| May 1990 | Thailand is planning to build a school for a new generation of Hill Tribes in a bid to keep them from being lured into growing drugs for Khun Sa, who is considered to be the biggest heroin dealer in the Golden Triangle straddling the borders of Thailand, Laos and Burma. A recent report from northern Thailand said the area's patrol police commander initiated the project which is to be funded entirely by donations. The school will be established in Mae Hong Son, northern Thailand, just opposite Khun Sa's opium-growing Shan state. Border patrol police will educate young Hill Tribespeople about the dangers of and possible ways to stop the drug trade. The Golden Triangle is said to be the source of nearly half the heroin consumed in the world. Opium production in the area is expected to be around 2,500 tons this year. Poppy is grown in nine northern and six northeastern provinces of Thailand (Xinhua General News Service, 05/11/90). |
| May 1991 | Angus MacSwan of Reuters reports (05/21/91) Heroin addiction is sweeping through the northern Thai Hill Tribes as modern times catch up with them, say villagers, police and drugs officials. Not only is heroin use debilitating in itself, but it also threatens to fan the flames of the deadly AIDS virus, which is rampant among denizens of the many cheap brothels in the north. The poverty-stricken Hmong, the Akha, and other Hill Tribes, whose exotic and distinct culture is a big lure for tourists, have traditionally grown opium as a cash crop, using it for rituals, medicine and recreation. Banpot Niamdee, director of the office of the Narcotics Control Board in Chiang Mai, gave an ironic explanation for why heroin use was on the increase "The largest number of cases are in development areas where we have suppressed opium cultivation". Government and foreign programs to substitute poppy-growing with crops such as coffee and cabbages meant the tribes no longer had access to opium and so were easy prey for heroin dealers. Niamdee also blamed foreigners who traveled in the north to indulge their own habit "because it is safer than here in the city". The problem is the Hill Tribes now have more contact with the modern world, but little opportunity to join it. Their travel is limited and most do not have full Thai citizenship because they are accused of being illegal immigrants from Laos and Myanmar. Figures for the total number of addicts among the 550,000 Hill Tribe population are hard to come by. The Northern Drug Dependence Treatment Center's Dr. P. Rungisvarode says many opium users became addicted to the drug because it was traditionally used for medicinal purposes. Modern legal medicines are now more easily available to the Hill Tribes. |
| Nov 1991 | Thailand's tourism infrastructure is reported to have made one of the world's most exotic destinations accessible to virtually any agency client with some interest in the unusual... In some ways, the north seems to have been turned upside down to accommodate tourism. Chiang Mai (pop 1.5 million) remains the gateway to many of Thailand's Hill Tribes. Visits to Hill Tribe villages with age-old cultures are a distinct attraction. However, these are cultures in transition in Hill Tribe villages, there are now schools, modern amenities, and even TV sets (Travel Weekly 11/28/91). |
| Dec 1992 | Terry Redding reports in the Orlando Sentinel Tribune (12/6/92) The Hill Tribes are becoming big business in Thailand as more and more tourists arrive to observe their ancient ways of life. Hill Tribes are ethnic minorities scattered throughout the remote northern Thai mountains, as well as in Myanmar and Laos. Most of the tribes moved from areas of China or Tibet in the past few centuries to escape repression or to find new croplands. There are several different ethnic groups and subgroups among the Hill Tribes. For example, the Lahu peoples are thought to have originated in the Tibetan Plateau. They make up about 11 percent of Thailand's estimated Hill Tribe population of 550,000. |
| Mar 1993 | An investigative report about prostitution in Thailand states "impoverished Thai parents sell girls into prostitution.. A generation of girls is being turned into commerce. Thailand has become the red-light district of much of the world. In a country of 56 million people, relief agencies estimate that there are 2 million prostitutes, up to 800,000 of them are children. Perhaps one in twelve women and older children may be involved, and up to 80 percent of girls in some tribal villages.... Relief agencies estimate that more than 40 percent of Thai prostitutes are HIV-positive. Thailand is the nucleus of an expected AIDS pandemic poised to rip a deadly path through the future of southern Asia. Tribal people will be hit especially hard. Relief workers fear that entire Hill Tribes in northern Thailand and Burma will be wiped out" (Dallas Morning News, 03/21/93). The reports continues, "In the northern villages of the Akha tribe, most of the young women are gone... where pigs and poverty share the narrow dirt lanes with bamboo-and-thatch homes.... Sompop Jantrakha, founder of the Daughters' Education Programme at Mae Sai, estimates that 70 to 80 percent of the girls in Akha tribal villages that he deals with "go to Bangkok" - northern slang for becoming prostitutes.... Even boys from the northern Hill Tribes are also being sought by agents in the prostitution trade " (Ibid.). |
| Apr 1993 | The Associated Press reports "In hill communities in northern Thailand, heroin is driving already impoverished tribal people into destitution and despair... The so-called Golden Triangle of northern Thailand, and adjacent areas of Burma and Laos is the world's main source of opium, the base of heroin" (04/05/93). Development programs of the past few decades have injected cash into tribal economies that once ran on barter, making them attractive to drug traffickers. Narong Suwanapiam, a Deputy SG of the Narcotics Control Board (a senior narcotics official), says dealers offer heroin free or at low cost to get people addicted, and also target former users just returned from detoxification. Heroin offers momentary escape from a society under great stress, where the young are losing trust in traditional values and the old cannot cope with dizzying modern changes. Narong said heroin addiction has a devastating economic impact. The $4 a day needed to support a heroin habit often is more than the addict can earn. A village with 125 addicts loses $500 daily just through the cost of the drug, a lot for a primitive economy. Most detoxification and rehabilitation programs have failed. Sentiment is growing that they must be conducted in a tribal environment rather than in urban or lowland centers. |
| Jul 1993 | Stephen Vines reports from Hong Kong (Business Times, 07/24/93) "The Princess Mother (mother of the Thai King) at 93, after spending many years in Switzerland, decided to spend most of her time in northern Thailand and use her presence to create a development project that would rid the area of its past dependence on narcotics production and become a model for rural development". (The revered Thai royal family has the kind of clout not available to other arms of government and can therefore do things which might seem overly ambitious in any other context). The Dei Tung Development Project covers 156,000 sq.km. It began in 1988 and is now active in practically every corner of this vast area. Heading the project is the blunt talking Disnada Diskul, the Princess' Mother's Private Secretary. Mr. Disnada says he set out to identify substitute crops like macadamia nut production which would command better prices than poppies and fulfill other requirements, such as job creation. Tea was also selected because the roots of tea bushes are good for holding the soil in hilly areas and tea cultivation is labor intensive, thus helping create employment. The area's other major problem is the large number of illegal migrants from Myanmar and Laos who are entirely outside the Thai system of government, making them vulnerable to become participants in illegal activity. Mr. Disnada, playing heavily on royal patronage, adopted another approach he persuaded the authorities to give him permission to issue the illegals with identity cards "to show they belong" and to keep them within the ambit of the law. So far 10,377 cards have been issued. Other development programs have attempted to solve the problems of Thai minority Hill Tribes by moving them from the hills and resettling them on lower land which is easier to farm. But the Dei Tung Project takes a different approach it starts from the assumption that Hill Tribes operate best in their natural environment and that dislocation is the worst possible thing for these communities. That is why all the schemes for the area concentrate on finding ways to make the hills more productive. |
| Nov 1993 | Phra C. Panchan, the abbot of Tham Krabok monastery, who is internationally renowned for his unorthodox treatment of drug addiction, is under mounting pressure from Thai authorities for his alleged harboring of Lao immigrants among his 13,000 Hmong flock. The authorities say the Lao Hmong are coordinating activities in support of rightist rebels fighting the communist government in Vientiane and are engaged in other criminal activities. Panchan strongly denies any involvement in opium production, saying the Hmong living in his monastery are Thai citizens who came to Tham Krabok for treatment. However, authorities are trying to flush out the Lao Hmong from the monastery in response to a charge by the Lao government after an alleged Lao resistance leader, arrested in Thailand, said Tham Krabok was a coordination center for anti-Vientiane activities. |
| Apr 1994 | Thailand's National Security Council plans to initiate 33 projects in order to help Hill Tribes people who now earn their living by growing addictive crops. The $10 million program is aimed at stopping the spread of drug addiction, developing communities, and conserving natural resources and the environment. The projects will also include resettlement options and vocational training for the northern tribes (Xinhua News Agency, 04/25/94). |
| May 1994 | The provinces of Tak, Phitsanulok, and Chiang Mai are reported to be the major marijuana-producing areas in northern Thailand. Much of the area consists of mountains and dense jungles which has made it difficult for the police to eradicate production. Tribes people have not only found it easier to grow marijuana in comparison to opium but it is also a more lucrative crop (BBC, 05/12/94). |
| Jun 1994 | The destruction of Thailand's forests is having a major cultural impact on its northern Hill Tribes. At the beginning of the century, over 75% of northern Thailand was covered by forests. That figure has now dwindled to less than 30% and it is rapidly decreasing. The forests provide the tribes with much of their traditional food, clothing, shelter, medicine, tools, and links to ancestors and spirits (Far Eastern Economic Review, 06/09/94). |
| Jun 9, 1994 | The Thai government is increasingly following a policy of assimilation in relation to the northern tribes people. The Far Eastern Economic Review reports that assimilationist policies are particularly evident in the education sector where the Thai language and Buddhist lowland values are emphasized; both of these are alien to the traditional highland culture. Further, the influx of tourists and the resulting commercialization in northern regions has disrupted the daily lives of the tribes people (06/09/94). |
| Jul 1994 | Villagers in northern Thailand state that they are suffering from various illnesses, including headaches and vomiting, due to acid rain from Chinese coal-burning power plants. Officials in Phayao province indicate that they have not yet established a link between the recent spate of illnesses and acid rain (Deutsche Presse-Agentur, 07/05/94). |
| Sep 1994 | Flood victims in northern Thailand are suffering from a major shortage of food and medical supplies. Twelve people have died as a result of landslides. Thousands of hectares of cropland have been destroyed (Reuters, 09/01/94; Reuter Textline Bangkok Post, 09/03/94). |
| Sep 14, 1994 | It is reported that in some northern Thai villages, up to 70% of girls eleven years old and up still work in the sex industry. The girls are often sold to child traffickers by poverty-stricken parents. The number of child prostitutes in Thailand is hotly disputed. The government puts the figure at 30-40,000 while non-governmental organizations estimate that the number is in the hundreds of thousands. Upon taking office in 1992, Thailand's Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai stated that eradicating child prostitution was his first social priority. However, organizations that work to eliminate child prostitution assert that not much has changed (Reuters, 09/14/94). |
| Dec 1994 | The UN International Drug Control Program (UNDCP) and the Thai government have signed an agreement to help prevent the spread of heroin use and to reduce the demand for opiates among the northern Hill Tribes. While there has been a reduction in opium production and use among Hill Tribals, heroin addiction is growing rapidly, especially among the younger population. The Thai government estimates that there are 300,000 to 500,000 drug addicts nationwide, of which 35,000 are hills peoples (Xinhua News Agency, 12/13/94). |
| Jan 1995 | More than 5,000 Karens entered Thailand after fleeing Burma, where the Karen National Union had been overrun by Burmese soldiers. (AFP, March 17) |
| Feb 1995 | The government of Thailand is launching a regional initiative to stop northern Hill Tribes from growing opium. The government will offer its expertise to train drug fighters in neighboring countries like Burma, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam. Officials state that while opium production is under control in Thailand, it is still grown in border areas (Inter Press Service, 02/08/95). |
| Mar 17, 1995 | More than 8,000 ethnic Karens living in refugee camps in northern Thailand, near the Thai-Burma border, fled the camps after "renegade Karens," who have aligned themselves with the Burmese junta, attacked the camp. |
| Jul 1995 | Snap elections were held on July 2 following splits within Prime Minister Chuan Leekpai's five-party coalition government. The Chart Thai emerged as the single largest party, winning 92/391 seats. Banharn Silparcha was appointed Prime Minister; he heads a seven-member coalition called the Thai Development Front (Reuter Textline Business Monitor, 12/22/95). |
| Oct 1995 | Visitors to northern Thailand report that the government's initiative to curb opium production had increased people's reliance on alternative drugs. Money to buy the drugs is often obtained by participation in prostitution. (Times Newspapers, October 21) |
| Mar 1996 | The US State Department's annual report on human rights revealed that incidences of prostitution among Hill Tribeswoman rose in 1995 and that owners of brothels there often pay off local government officials to prevent raids. The report also indicated that only half of the country's tribal members possessed documentation that would allow them to become a citizen of Thailand in the future. Without the documents, tribes people cannot own land, but the government did initiate plans to begin a process to patriate tribal people. |
| Jun 9, 1996 | Thailand began a national celebration of the 50th anniversary of King Bhumibol Adulyadej's reign. The king is considered by many to be a unifying force in the country and essential to keeping the peace in the country and facilitating Thailand's process of democratization. (AFP) |
| Jul 1996 | The last 3000 tribal Hmongs from Laos, living in refugee camps in Thailand for over 20 years, began to leave Thailand for the United States. By the end of the year, the refugee camps in Thailand will be closed down. Since the 1970s, the United States has accepted over 127,000 Hmong from Laos into the country. (New York Times, July 18, 1996; March 12, 1997) |
| Aug 1996 | Thai officials anticipated a significant increase in illegal opium cultivation among Hill Tribes in the north of the country, despite concerted regional efforts to end the practice. This increase is a result of a rapid increase in demand for and the cost of heroin following the surrender of drug warlord Khun Sa. (Xinhua, August 2) |
| Dec 1996 | After Thailand's GDP grew by over 8 percent in 1994 and 1995, growth slowed to 6.7 percent in 1996, signaling the beginning of a long and dramatic decline in Thailand's economy and the end of Thailand's "economic miracle." The economic crisis is especially troubling for Sino-Thais, who comprise the majority of business owners in the country. (Business Line, September 19, 1997) |
| Feb 1997 | The Thai government screened and registered over 13,000 Hmong living in a monastery, 100 kilometers north of Bangkok. Abbott Chamroom Panchan claims he is protecting the thousands of people from being deported to Laos. Thai officials stated that they would investigate the national origins of each person and planned to send back to Laos any non-Thai Hmongs. Those living in the monastery provide cheap labor to rock quarries in the region. (Deutsche Presse-Agenteur, March 6, 1997) |
| Apr 17 - 29, 1997 | The Cabinet of the Chavalit Yongchaiyudh government passed three separate resolutions insuring the land occupation rights of Hill Tribes people in northern Thailand's Doi Inthanon National Park. Ownership was guaranteed to those who could prove occupancy prior to 1993, and no peoples had to leave while their case was under review. (InterPress Service, June 11, 1998; Bangkok Post, April 29, 1998) (April 17, 22, and 29) |
| Aug 1997 | Analysts predict that by the end of the year, all of the hill-tribes people of northern Thailand will have access to electricity for the first time. (AFP, August 19) |
| Dec 18, 1997 | The Tourism Authority of Thailand announced that it would try to discourage tourism aimed at showcasing people of the Karen tribe, members of which are notable for their elongated necks (achieved by individuals wearing dozens of brass rings around their necks). Human rights groups accused the tourist board of exploiting the Karen and violating their rights after foreign papers printed reports stating that tour operators in Thailand were luring members of the tribes into "show-villages" to be looked at by travelers. (AFP) |
| Mar 20 - 30, 1998 | Fires raged through a national park in northern Thailand, destroying more 2,500 hectares of forest. The country's deputy agriculture minister accused hill-tribe people, in conjunction with the Northern Farmers' Network, of purposely setting the fires in an effort to expand farmland, a charge within members of the network denied. (Xinhua, March 30) |
| May 1998 | Four-thousand lowland residents blocked a main highway leading to the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai for days, demanding that hill-tribe (highland) people no longer be allowed to live in the upper watershed forests of that city. The highlanders, they argued, are destroying water sources within the forests as they rapidly deforest the region (using slash-and-burn methods). (InterPress Service, June 11) |
| Nov 1998 | Using a $1.25 million loan from Japan, the Thai government initiated a plan to turn Wat Chaan, the remote home of members of Karen tribe, into an "ecotourism destination." Young people of Wan Chaat, as well as several local NGOs, tried to stop implementation of the plan, fearing it would destroy local culture as well as the environment. Concern was also raised that the Karen people would be treated as if they were part of a "human zoo." (InterPress Service, November 10) |
| Jan 1999 | A small charity group known as The Karen Action Group made a series of trips to northern Thailand to provide assistance to 100,000 members of the Karen tribe living there as refugees. (Western Morning News (Plymouth), January 19) |
| Mar 3, 1999 | US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright praised the efforts of Thai officials for "improving the living standard of the Hill Tribes and implementing crop substitution" as part of its campaign to limit the growth of drugs. (Japan Economic Newswire; also AFP, March 4) |
| Apr 1999 | A series of gun-related shootings in northern Thailand left 13 villagers and a policeman dead. Some of the killers were suspected to be from the Lahu tribe. (AFP, April 11) |
| May 1999 | Reports indicate that more than 10,000 representatives from the Hill Tribes launched a prolonged, three-week plus demonstration against officials in Bangkok. The demonstrators were calling on the federal government to liberalize citizenship laws and land rights. (Emerging Markets Datafile, May 27) |
