Transcript: Episode #266: Namaste to Nowhere
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Host 0:14
Before we get into today's episode, I want to tell you about the Burmese made handicrafts that are non profit sources from vulnerable artisan communities across Myanmar. These lovely crafts bring the life and color of Myanmar to the world. More importantly, their purchase assists the artists and their families, while also going on to support our ongoing humanitarian and media missions. Please take a moment to visit our shop at alokacrafts.com that's A, L, O, K, A, C, R, A, F, T, S.com.
1:20
You will be every day. Insurgent groups from northeast India active along the Indo Myanmar border, engaged in an intense gun fight with Myanmar's rebel factions, the PDF and KNFB in Myanmar, close to Manipur, scan jongle.
2:10
Street, rising tensions at the Indo Myanmar border, the Indian government has decided to construct an impenetrable fence.
2:18
PDF and KNFB cauders had encircled the camp armed with sophisticated weapons, using RPGs and bombs the Myanmar army reportedly conducted.
Makepeace Sitlhou 2:30
Hi, my name is Makepeace Sitlhou. I'm an independent journalist. I've been covering northeast India since about 2017 now, and of course, since the crisis and the, you know, the military coup happened in Myanmar, have been consistently covering what's been happening along India's borders, you know, particularly looking at two states, both Manipur and Manipur and Mizoram, and Looking at really, various aspects of it, not just the humanitarian crisis, but also security situation. These are the the armed insurgent groups operating on both sides of the border, and looking at also India's refugee policy, among other I would say, aspects of this crisis.
Kimi Colney 3:22
Hi, my name is Kimi Colney. I am from Mizoram, and I have been reporting since 2016 I have mostly covered the state of Mizoram, but for a while, I also covered the Northeast states. For around two years now, I work for an independent media house called East Mojo, which is which is based in Guwahati Assam, and yes, I have been covering the refugee crisis in our state along the Indo Myanmar border.
Host 3:54
Thank you both very much. Thank you for joining us and sharing your expertise and your reporting with us, I think it would be good to start and sharing with our audience to give them a bit of basic context and background about northeast India, the geography, the peoples, the politics, society, anything that you think would be relevant to better understanding what is currently being played out With the Myanmar crisis starting to spill into that area and how they're responding. So make peace. Can you give us some background to introduce our audience to the important points you think are necessary to know and to understand about northeast India?
Makepeace Sitlhou 4:35
Yeah. So it's a very vast region that's really at the far eastern side of the country. In India, you know, it's sort of separated, or rather connected to what we call the Indian mainland by something called Chicken stack. It's a very small, narrow strip of a corridor, you know, that connects it to a. Land masses. I think because of this, you know, tyranny of distance, which is often, which is what it's called, you know, a lot of going on in the region tend to not reach, you know, what's reached New Delhi in particular, or, you know, reach most of India. So there's a general lack of awareness also about northeast India, both, you know, both among Indians as well as people. Internationally, it's also, however very geopolitically, a very sensitive region. I mean, there are about eight states in total. For the longest time it's been it's known as the Seven Sisters, because it was like seven, seven states together. But these eight states, you know, like they border, like important neighbors, both in South Asia and Southeast Asia, like Bangladesh, China, you know, Bhutan, Myanmar, and there's something that I think has been, which is why the region, for that reason, is also looked at as a as a frontier state, as you know, something that we that India has, obviously, it needs to fortify and protect its borders, but has also often overlooked its own sort of nuanced, you know, politics, its own fault lines, its own sort of, you know, if you can call indigenous concerns and issues. So I would say that's how it kind of sum up the region.
Host 6:24
Yeah, that's a lot to take in. And I think to delve a bit deeper into those fault lines of the diversity, I assume we're talking about ethnic, religious, regional diversity, that's each of which probably has its own history in terms of how they got there, and how the different groups interrelate. I know this is a subject unto itself that we could spend hours on a separate podcast conversation delving into, but just so we better have an understanding of how what's making up that diversity and how it's playing out, so then we can move into the Burmese refugees that are starting to come in. Can you follow up with giving us an overview of how you would describe the diversity in that region to a newcomer who isn't familiar with this region.
Makepeace Sitlhou 7:09
Well, I think for most of India, they sort of, you know, club, the seven states, the eight states, again, sorry, as like one sort of a nucleus, right? And we're just sort of known as North East nurse. And that's also like an awareness level that has come, like, after like, at least two decades or something, because for the longest time we'd be mistaken as like, Chinese or other foreign nationals from like, you know, Southeast Asia, or like, East Asia. So, you know, even to get so far as to be called or to be identified as northeast Indian feels like some sort of a victory, but it really doesn't capture, you know, what is the real diversity of the region? I mean, there are, there are as many languages. There are so many dialects, you know, to speak of. There are also multiplicity of religions out here. You know, we've got, like, a mix of people who come from Tibet, from Myanmar, from, like, in fact, even from, you know, some older Chinese provinces, Thailand as well. So it's a very, very, it's a very diverse. It's a very like, mixed up, sort of, you know, like mixed up ethnicities. And, you know, sort of, historically speaking as well. There's been so much intermingling between ethnicities and races from all of these regions in Southeast Asia and South Asia, which includes, obviously, in the Indian mainland as well. Because we do have people from you know, who trace their roots back to Indian mainland as well. So it's really a region that sort of doesn't really have a very well defined, homogenous, ethnic kind of identity.
Host 8:46
Thank you for that. And Kimi on this subject of diversity, and looking at the history of this diverse region, how it's playing out in the Northeast today, and its relation to Delhi, in your reporting, your lived experience, anything that you would like to add to add to this characterization, to help our audience better understand this context?
Kimi Colney 9:06
Yeah, I think I'd like to add to what make me said that it's taken a long time for the rest of India to see what North East is, and I think sports has played a big factor in that. It's our sportsmen who have helped show that okay, there is a state here in Mizoram in Manipur, and that has played a big factor. And even regarding like, from a media point of view, there's a lot of marginalization of the media in the Northeast, and it's still a struggle. Like yesterday, me and make peace were discussing about it, and sometimes we feel like, okay, it will never get better, like, when will northeast ever be prioritized? But there is development, there is progress. There are more people coming out, there are more people speaking up, and there are more journalists who are coming up, and there is a lot of progress. I just want to take an example of like, recently in Mizoram, there was a big land. Where around 30 people were killed, and then there was no mention of that by the Prime Minister or anything in his tweets. And he usually mentions any incident, like a fire breaks out, and he says, Okay, we going to pay compensation. We're sorry and everything. But it took him, like over three, four days to see mention about the incident. Not just in Miz or Manipur, there were floods, and like, 1000s of people were affected. So we've still got a long way to go, but I think there is some progress that's really interesting.
Host 10:29
So you're really painting a picture of this isolated frontier territory, disconnected from the main centers of power, and what what is thought of by Indians, as well as those outside of what constitutes in the on something that's kind of off in the periphery, both in a spatial sense as well as in a cultural or psychological sense, it sounds like.
Kimi Colney 10:50
Yes, yes. That's That's true. I agree with what you say, yes. So I lived in I was born in Maharashtra. I grew I went to school in Tamil, Nadu, Uttarakhand, so I've been all over India, and I should I do feel like an Indian first and a meso second. But usually that's not how I'm made to feel, because most Indians even through elementary school, till I started working in a company in Chennai where everyone was very educated, like, but even there, like, all through this time, like, people were not aware of the Northeast states. So I think that, really, I don't know, gave me a lot of patriotism, like, made me want people to see that there's a state here. There are all these eight, like, diverse states here. And yeah, I think that's something that a lot of people from the northeast, who go to the rest of India, they struggle with that. But yes, as I said before, there is a lot of progress. People are starting to see that we are here.
Host 12:02
Yeah. And what I find really interesting is you're providing this context. This is so helpful and valuable for understanding the situation today, because also we have northeast India, but then as we're looking at Myanmar, it's, of course, northwest, Northwest Myanmar that is, is also and when you're looking at the state of Myanmar, this is also a region that is on the periphery, forgotten, both psychologically as well as spatially. And so you have this very important relationship between New Delhi and apida, between the two countries and the two administrations governing those countries, and yet spatially and physically those that relationship is played out in a region that's somewhat forgotten and frontier to both of those power centers. So how do you see this playing out in terms of the political power bases and how they talk, but then simultaneously, on another level, you have the physical borders which are far away from those respective power bases.
Makepeace Sitlhou 13:01
Well, you know, this is a bit of a running joke. We realized this also, you know, coming here, as well as we were very acutely aware of this, right? That, you know, we have that sort of kinship, not just ethnically, with, you know, let's say the chit state, or parts of Sagan region. We also realize that we're, we're the third world, part of the Third World. It really doesn't help us much to be represented, to be heard by the power centers. And, you know, I think it also explains because, I mean, you know, we've spent a couple of days in Bay sod, where, obviously we've, like, met a lot of migrants, a lot of people who are refugees, you know, escaping the crisis in Myanmar, but often the questions around Chin State, or anything along India's Well, it's not about what India's borders with Myanmar, but what's happening on that side of Myanmar the way. So the western side is fairly unknown to people, a lot of the you know, especially, let's say, the members of the nug, CRP H or, for that matter, even the journalists who are currently living in exile here because they come from places like Yangon or maybe from like the current the current state. So yeah, I mean, it's something that we we it's sort of almost like a repeat of, you know, speaking to like, slightly Well, a very, very uninitiated audience back at home as well as you know, also seeing that sort of black stairs over here. So yeah, I think it's like it's this constant feeling of marginalization that we do wherever we go.
Host 14:31
So I think that's a good segue to the question we've talked about before this interview, of just contrasting the border situation for the Myanmar refugees and migrants in Thailand, with Mesa and India and the Northeast corridor that we're talking about. And as you've spent so much time looking at the Burmese situation there, which we'll get into later, but before we do, you've just spent the last week exploring and understanding the dynamics here in Thailand. And so how would you contrast the similarities and differences between. The Burmese are facing here, and what you've seen them facing in your home state?
Kimi Colney 15:04
Yeah. So I just first, I want to add to what she said, because, like, Miz Aram is hosting a lot of refugees, around 40,000 refugees right now, and so I had this understanding, I mean, it was a very ignorant understanding, but that when I came to me sad, and when I met the people of Myanmar here, the refugees here, like we would, there would be a kinship, but that was not actually the case, because they were not really aware of what's happening on that side of the border. And they were not so aware of like the Jin community and there in Mizoram or in Manipur. So that was a new learning for me. So yeah, even while speaking to the refugees here in Mesa, I was telling them, I wish the refugees in Mizoram could come here, because here they have support from the government. I know there are a lot of restrictions. They live in a lot of fear. They don't have it I don't mean that they have it good, either, but they have it better than the refugees in Mizoram, because in Mizoram, our state is already, as we said, we are the Third World. In a third world, our state does not have any funds to sustain itself. We depend on the central government for over 90% of our funding, and for us to be able to accompany like 1000s and 1000s of refugees, it's a crisis. I was just talking to the DC of long Kyaw District, which is hosting over 7000 refugees right now, when I was asking him, how is the situation? And he said, this is already too big a number. We cannot take any more than this. So it's like some villages are supporting a refugee population that's bigger than the village population. So it's, it's really a humanitarian crisis. People literally run out of food. There's like little aid from INGOs, and much lesser than it is in Thailand. So, I mean, we can't compare two tragedies like I can say this, it's not fair to do that, but I think, yeah, it's really a crisis back in Mizoram.
Host 17:13
And then looking at the refugee situation in in northeast India, we talked before about the difference between how the power centers are talking to each other, the respective power centers, and the actual physical places of those peoples that are coming in contact. And so how would you contrast how New Delhi has been responding to the developing crisis in Myanmar and their close ties with the military, with how the regional actors, the local actors, the people and the local governance. How, in India and northeast India, Mizoram and Manipur, how they're responding to the Burmese that are fleeing physically to their place?
Kimi Colney 17:50
Yes. So yes, India is not a signatory of the Refugee Convention, and I think she would have a lot to say about Manipur, so she will add to that. But in regard to Mizoram, yes, even from the beginning of the coup, they were asked to send back the refugees from Myanmar. But our chief ministers, despite all their weaknesses in this, in this particular point or they have been very strong, they have stood very strong against the central government. They said, We're not sending anyone back. We have a new chief minister who was recently elected. He has also stated again that we welcome all the refugees and we will not send anyone back so and I think even the central government is aware that they cannot force them. There's nothing they can do to force them, because we do share, like a kind of brotherhood. We have ethnic ties with them. If you look at us, if you look at our language, everything is quite similar. So it's like how they say you are separating people of the same family. And I think that's not possible, and that's not something that Narendra Modi can force us, even a small state chief minister, to do because it would create havoc if they try to forcefully do that. But they've tried to close the border, but I think even that has gotten a lot of opposition, and from what our chief minister said, he said he's hopeful that they will not be sealing the border, but let's see the museum side of the border. I mean, closing the scrapping the free movement regime. I think you might be aware of the free movement regime, like people from India and Myanmar in Miran border can cross on both sides up to 16 kilometers. So they're trying to scrap the free movement regime. But even that has seen a lot of opposition. People have gotten together in protest opposing that. But let's see how it plays out.
Host 19:46
Yeah, so then, before moving to Manipur, just a follow up question about Miz you, it's very laudable you mentioned the chief minister and people because of this sense of shared brotherhood and sisterhood connection with at the. People across the border, helping them in their time of need and resisting the new Delhi's demand that they return them. However, this is a conflict that's been stretching three and a half years. It's only getting worse. It's particularly getting worse in Chin State, and the refugees are only fleeing in greater numbers from the extreme harm and violence that's happening in Myanmar, you yourself referenced how there's, there's now camps that are eclipsing the size of towns and villages in that region. There's you've mentioned, there's not resources to be able to support them. So how is this situation continuing to play out, even with all the goodwill in the world to want to support these communities coming, if the resources aren't there, what's that looking like.
Kimi Colney 20:40
Yeah, it's hard to say, but from my opinion, I don't see a very hopeful future. Because see from the refugees, if 100 are good and if 10 are bad, the deeds of the 10, they come out in the community. I mean, they they play a big role in the community. Everyone hears about it like especially now we have a lot of drugs smuggling going on, and even the government authorities have said that this has increased after the influx of refugees. So especially among the youth, there's a growing apprehension towards the refugee population, like regarding scrapping of the free movement regime, there was a, I did a story on how the youth are actually in favor of scrapping the free movement regime, because a poll was done on the college students in Mizoram, the political science students, and they were actually in favor of it. They said, We are okay with continuing to visit each other and crossing the border, but doing it legally, because there is like such a big rise of smuggling of drugs, and which is a very sad situation, actually. So it's hard to say, Yeah, it's hard to see a bright future.
Host 21:58
I see. Let's turn to Manipur. How would you contrast how things have been playing out in Manipur to how they've been developing in New Zealand?
Makepeace Sitlhou 22:08
I would say like Manipur is like diametrically opposite to, you know, how at least both the government and you know, well, certain section of the locals in Manipur have been responding to the, you know, humanitarian crisis, to the refugee inflow, basically, well, at the beginning of the crisis, well, you know, there were also these set of like, extremely like, reprehensible orders that were passed by the central ministry, pretty much asking them to, like, push back in those words, you know, migrants who have coming, who have come in, and, you know, because, I mean, they're also, like, designated as illegal migrants, you know. So they're like, they've been asked to, like, push back and like, the way that visora government has responded is just basically, like, you know, we'll do our thing and just leave us be. You know, they've not, like, agreed to or adhere to any of these sort of orders from Central ministry. But it's also an important, I think, fact to note here that there's a regional party in power in Mizoram, which is not the case in Manipur. Manipur does have the BGP, or the party, and the party government in a coalition, you know, with other regional parties, but they are the majority party, which is why there's that kind of you know willingness to, you know, basically, give in to these orders. But I think besides the sort of you know party command and that kind of you know structure to, you know, sort of follow instructions, there's also an implicit sort of, let's say, interest or take of the majority community in Manipur. Just to give a very quick sort of, you know, background or context on Manipur, it's basically, it's a, it's often described as a bowl shaped, sort of a, you know, state where the bottom of the bowl is the valley which is occupied by what the ethnic may take community the may take communities are mostly composed of Hindus, and there's a small, you know, percentage of them who follow an indigenous faith, as well as those who are Muslims as well and Christian but the latter three are very, very small minority. However, at the edge of the bowl is it's the status are surrounded by hills, and that makes up, like the larger portion, at least, like 70% of that land is Hills, which is occupied by, very broadly speaking, to tribes. That's Nagas and the cookies those. So since the crisis actually occurred because the borders, you know, of Chin State and Sagaing, basically, you know, share, I mean, the board the states, these states in in Myanmar, share borders with, you know, with the cookie Hill areas as well as the Naga areas. They've obviously been. Receiving refugees in both these parts. I think the difference is that they've been doing it sort of in the beginning of the crisis. They were doing it really sort of silently. They were doing it really discreetly, knowing well that, you know, it's a BJP government in power in the state, as well that, as well as the fact that, you know, the majority community that is the May days are not really in favor of, you know, these refugees being brought in. I mean by and large. But also, I think it's important to distinguish here that in the beginning of the of the refugee crisis, I'm talking about 2021 it wasn't like the it wasn't like the meetings were necessarily very, very abjectly opposed to letting refugees in. There was just little recognition of, you know, of the refugees coming in. And it's also true that they were not like the inflow of refugees was much lesser compared to what was coming. I mean, the kind of numbers that mizram Were taking in, so, you know, so there wasn't much recognition of that from the Metis community. There were, in fact, quite a few civil society actors who also felt that to give them some sort of like a temporary stay and everything, and, you know, to not necessarily push them back, because they did recognize this as a humanitarian crisis, and not just as an ethnic sort of a kinship thing, right arrangement, or something like that. But for at least like two years, a good two years, the state government in Manipur, sort of, you know, either pushed them back, which has been seen, like in several videos and stuff like that. It's also been reported or detained them in detention centers as well as a central jail. But besides that, they a lot of refugees, however, still managed to circuit three come in, and, you know, and I think, instead of sort of like, even, despite being perhaps aware of it officially, it was like some sort of sinister design which was to be seen only later, 2023 where, you know, they wouldn't really like acknowledge, or they won't really record, like record, or, you know, take details down of all the refugees who are coming in, you know, to kind of just know where they are located, you know, and things like that. And just how many you've got, you've got them in the state, what later happened was this kind of politics around refugees coming in. And because refugees, a lot of the refugees had, like, sort of similar, they came from the same ethnic stock as many of the cookies those the government basically decided to, you know, play politics over it and say that, you know, en masse, this whole community, the ethnic community, are like illegal immigrants, so they kind of use the refugee bogie to kind of demonize an entire community. It's, again, an important thing to note here that they left out the Nagas. And I think that's obviously something that you will need a separate podcast episode for. But I'll just talk about the cookies those here that you know, there's a I mean, again, there's a lot to sort of speak in terms of, like, why they did this for just the cookies those, you know, but I think that's where they what happened was that by then, like, sometime in early 2023 they sort of started this whole, like, you know, village survey, sort of an exercise where they got A couple of like, the state legislative members and a couple of bureaucrats in Manipur to, kind of, you know, do the survey of certain refugee camps to get a number of just how many refugees were there. And if I'm not, it was, they didn't do it for all the districts. They did it for, like, I think, about four districts, four districts in the hill areas. And the outcome of that. I mean, again, the methodology of how they went about it. None of that is known. All of this is very opaque. So, I mean, I still take these numbers with a little bit of a pinch of salt. But what came out of that survey, that preliminary survey, if you will, was that there are at least about, like, three to 5000 refugees who were, you know, sort of with that we had in the state, which is, I mean, when you think about it, I mean, it's, it's really nothing, especially when you compare it to, like 50,000 I mean, at some point in, because I had been reporting there since 2021, they were almost, they were almost searching, like a lack or something like that, you know, like whatever, 100,000 something like that. You know, in the worst of times, right? But just with a mere 5000 figure, the chief minister, basically the head of the state in Manipur, managed to drum up that so much hysteria that we've just really, you know, conducted this village survey in like four districts, and we found like 5000 you can only imagine how many more would be fine if you had to, like, you know, do a very thorough survey everywhere, you know. So this became a very convenient ploy to kind of, you know, drum up this hysteria about illegal immigrants coming in, coming across the borders, and, of course, the usual and very predictable anxiety of how they would, you know, take our jobs, take our land, you know, just take everything. Basically. Okay, so that's kind of that, that's also like, you know, that became like, in some way. It's sort of, of course, with many other factors coming into play, segued into what has been, you know, an ethnic conflict, a civil war, really, between two communities, you know, since more than a year in Manipur, primarily between the, you know, the may take community as well as the cookie so tribes living in the hills, and it has led to like this absolute, you know, separate administration of sorts, at least informally, or even to some extent in paper, where, you know, everyone, not just, not just that the people of it's the residents who are who have been completely, you know, shifted from one area to another according to their, you know, the majority dominance of that particular area. But even, like officials, even police officials and bureaucrats have been given postings based on, you know, the ethnicity and that they should be posted in areas where, you know, their respective ethnicity is the majority. So in a sense, it has divided state, and we've got like these war zone, like buffer zones separating the hills and the valley. And, you know, as we speak there, there are still, like conflicts, and, you know, going clashes going on, and still a lot of violence and still more deaths.
Host 31:23
This is incredible. So you're talking about a civil war that's emerging between, just to be clear, the maytay community and the cookie so, but the cookie so that are Indians that we're not talking strictly about the refugees coming in. But we're talking about those holding Indian passports that are residing there, physically, right, right?
Makepeace Sitlhou 31:43
Absolutely. I mean, what is, of course, painted by a lot of like, the radical sections of the methi community, and unfortunately, that includes the CM as well the chief minister himself, who's probably the most radical head, you know, of them all, is that, you know, everyone is like all the cookies communities and mass painted as, not as refugees, necessarily. Again, refugee would be a thing that their refugees would be acknowledging their plight, right? So they that would be like too kind of word to kind of, you know, use them, or to kind of label to slap on them, you know, they instead use things like illegal immigrants. And that's what really, like, you know, then sort of drives that sort of, like, you know, very xenophobic kind of a hysteria, and, you know, rouses those kind of sentiments, right? But, yeah, to be clear, though, the fight really, in any of these conflict, in any of the conflict, or any of the clashes that have happened, it's the refugees are hardly involved. I mean, they're in a pretty, like, you know, hand to mouth state. I mean, they couldn't possibly get on the front line and, you know, whatever start, like, be able to be in a position to fight in any way. So it's really the people who are, I mean, at least I can speak as someone from the hooky zo community, and from what I've seen and reported, I mean, they've mostly been on the defense where, you know, certain radical groups, as well as the, what we know as Valley based insurgent groups, who had been taking shelter in Myanmar for the longest time have now, kind of, you know, returned home in Manipur and and they're basically, you know, doing these incursions in the hills, you know, in The under the, of course, the guise of, like, basically maintaining the integrity of the state and, you know, not allowing it to get sort of split up accordingly. I mean, according to them, by the illegal immigrants, or the forces, even, for that matter, certain forces from, you know, from the People's defense forces in Myanmar. So there's just, just, there's a lot of, like, disinformation going around. But, I mean, the truth of the matter, which, of course, even the, you know, the government even knows that it really, it really is, it really is a war that's driven by, you know, by purposeful disinformation, you know, just and a lot of brainwashing, a lot of like, you know, fake news again, especially pushed by the media and the Valley, which between two communities who otherwise were getting along. All right, it's something that there's so much like to unpack there, but there's a lot to unpack there. But we've also, like, seen for the longest time, and there's been this sort of like, you know, there's been this, you know, news, or this kind of rumor that's been beaten around for the longest time, that the people's defense forces are aiding some of the insurgent groups who are from the cookie so community in fighting the METI forces, or, For that matter, you know the army or the Manipur police, right? Again, to sort of, you know, again, important to mention here that the Manipur police, which is again by and large, made up of Metis, have been fighting on the side of the Metis forces, and not necessarily been a neutral force, as they're required to be. But. A there's been, there's been a recent statement that that has been brought out by the National investigative agency, which is India's, one of India's premier, you know, investigative agencies, which has, again, quite out of the blue, you know, just shortly after the election results, where, you know, effectively, the people have voted for the Indian National Congress, India block the opposition party, and not the BJP, right? Saying that, that the PDF in in Burma is kind of, you know, aiding is aiding the cookie. So groups in in basically, sort of, you know, creating this, you know, creating as well, as you know, further fueling the Manipur crisis. But before that, like, I mean, about a month or two before that, the same investigative agency had brought it up, brought out a very detailed chart sheet in which they had alleged that certain Naga groups, certain groups and the methane surgeon groups, had had basically, you know, had played a very important role in kind of aligning with each other and attacking cookies though community, you know, areas in Manipur. So again, in a way, they've kind of got everyone involved. And, I mean, there's, there's some truth to it, but the more, I guess, the more explosive part of this whole recent statement is an official sort of admission, or maybe the first time that an Indian Agency is, you know, actually saying or acknowledging the role of PDF, which is, which still remains to be, let's say, confirmed or substantiated. Because, you know, while this is just a statement, there's been no evidence to back it up.
Host 36:44
So can we connect what's going on locally, physically, going back to these power centers, and how their relationship and their aims may or may not play into this? Because, as you're talking, I'm wondering is from these communities that are or these individuals in those communities that are pushing this kind of conspiracy theory, or exploiting maybe different fractures that have existed and using them for this purpose, to to to capitalize on them and make and see the kind of gains that they're looking for is, are they? Are they simply looking at, well, we don't really care what's going on outside of the border. We just want you out, and we want, maybe we want to take advantage of the situation to for our own ends. Or do you see any kind of wider aim there of aligning with the military, being, again, the Burmese military, being against the democracy movement, or something, something a bit more sinister, a bit more top level, that is affecting or playing out these kind of regional and physical violence that's taking shape.
Makepeace Sitlhou 37:51
I think at this point, it still would be a bit of an overreach for me to kind of, you know, necessarily, put together an analysis of like the largest ministers that's designed because, I mean, it's something that I would say most of us from Manipur has still been sort of scratching our heads around, you know, what's the, what's the, I mean, well, we understand how the state government is playing it out. I mean, they're obviously playing the the ethnic, majoritarian card here. But what's the, you know, what's the BGP party in the centers, which is essentially like a cow belt party, what we call the very Hindi Hindi Hindi majoritarian party. What is their skin in this game here? Right? I think every, everyone really knows, everyone knows this very well. It's that, you know, Indian Government has maintained very, you know, sort of good diplomatic relations with the military junta, and that's been consistently so, I mean, through this whole period. I mean, even before the coup as well, and they've had, they have, in the past, sort of, you know, had this sort of an understanding where the Indian government, you know, would kind of get this sort of like a consent or with their with the consent of the military junta, they would, you know, kind of flush out like, you know, insurgents, like a lot of the a lot of Indian insurgents, you know, who are, again, separatists, you know, from Manipur, or, for that matter, from from naglin and all of that to, you know, flush them out of, you know, shelter camps or base camps that they have in Myanmar. But sorry. What's happened since the coup? As you know, what's happened since the coup is that we've seen two things. We've seen two major developments. We've seen the involvement of of the Manipuri or the methane surgeon groups, you know, who are fighting along with the junta and who fighting the people's defense forces. I mean, something that has come out. And I've also spoken to people who are in, you know, CNA and, you know, sort of CNF and these kind of forces, well, you know, the Chin State forces, basically, who've talked about, like, their clear role in, sort of, you know, fighting on the side. The of the junta, I mean the clear role of the methane surgeon groups and but also with the kind of like, you know, with the kind of gains that PDF is getting, particularly in the ethnic areas, I believe this has also meant that their the basis, the safe havens of the methane surgeon groups have been essentially, you know, disrupted. And they've had to basically move back into India. They've had to move back into India. They've had to kind of come back to India and things like that. And, you know, just Manipur being in this crisis, kind of a crisis mode. And, you know, again, that sort of separation happening of the ethnic communities between the hills and valley seems very rather convenient. I mean, I can only kind of paint what the picture is without necessarily giving you the analysis. But it seems, it seems convenient a time, you know, when, of course, things were not going too great for them in Myanmar at the same time. The second thing is also the involvement of what is called, what is called K and AB, or cookie national army, Burma, which is, which has been helping the PDF forces. They've been helping PDF forces. Some even in like, you know, sort of border townships, like Tamu in sagaya region, which borders, you know, Moe in Manipur, so, so KD has had that sort of involvement, you know, very clear involvement and actually very public support as well for the PDF. And if I'm not, if I'm not mistaken, they're very much counted as PDF, and not just like, you know, they're not with PDF, but they're actually part of the PDF in that sense. So they are being the Burmese division of the cookie national army. They are part of the democratic movement. They are part of the resistance, you know, so, so with, with, with them gaining ground, there's been this kind of like, there's, there's a certain like, there's always a bit of a, let's say not, I would not say discord, but there's always a little bit of distance, I would say, in what, India sort of frames as, sort of, you know, their national security policy or kind of approach, and also what it sort of, you know, frames as it's or the way it approaches foreign relations or geopolitical relations, right? And also what, what's happening on the ground, vis a vis what its intelligence agencies tend to, sort of how they tend to operate, and how they tend to kind of, you know, kind of, let's say, you know, strike their dealings right with many of these groups. And this is just from my general understanding through my career of reporting on, you know, insurgent groups and armed groups and, you know, sort of counter insurgency in India. So what I what I find generally to be is very often that a lot of intelligence agencies usually work with the goal of, like keeping national security in mind, like, what is good for India's national security, which obviously, like with with the money poor insurgents kind of coming back, that would be seen as a good thing, you know. I mean, there was, in fact, even a there was even a ceasefire agreement that was signed with one particular Manipuri insurgent group. And this was a group that, you know, it was certainly the Pro for pro talks faction of the group. But it certainly was a group that was would have never in a million, million years, thought of, you know, like having political talks with Indian government, because they were so adamant about being, you know, about, basically, like, their own autonomy, and being separated from the from India, right? Yeah, so, but it's same time, I find that there is a sort of dissonance, or there's certainly this kind of a distance where, what, how India would conduct itself diplomatically and geopolitically with countries, doesn't quite reflect what happens on the ground vis a vis intelligence agencies, because intelligence agencies, at least, for the longest time, did work keeping national security in mind. But for a lot of you know, for, for, for, however, what's, what's going on at least in New Delhi, or, you know, Visa V like the NBA, the minister, the Ministry of External Affairs. I mean, they would just have something else completely in mind, you know. So it's a little difficult to kind of be able to drop that statistical design. It's a little early. I would still say, I mean, there's certainly a lot happening effort, but I would say it's a bit premature to be able to draw very like, you know, easy conclusions, because also to not fall into the same easy trap that many other people tend to, you know, whatever get into.
Host 44:31
So yeah, I just want to come back to the reference that you made a little bit ago about the maytay insurgents that are fighting the PDF in Myanmar. If you can describe the history of that, how long they've been there, and what their aims are, what their aims are for crossing the border into another country to wage conflict there. That seems at odds with the kind of fractured reality that you described in northeast India, the gains they're trying to make in country, why they're then going out of country to go beyond their community.
Makepeace Sitlhou 45:00
Yes, well, I think they, they went out of the country. I mean, they went, they crossed the border. It's been a, it's been like a, you know, pattern for a lot of Northeast based insurgent groups for the longest time to take shelter in places like Myanmar, Bangladesh. There was a time when they were, you know, pretty well fortified in Bhutan, until they were flushed out of Bhutan as well. I mean, that's something that's something that's part of history that everyone mostly knows about, right? So it's uncommon, and, you know, hardly unimaginative to even think they would obviously take shelter across the border. But as I was still telling you, also about like, the kind of, you know, sort of negotiations, or the understanding between the Indian government and the military junta that you know, in terms of, like, dealing with these insurgent groups. So even this, despite this, like, you know, this very hoity, toity relations, good relations, and this loud, like proclamations, which we especially coming from the Indian government that, you know, we've got, we've got a good relationship going on with military junta. And, you know, we they're giving us the access, and they're letting us destroy, like, you know, the camps, or mean, any baby bases and things like that in on their side of the border. But in fact, I mean, military junta were playing it pretty safe, like they were in some sense, like double crossing India, like many camps still remain. And certainly, I mean, I think the, I think the, you know, the kind of civil war between the PDF and the junta sort of really exposed the fact that there was still several, I mean, they were just new base camp that was set up basically for, you know, for the for the Maintain search and group. So they were not really dealt with as India had, so, you know, proudly or boastfully proclaimed, you know, they've just been given. They've just been been sort of, you know, they just struck a different kind of arrangement with them. So when the crisis happened, and when the resistance obviously, like, you know, sort of came to their doors, or when, when the resistance really gave a real, sort of, you know, challenge to the military junta. That's when it was time for them to kind of, you know, ask for their pound of flesh. So that's how, essentially, the baking surgeon groups, in exchange for a safe base, a safe haven in Myanmar, fought the war for, I mean, you know, on their behalf.
Host 47:17
So you're describing a kind of alignment of either of purpose, if not actually strategically, but at least an alignment of purpose between the maytay insurgents that are doing the junta, bidding for them and fighting the common enemy and and the junta obviously being pleased that they have some measure of support. How does New Delhi look at all of it? Look at this, this relationship going on in a physical place.
Makepeace Sitlhou 47:41
I mean, honestly, from, you know, like from the outside. I mean from the, when I say from the outside, I really mean from the from the media trenches. And really, I mean, since the last 10 years, media trenches are really far away from where the government sits, right. We don't have that sort of access anymore. And it's people are, people are not as amenable to talk as they would before. But even then, like, you know, it's, it seems quite ridiculous. It makes India looks extremely, you know, naive, to say the least, because, and even despite these, you know, sort of revelations, kind of, you know, coming to the fore, and obviously, like, you know, with, I mean, all of them coming in print or, you know, being revealed in the media, they sort of still have their horse like this on. They kind of, like, that's sort of the approach that India takes with a lot of like, I would say, like, you know, foreign developments and foreign relations, you know. And I think in some sense, again, when it comes to India's northeast and Myanmar, they can kind of almost get away with it, because it's not, again, a very, it's not a very watched corridor, unlike Pakistan, right? Like, obviously something in along Pakistan, Kashmir would just like, you know, is so heavily scrutinized, and, you know, for very understandable reasons, of course, but anything along the eastern borders is just like, you know, it again, flies, you know, in the faces of most people because of ignorance, largely, and they don't know these intricate or, I mean, some of these details are not even really that intricate. They're just, they just, they're there, but they people aren't really aware of it. They don't know the dynamics, or they don't know how, in terms of even counter insurgency, or, you know, national security, they're being dealt with, so they sort of get away with it. They're not really asked those kind of hard questions by most of even the journalists. I mean, for all kinds of reasons. You know so but however, I mean, of course, you know, for those who know, for those who follow, it doesn't make India look like they really have a I mean, and I'm not just talking about after the coup, right, with, of course, India coming up, I think, quite a bit on the radar by international agencies, where the think tanks or research groups, or, for that matter, even the medias. What exactly is India doing? You know, continuing to do business with the junta. And of course, like flying down, or flying them down, you know, sort of having these, like, you know, very grand photo ops and things like that. But even before the coup, like India has always seemed like this very weak regional player, you know. And yeah, I mean, it sounds that there's obviously Aspire or somewhere it's not something that they just even aspire. I think for them in their heads, they're already the big player, but you know, they don't have the track record to show for it.
Host 50:29
I do want to ask another question about the refugees, getting back to them and their plight, and as you've both illustrated here, the larger numbers in Mizoram, but the harsher conditions in Manipur. And I want to give our listeners a better sense of how it looks and feels there. You've referenced the camps, the where, where they're living, where they're making temporary homes, as well, in the shelters, as well as detention centers. I assume those are more on the Manipur side, but I don't know if they're also in Mizoram, but I wonder if, in terms of if you visited some of these camps, differences among the camps, as well as the detention centers, I wonder if you can give us an impression of what life is like there, and if you're able to, because you just came back from Mesa, contrasting it with you referenced before about how the state is supporting or not supporting These refugees, but in terms of the actual life you of the actual life you give, if you can give some color into how you're seeing life play out, and the hardships that people have day to day and living in these places, as well as detention centers.
Kimi Colney 51:33
Okay, so the refugee camps that I visited the in 2022 1022, I think we went to a refugee camp near England district, and I was there. We were there to shoot a documentary, and then we interacted with some of them. There were around 600 to 700 people there, and the people who were supporting them the village. They were the village population was half of that. They were around 300 and yeah, and they told the when, when we were talking and, like, trying to set up interviews. And they said that we were informed that we even went through the kitchens and then there's their sleeping area, like, just to describe they were in a place that was a former formerly used by the army. It was uninhabited, like it was left desolate, and the government kept them there. So it was this cold, hard floors that people of all ages, 60, 7080, and a lot of children, lot of nursing mothers. They just put like a sheet of cotton. They had to sleep there. And then people were still coming in every day, but they were even sleeping on the like entryways. There was no more space there. And then the people who are looking after them, they informed me that they only had food left, and enough food left for maybe the next two, three days, they did literally running out of food. And the people of the village, there was nothing more that they could do. And our state government is very, very poor, and so even make peace had supported me. We reached out to people through Instagram, and we raised funds for them maybe for another month. So that's like, just giving an example of the kind of crisis that is there. It's very difficult, but some ing as a few are there, like true people in mizram, they're trying to extend support, but it's really not enough. And, yeah, the situation is quite bad. There we even went to far con, which is on the far end of the border. And even there we went inside the homes of the people. They were staying in makeshift huts, and some of them were staying in, like their relatives, empty huts. So when we interviewed the people, like some of them, said they had 100 rupees, like 100 rupees you can get salt and water. Maybe there's nothing much you can get. They were just solely depending on the Waimea, which is like an apex NGO for Mizoram, even the Waimea, they have their good and bad sites. But regarding the refugee crisis, they've been doing a lot. So they are the ones who usually mobilize funds, collect funds for the refugees, and distribute food and clothes. And so that's what the situation is like. There to go into details, I think it would take too long, but so just taking like, one or two examples, and in May sod, we did not visit the refugee center or the refugee camp, actually, so it's hard to understand, like, how to compare even, but from the exiled people living in May sod, I think they also. Have their struggles, but yeah, they are able to work. They are able to open restaurants, which is not possible in Mizoram. Mizoram the people, even though they've welcomed them, they've put a strict imposition that they cannot open place of business. They cannot have any land, or they cannot have any government identification cards, I think, which is the same here. But so it's much harder for them to find a living. It's much harder for them to find a living. And, yeah, that's the situation there. Thank you.
Makepeace Sitlhou 55:36
Yeah, I feel like comparing what's going on in Mizoram primarily. I mean, Manipur doesn't really have these designated camps, as you know, what the kind that Mizoram has, especially because, at least from what I've seen and what I know, you know, people are being housed in, you know, whatever structures that exist basically, or in people's homes, inside people's homes. So this, I mean, that is also, of course, happening in Mizoram as well, but because of this lack of, like, you know, infrastructure or government support in Manipur, so that even that doesn't really exist. So, you know, it's just really like, is this really family members? Is just like family members, you know, swelling up in houses, in households, right? So that's really the situation in Manipur, which is, I guess it's in many ways, much worse as well, as, you know, even more awkward, in some sense, right? But I think comparing like me sought and like Mizoram as a whole, in a sense, is really like apples and oranges, actually, in some ways. And also, of course, there is a certain, there's a huge divide in terms of like development and, you know, kind of like, so whatever amenities basically being available. And this, I think this is where the just that distinction is important to make, as well, that, you know that the tak Province, which is where may thought comes under is, you know, it's just much more affluent, you know, a place, compared to like, Mizoram as a whole, like, I think they were, you know, we were going around, and they were parts that Kyiv was looking at certain malls and stuff, and they're, like, they've got bigger malls than what we've got in the capital, right, yeah. And that's the reality. That's really the reality of it. I mean, there are bigger malls, really, than probably the entire northeast, not just in not just in eyes all actually. But I mean, malls aside, though, really it's why I think it's apples and oranges, is also because it's, it's a difference of the way that the power center in Thailand has developed, me as a place, and we've been given quite a bit of background as well on it, in terms of how it used to be a ghost town. But, you know, the government also saw that, sort of like, you know, potential in it with, you know, many migrants, basically, coming in across the border be I mean, besides just the entry the formal entry points being designated. There's always these borders are poor as you can never keep people out, you know, from coming in and out of borders or crossing borders, right? And they saw the they saw they acknowledged that as a reality. And I think it's very exceptional in that regard. And having been in borders, not just in the northeast, but also in the US, Mexico side. It's instead of, like, putting up walls, or, like, ridiculous shipping containers, or trying to, like, end the FMR, the free movement regime, or, you know, taking any of these oppressive sort of steps, they saw the business potential in it, and they, they were like, Hey, we can have, like, you know, we can this. This can be a whole, you know, city and a center unto itself, you know, let's throw up some malls here. Let's throw up like, you know, whatever developments out here, you know, let's build, bring up some industries and facilitate, like, some sort of a, you know, working condition, or, I don't know, temporary work permits for the migrants and the refugees and things like that. You know. Let's like, let's see how this actually feeds and helps our economy, as opposed to what has been done in India, where it's just like hysteria and hysteria and, you know, a place like Mizoram, any which way, doesn't get it doesn't get much. I mean, it's also like, I mean, another thing that I think was important to bring in is that, you know, Mizoram is one of, not just the one of the poorest places. It doesn't it's situated, really, in the highlands. It's one of the, you know, whatever, highest places, one of the highest hill stations in India. It doesn't produce anything. It imports everything from outside. So cost of living in Mizoram has always been very high, even for the locals themselves, right? So it's hardly sufficient for the locals. And, you know, people struggle. They're there on many, on several other human development indexes. Actually, Myanmar is, sorry, Mizoram is pretty, pretty good, actually, and better than many parts of India. But that's also just largely because of the kind of culture that they have there. I think Kim, you should talk about a little bit about that, you know, with NGOs like. The yma, how they sort of have this, in some sense, a very socialist setup, where everyone's everyone is gets something in every certain amount that's insured to everyone. That's how they sort of divide their resources, because there are just so little, I mean, contrast that to me, sod, which is really an up and coming town, right? It's, you look at that, you look at that town, and you think, you think it's somewhere in the middle of somewhere it could, it's just like almost, you know, Chiang Mai, sort of, you know, kind of a potential somewhere, probably very inland, or, you know, closer to the power center. But that's not the case. And I think that's the that's the contrast here. That was very striking for me.
Host 1:00:41
That's very helpful. Thank you very much. And I also, as you're as you're contrasting this, the thing that's coming to my mind is one that may sod has a history, at least from the 88 movement and Myanmar, when I don't know if, if it was, if the town predates that, but at least through 88 when a lot of the democracy activists were fleeing, Mesa was being developed. So that's a several decade, year history, developing that town and developing the Burmese community there, and their relationship to Thailand. That this is that we don't see in northeast India. And I also, as we think about what's going on in Manipur and Mizoram, it also comes to mind that you're, of course, you're all describing what's happening once those refugees get in there and the life they face. We also have to add how difficult it is for them to even reach the border, that they are that the roads are not great, that many of them are coming on foot, and unimaginable difficulties of the age and physical condition of the people having to reach just the border area, let alone the violence that they're having to avoid, they're fleeing and then having to avoid as they reach that border. So I also just want to emphasize and highlight the situation that the refugees are facing in Manipur and Mizoram that that is that their trouble started long, long before this, as with anyone who's had to flee their home from violence. So these are really powerful reflections and information that you've been able to provide us about the context in your home state and how and how that's changing, how the physical nature of these communities in your home states are changing, and perhaps in India as a whole, is being affected by the violence that's going on in Burma, as well as learning about being able to contrast. I think many listeners in their mind will have some either experience or connotation, understanding of Mesa, understanding the role that's played. People familiar with Myanmar, how may SOT is a name that comes up. But I think Museum and Manipur, not so much. And so these are just names that we're hearing in this, as you've described, this frontier region. So being able the fact that you have recently been to these places in Thailand, and you're able to bring back contrast and eventually parse it out as apples and oranges, I think this is very relevant to our listeners trying to gain a better understanding.
Makepeace Sitlhou 1:02:58
I just think that this, there needs to be a gap. I mean, you know, that has to be bridged both on the Indian and Myanmar side as well. I mean, Let's also not forget that Myanmar does have a, you know, a parallel government, you know, of course, I know it's, it's still waiting to be formally recognized and given that sort of due recognition and things like that. But even with that in place, even with the kind of structure that they have in place, you know, with the parliament, with the national unity government, and let me underline the fact that it's a national unity government, I think it's important for them to also be as aware of what's going on in the India, on India's boss, on borders, which are, you know, sort of on the Indian side, on the western side, as it is important for Indian government, or for Indians to know what's going on in their eastern borders.
Kimi Colney 1:03:51
Yeah, I think I want to add to that, because that's what we've been discussing a lot, and it's really hard to digest the fact that the the nug or the CRP here has very little knowledge of what is going on that side of the border, our side of the border, and I think to be able to form a national unity government, this is something that they really have to work on.
Host 1:04:32
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