normal."

A source familiar with the issue said that from a scientific point of view, the pH level does not indicate the amount of cyanide, mercury, and other toxic chemicals in the water.

The pH level can be manipulated by adding other chemical components, the source said, adding that there are many environmental tests that Lao environment officials have no role in.

Mining is a key source of revenue for land-locked Laos.

The significant cash flow generated by the Phu Kham mine has also supported PanAust’s growth while contributing to a strong balance sheet, the Australian company said on its website.

The operation comprises a large open-pit mine feeding ore to a process plant with recovery of copper and precious metals into a saleable concentrate using conventional flotation technology. The final product is a copper-gold concentrate.

Most concentrate is trucked in covered containers to Sriracha Harbor, south of Bangkok in Thailand, for shipment to smelters in Asia. A second, shorter, export route via the South China Sea port of Vung Ang in Vietnam was established in 2012.

Reported by RFA's Lao Service. Translated by Viengsay Luangkhot and Somnet Inthapannha. Written in English by Parameswaran Ponnudurai and Rachel Vandenbrink.

Authorities in Hungary expelled a visiting senior official of the World Uyghur Congress (WUC) and took other actions that caused the abrupt cancellation of the group's youth wing meeting in the capital Budapest this week, according to WUC officials who believe the European nation was acting under pressure from China.

Umit Hamit Agahi, the WUC Vice-President, was detained and interrogated by the Hungarian police for nearly 12 hours on Thursday before he was expelled to Germany, the headquarters of the WUC, which champions the rights of the minority ethnic Uyghurs in China's Xinjiang region.

Police also sealed off the venue of the meeting organized by the World Federation of Hungarians and the Budapest Attila Hotel where the Uyghur delegation was staying, citing a bomb scare, the WUC officials said.

The actions forced the cancellations of the meeting, which was scheduled for three days from Friday, and a pre-meeting press conference to be attended by foreign envoys and members of Hungary's parliament.

“I strongly believe the dark hand of China is behind this," Umit Hamit Agahi told RFA's Uyghur Service on his return to Germany.

Terrorism

He said that during his interrogations, he realized that he was being held on suspicion of terrorism and that police had told him he was "a threat to the security of Hungary" without providing any evidence.

“This is something unexpected for me and for my organization. We were holding the meeting legally and with the support of the World Federation of Hungarians, which was registered in Hungary," said Umit Hamit Agahi, who is in charge of WUC's European affairs.

"I have been living in Germany for the past 19 years, I am a German citizen, and have been working with human rights organizations in the EU [European Union] over the past 10 years. I have gone to Hungary eight times for the past 10 years. I have close links with rights organizations in Hungary. I am no stranger to Hungary."

He said Chinese state security organs may have provided the Hungarian police with "false" information about himself and "triggered alarm" in Hungary.

"Only China calls the WUC a terrorist organization," he said.

China has blamed much of the violence in the restive Xinjiang region on Uyghur "terrorists," but rights groups say Beijing exaggerates the terrorism threat to take the heat off domestic policies that cause unrest or to justify the authorities' use of force against the Uyghur minority.

Uyghurs say they have long suffered ethnic discrimination, oppressive religious controls, and continued poverty and joblessness, blaming the problems partly on the influx of Han Chinese into the region.

Explanation

Dilxat Raxit, the WUC spokesman, said the Hungarian government owed an explanation for the explusion of Umit Hamit Agahi and for clamping down on the WUC meeting.

"We call upon the Hungarian government to elaborate on the reasons why our activities were stopped."

Dolkun Isa, the WUC Chairman of the Executive Committee, said the Munich-based group had been in contact with German and Hungarian envoys in their efforts to gain the release of Umit Hamit Agahi.

"If he was detained because of fears of the Chinese government, then it is very unfortunate news not only for the Uyghurs but also other suppressed nationalities around the world," he said.

Dolkun Isa charged that China was using its economic might to obstruct the activities of overseas Uyghur organizations.

Pressure

He said Beijing was pressuring countries in the Middle East and Central and South Asia to control Uyghur activities there and deport home Uyghur political aslyum seekers.

Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Malaysia, Pakistan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos have been listed as among countries which have bowed to demands by Beijing to repatriate the Uyghur minority fleeing persecution in their homeland in China's northwestern Xinjiang region, according to Uyghur exile groups.

"If China has made Hungary to submit [to its demands], that is very unfortunate and dangerous not only for the Uyghur human rights situation but also for the world's human rights development," Dolkun Isa said.

"We urge all justice-seeking countries and organizations to pay attention to this incident and express their concerns over this."

Reported by Shohret Hoshur for RFA's Uyghur Service. Translated by Mamatjan Juma. Written in English by Parameswaran Ponnudurai.

Laos broke its silence Friday over its much-criticized deportation of nine North Korean defectors, saying it had handed them directly to North Korea and not to China as widely reported.

News reports, some quoting South Korean officials, had said that Laos had deported the defectors, some as young as 14 years old, to China which then repatriated them to North Korea this week without having their asylum claims assessed.

North Korean defectors face harsh punishment, including the death penalty, on their return home.

The Lao Foreign Ministry said in a two-paragraph statement sent to RFA's Lao Service that the Lao government had handed the nine North Koreans to the North Korean Embassy in Vientiane.

It said that the nine North Koreans, aged between 14 to 18 years, and two South Koreans were detained by police in Oudomxay province bordering China. It accused the South Koreans of committing human trafficking.

Lao statement

"On 10th May 2013, the police of Oudomxay Province of the Lao PDR detained 11 Koreans and had subsequently transferred them to Vientiane for investigation," the statement said.

"As a result of the investigation, it has been identified that nine of them are the citizens of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) aged between 14 to 18 years who have illegally entered into the Lao PDR, while the other two are the citizens of the Republic of Korea (ROK) who have committed human trafficking."

"In accordance with the Law of the Lao PDR, particularly the Prime Minister’s Decree No. 136 on Immigration and Foreigners Control, and after coordination between the Lao authorities concerned and the concerned Embassies in Vientiane, the Lao side has handed over the nine citizens of the DPRK and the two citizens of the ROK to their respective Embassies on 27th May 2013 and 28th May 2013, respectively," the statement said.

There was no reference to China in the statement or whether the defectors had been sent to North Korea or China.

Reports had said the nine were returned to China on Monday and flown back to North Korea the following day.

Beijing has not commented on the issue so far.

International obligations

International law requires that a person be allowed to apply for asylum and not be expelled to a country where his life or freedom may be under threat.

The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR had expressed concern that the deported individuals did not have a chance to have their asylum claims assessed.

“We have received credible information that the nine young North Korean defectors were subsequently returned to DPRK via China,” a spokesperson for the U.N. human rights office (OHCHR), Rupert Colville, said, according to a statement issued by the Geneva-based office.

Colville added that OHCHR was “extremely concerned” about the protection of the group members “who are at risk of severe punishment and ill-treatment upon their return.”

"We are dismayed that the Governments of Laos and China appear to have abrogated their non-refoulement obligations, especially given the vulnerability of this group, all of whom are reported to be orphans."

"We urge the Chinese and Laotian authorities to publicly clarify the fate of the nine young North Koreans, as well as the conditions under which they were returned, and request the Government of DPRK to provide immediate access to the group by independent actors to verify their status and treatment," the statement said.

The U.N. General Assembly, in successive resolution, has expressed serious concern about the situation of refugees and asylum-seekers expelled or returned to North Korea and the sanctions imposed on those repatriated from abroad.

On Friday, South Korean activists criticized Laos during a rally outside its embassy in Seoul.

"We are here to call on Laos not to deport North Korean defectors because there is concern they may be tortured when sent back," the Associated Press quoted Lee Ho-taek, head of a group that provides refugees with support, as saying.

Defectors' plight

Close to 25,000 North Koreans have come to South Korea since the end of the Korean War. The vast majority of them hid in China and Southeast Asian countries including Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam before flying to Seoul.

China, North Korea's key ally, does not recognize defectors as asylum seekers and has been known to return them to Pyongyang.

"North Korea has to come clean on where these nine refugees are and publicly guarantee that they will not be harmed or retaliated against for having fled the country," said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch. "As a result of their return, they are at dire risk."

Reported by RFA's Lao Service. Written in English by Parameswaran Ponnudurai.

Updated at 7:15 p.m. ET on 2013-05-28

Laos has deported nine North Korean defectors to China after rejecting a plea by Seoul to send them to South Korea, according to officials Tuesday.

The defectors, who had fled their country to the Southeast Asian nation via China last month, are all orphans in their teens and early twenties, one nongovernmental organization said.

The deportation raises fears that Beijing will repatriate the defectors to North Korea, where they are likely to face harsh punishment.

The nine were put on a plane to China late Monday after being rounded up in Laos on May 10, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reported.  

The report quoted a South Korean foreign ministry official as saying that Seoul had asked that the defectors be sent to South Korea instead, but Laos had “unexpectedly” rejected the request.

A representative of a civil society organization in Laos familiar with the case said several North Koreans, possibly diplomats, were on board the flight to China with the defectors.

The defectors—seven men and two women—are between 15 and 22 years old, according to the representative, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

South Korea sets up task force

South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-se confirmed the plane had landed in China and said his ministry has set up a task force to handle the case, according to Yonhap.

In a regular press briefing on Tuesday, the ministry’s spokesman Cho Tai-young declined to comment on the case, but said Seoul "has continued to make efforts with relevant countries to bring North Korean defectors” to South Korea.

Rights groups in South Korea expressed dismay at the deportation, urging an all-out effort by Seoul to prevent Beijing from repatriating the nine to North Korea.    

Kim Young-ja, director of the Seoul-based group North Korean Human Rights, said the deportation could signal stepped-up efforts by North Korean authorities to prevent citizens from passing through Southeast Asian countries.

“North Korean authorities have been making a lot of efforts to prevent North Koreans from escaping the country,” she told RFA’s Korean Service.

“North Korean authorities tightly control the border with China even on the Chinese side. Now, they are trying to block the Southeast Asian escape routes."

Laos and other Southeast Asian countries are a common transit country for North Korean defectors who escape their homeland via China with the aim of eventually resettling in South Korea.

China considers the tens of thousands of North Koreans hiding in its borders as illegal economic migrants rather than asylum-seekers, and routinely deports them back to North Korea despite protests by rights groups.

Rights groups say the returnees face severe punishments, including the death sentence.

Reported by Songwu Park and Hee Jung Yang for RFA’s Korean Service. Translated by Bong Park. Written in English by Rachel Vandenbrink.