Mizzima/RFA-May 12
Myanmar residents forced to flee their homes for camps across the border in Thailand are facing growing hardship amid cuts to international aid, with more than 108,000 people now struggling to access stable food supplies, civil society organizations told Radio Free Asia on Wednesday. Predominantly ethnic Karen from eastern Myanmar’s Kayin state, facing brutal village burnings and airstrikes by the junta, have fled en masse to camps in Thailand, where many have lived for years seeking refugee status with no access to jobs or legal documents. The difficult life of residents in the camps escalated when the U.S. government slashed the budget of the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID. NThe United States, through USAID, has been the largest donor, contributing about 69% of the camps’ funding as of early 2025. This significant support facilitated essential services including healthcare, food distribution, and sanitation, often implemented by NGOs like the International Rescue Committee and The Border Consortium, according to the Organization for World Peace.
“Because aid donations have continued not to arrive, the refugees’ situations will become worse than before, because they have no documents,” said Karen Peace Support Network spokesperson Cherry, who only gave one name. “They have no permission to come and go from the camp without identification, passport or Thai citizenship documents, they have a lot of difficulty in searching for jobs.” Children five years old and under have had their food budget slashed to just five U.S. cents per day, while those over five will receive eight cents a day in allocated food, according to a statement co-published by 20 Karen groups on Wednesday, adding that over one million people in Kayin state and neighboring areas alone are affected by aid cuts. Read more at:
