With the annual registration deadline looming at the end of this month, the stateless condition of the migrants is threatening their futures in Thailand.

Among the most vulnerable are the Rohingya, who have been denied citizenship since 1982. Accounting for around 30 per cent of all Myanmar Muslims, they are among largest Muslim communities in the country and yet have faced the most severe persecution and discrimination from state authorities.

Launched yesterday, the report “Existence Denied” reveals  Myanmar Muslims’ difficulty in obtaining the Certificate of Identity that is required by Thai migrant labour law. Crossing the border without it can result in heavy fines, deportation and a two-year ban on re-applying for a work permit.

“[We consider] the Thai government to be helpful toward Myanmar minorities. Yet, although we have a system in Thailand, the root cause is in Myanmar,” said BHRN executive director Kyaw Win. “The human rights issue [citizenship] is a key problem in Southeast Asia from the viewpoint of migrant workers.

Kyaw Win urged the international community not to support a government that “creates discrimination and a situation that threatens minorities”.

“The military’s propaganda and ultranationalism is very strong in Myanmar. Violating [the law] has become a solution for discriminatory authorities, extremists and hardliners,” he added.

BHRN also demands fundamental structural changes in Myanmar while urging Thai authorities to partner with rights groups in creating a system of documentation that would allow migrant workers to “live and work with dignity” in Thailand.

Focusing on 36 people in Tak’s Mae Sot district and four Myanmar Muslim communities, the report found that nearly 80 per cent of interviewed Muslims had never been issued citizenship documents in their home country. Many were from the second generation of their families to suffer statelessness.

Meanwhile Kureeyor Manuchaw, project coordinator for the Migrant Working Group, urged the Thai government to adopt a specific policy for workers who cannot return to their countries for reasons of safety.

Some 700,000 Rohingya have fled a military crackdown in their home state of Rakhine since August last year, in what the UN and others have branded ethnic cleansing.

“Forcing [the Muslims] to return to Myanmar may not be a good option because of safety concerns,” Kureeyor said.

Myanmar “rejecting [their] nationality is a challenge as identification is required by the Thai government”.

The decision comes with many in the United States reassessing historical and cultural legacies, leading to monuments being taken down and buildings renamed as the country grapples with ongoing racism and discrimination.

The Laura Ingalls Wilder Award will now be known as the Children’s Literature Legacy Award, the Association for Library Service to Children announced.

The ALSC said the decision was made in consideration of “expressions of stereotypical attitudes” in Wilder’s work that are “inconsistent with ALSC’s core values of inclusiveness, integrity and respect, and responsiveness.”

“While we are committed to preserving access to Wilder’s work for readers, we must also consider if her legacy today does justice to this particular award for lifetime achievement, given by an organization committed to all children.”

Wilder won the first award in 1954. Other winners are E.B. White, the author of “Charlotte’s Web” and Theodor Seuss Geisel, author of the Dr Seuss books.

Critics have highlighted anti-native and anti-black sentiments in Wilder’s work for decades, although her books are still published, read and loved by many.

Read also: No Nobel Literature Prize after #MeToo turmoil

In 1952, a reader complained to publishers Harper’s about the author’s characterization of the West as a place where “there were no people. Only Indians lived there,” The Washington Post reported.

Harper’s in 1953 decided to change “people” to “settlers” but other criticisms focused on her depictions of Native Americans and some African Americans.

Wilder was born in 1867 in Wisconsin, becoming a school teacher and moving to Missouri with her husband in 1894, dying at the age of 90 in 1957.

Her first book, “The Little House in the Big Woods” was published in 1932 when she was 65. It told the story of five-year-old Laura and her pioneer family in Wisconsin.

It was followed by “Little House on the Prairie” in 1935, “On the Banks of Plum Creek” in 1937 and “By the Shores of Silver Lake” in 1939.

The books inspired the hugely popular 1974-1983 television series “Little House on the Prairie” starring Melissa Gilbert. The ALSC is part of the American Library Association, founded in 1876.//AFP

    Myanmar is accused of waging a crackdown in Rakhine state that forced 700,000 to flee that the UN and major western powers have said amounts to “ethnic cleansing”.

Its leaders have come under fire for taking little punitive action against the military, which has maintained its troops were responding to attacks by Rohingya militants.

But the military said late Monday in a Facebook post that Major General Maung Maung Soe, the former head of the western command in Rakhine, had been “purged” for poor performance.

The announcement came after the EU said he was among seven security officials hit with travel bans and asset freezes, but Myanmar did not link his sacking to the new sanctions.

The Facebook post said Maung Maung Soe was first reassigned last November, and that his removal from his position in the western command was to “inspect his responsibility over his weakness while working for Rakhine state stability”.

Maung Maung Soe was also the target of US sanctions last year over the Rohingya crisis.

The statement added that Lieutenant General Aung Kyaw Zaw — commander of the bureau of special operations and also on the EU list — was permitted to resign in May for health reasons and “weakness in serving duty”.

Canada said Monday it was also imposing sanctions against the same seven figures named by the European Union.

The EU said the individuals were targeted because of their “involvement in or association with atrocities and serious human rights violations committed against the Rohingya population in Rakhine state in the second half of 2017.”

“These violations include unlawful killings, sexual violence and the systematic burning of Rohingya houses and buildings.”

Most Rohingya refugees have settled in squalid camps in neighbouring Bangladesh and say they are too afraid to return to Myanmar though both countries have signed a repatriation deal.

Many refugees say they will not return without a basic guarantee of protection.

The United Nations signed a deal with Myanmar this month to allow its agencies to assess conditions on the ground in Rakhine state, which they say are not yet ripe for a safe and voluntary return.

Myanmar’s de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi has faced global criticism for not standing up more for the Rohingya, though supporters say she has little control over army actions.

In a statement on Monday (June 25), a Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) spokesman said the 1962 treaty was guaranteed by both governments in the Separation Agreement, which was registered with the United Nations when Singapore broke away from Malaysia in 1965.

“Both sides must comply fully with all the provisions of these agreements,” the spokesman said.

In separate interviews with Channel NewsAsia (CNA) and Bloomberg Television, Tun Dr Mahathir revived the water price issue which was a recurring source of tension between both countries especially during the later half of his previous term as prime minister between 1981 and 2003.

He told CNA that the price – 3 sen per thousand gallons – is “ridiculous”, and that Malaysia will approach Singapore on renegotiating the terms of the deal.

Asked if he will talk to Singapore about going back to the drawing board on the issue, Dr Mahathir said: “We are studying the case properly and we’ll make a presentation.”

However, he said it is “not urgent” during a news conference after a Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia supreme council meeting on Monday.

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Malaysian PM Mahathir revives Singapore water dispute, says supply deal ‘too costly’

On whether the Cabinet discussed the matter before his media interviews, he replied: “We didn’t discuss the water issue. But I was asked by the press.”

The water agreement, which expires in 2061, entitles Singapore to draw up to 250 million gallons a day (mgd) of raw water from the Johor River daily. In return, Johor is entitled to a daily supply of treated water of up to 2 per cent or 5 mgd of the water supplied to Singapore.

Singapore pays 3 sen per thousand gallons of raw water, and sells treated water back to Johor at 50 sen per thousand gallons.

In his interview with Bloomberg on Monday, Dr Mahathir criticised the 1962 water supply deal with Singapore as “too costly”, and said it is among the issues with Singapore “that we need to settle”.

This follows on his announcement last month that Malaysia plans to scrap a multi-billion dollar high-speed rail (HSR) line from Kuala Lumpur to Jurong East. He has yet to inform Singapore about its intent, he confirmed during the CNA interview.

In an interview with The Straits Times in March, before he won the election last month and became prime minister for a second time, Dr Mahathir described the price of the water sold to Singapore as “absurd”.

The legally binding 1962 treaty contains provisions that make clear Malaysia cannot unilaterally raise the water price anytime it wants.

In the past week, several of the president’s top aides have been targeted by protesters while dining, and his spokeswoman Sarah Sanders was asked to leave a restaurant in central Virginia over her views.

Now, the president has weighed in — and he’s not happy.

The billionaire president’s target? The Red Hen in Lexington, Virginia — a cozy 26-seat, farm-to-table establishment in a 19th century brick building specializing in the local cuisine of the Shenandoah Valley.

On Friday night, the owner asked Sanders and her party — who were already seated and eating a first course — to leave after some of the staff objected to her presence.

“I politely left,” Sanders tweeted, adding: “Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so.”

But Trump was not having it.

“The Red Hen Restaurant should focus more on cleaning its filthy canopies, doors and windows (badly needs a paint job) rather than refusing to serve a fine person like Sarah Huckabee Sanders,” he said early Monday.

“I always had a rule, if a restaurant is dirty on the outside, it is dirty on the inside!”

Beet risotto and immigrants

On its website, the Red Hen highlights its beet risotto, featuring “vegetables from Rancho Calixto, a family farm founded by immigrants from Mexico.”

Owner Stephanie Wilkinson said her principles had to come before profitability.

“I have a business, and I want the business to thrive,” Wilkinson told The Washington Post, adding that she felt she needed to make a stand against an “inhumane and unethical” administration.

“I explained (to Sanders) that the restaurant has certain standards that I feel it has to uphold, such as honesty, and compassion, and cooperation,” Wilkinson said.

Sanders was not the first to face a public backlash in her off hours.

Senior White House aide Stephen Miller was branded a “fascist” by one angry patron during a visit to a downtown Mexican restaurant.

And Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen made a quick exit when leftist protesters marched into another Mexican restaurant chanting “Shame!” She also confronted angry activists at her home in the suburb of Alexandria.

In a deeply polarized political climate, especially as an immigration crisis swirls on the border with Mexico, even their choice of restaurants was criticized, with many seeing Miller and Nielsen as especially tone deaf.

Red and blue plates?

Cue the protests and hand-wringing on both sides. The Red Hen is now the target of a conservative boycott, while Democrats are cheering.

Representative Maxine Waters urged her supporters to “show up wherever we have to show up” to protest Trump’s policies.

“If you see anybody from that cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd, and you push back on them, and you tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere,” she said.

Trump clapped back at her, using his regular insult that she is an “extraordinarily low IQ person” and accusing her of wishing his supporters harm.

“Be careful what you wish for Max!” he warned.

And Sanders added during her Monday briefing: “Healthy debate on ideas and political philosophy is important, but the calls for harassment and push for any Trump supporters to avoid the public is unacceptable.”

Some are drawing parallels to a recent US Supreme Court ruling that backed a Colorado baker who refused to design a wedding cake for a same-sex couple in order to protect his religious liberty.

“Some who defend baker’s right to refuse service to gay couples, whine re ppl refusing service to a person who’s the face of a deceitful Administration,” said conservative pundit — and harsh Trump critic — Ana Navarro.

“Difference is, being gay is not a choice. Being an accomplice to Trump, is.”

But not all Democrats are crying victory.

“Kind of amazed and appalled by the number of folks on Left who applauded the expulsion of @PressSec and her family from a restaurant,” said David Axelrod, a former top aide to Trump’s predecessor Barack Obama.

“This, in the end, is a triumph for @realDonaldTrump vision of America: Now we’re divided by red plates & blue plates! #sad.”

And in an editorial entitled “Let the Trump team eat in peace,” The Washington Post said the blurring of lines between public and private lives was worrying.

“It wasn’t the first time recently that strong political feelings have spilled into what used to be considered the private sphere,” it said.

“We understand the strength of the feelings, but we don’t think the spilling is a healthy development.”

“We all know there is a ridiculous moment at our border, but there are brutal, horrific life-killing moments at every shore in this globe,” the 60-year-old said at a Paris screening of a documentary on the Holocaust.

“As much as I don’t feel children should be separated from their parents at the Mexican-American border, nor do I think they should be dying on boats or at the shores on every other border around the globe,” said the star of “Basic Instinct”.

“This is a problem in every country of the world. Children are dying in boats, and dying on your shores… It’s a problem of lacking humanity, no matter where you are.”

Stone lamented “how terrorism is literally scaring the humanity out of us, how the terrorists are teaching us to turn our backs on each other”.

The comments came as Italy’s far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini paid a surprise visit to Tripoli on Monday in his fight to block migrants.

In the United States, President Donald Trump on Sunday reinforced his hardline stand on migrants despite an about-face on family separations that has seen more than 500 children reunited with relatives.

He said in a tweet that “we cannot allow all these people to invade our country”.

Stone was speaking to journalists at the end of the Paris Art and Movie Awards where she screened a short documentary “An Undeniable Voice” directed by Price Arana about Sam Harris, believed to be the youngest Holocaust survivor.

State Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Christina Liew explained they believe the tourists were unaware of the severity of their actions.

“But we want to identify and fine them so that we can explain that something they deemed as ‘fun’ was actually disrespectful and not right in Sabah, especially at places of worship,” she said yesterday.

Liew, who is Deputy Chief Minister, said the tour operator who had brought the tourists to the mosque would be fined.

“We want to remind and warn all tour operators to inform their customers to refrain from acting disrespectfully at holy sites, all places of worships and areas of sensitivity in Sabah,” Liew said.

On Sunday, a viral video clip showing two women, believed to be tourists, dancing and acting on the balustrade in front of the iconic building caused uproar among netizens.

In response, tourists have been temporarily barred from visiting the mosque.

Mosque chairman Jamal Sakaran said the incident was regrettable as tourists are usually briefed on the dos and don’ts of visiting the place of worship. “Our immediate action is to close this mosque to visitors.

All express buses, Grab cars and taxis are not allowed to bring tourists to the mosque compound,” he said in a statement on Sunday. He also said that the mosque management will also be hiring more people to guard the building and its compound.

The conflict began on June 25, 1950, when the North launched a massed invasion of the South, capturing Seoul three days later.

But Pyongyang has long accused the US of provoking the Korean War as part of a plan for global domination and blames it for the division of the peninsula, agreed between Moscow and Washington in the closing days of the Second World War.

The North’s tightly controlled official media are normally packed with anti-American invective on June 25, but 2018 proved to be a marked exception.

“Every year on this day, our army and people row the boat of memories, full of creed and determination to defend the nation,” a report carried by the state-run Rodong Sinmun read.

“What surprised the world even more was… our people’s solidarity to annihilate the enemy,” it added — without identifying the enemy by name in any of its coverage.

In stark contrast, all six pages of the newspaper last year were filled with colourful criticisms of the “US imperialists”, blaming Americans for “a holocaust in which they massacred countless Koreans in the most brutal and barbarous way”.

This year’s anniversary comes less than two weeks after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump shook hands at a historic and unprecedented summit in Singapore.

More virulent forms of anti-US propaganda have been disappearing from the streets of Pyongyang, while images of missile launches and military formations on a prominent site outside the city train station have been replaced with visuals of industry and agriculture.

Analysts say the rare omission of the US in North Korean media coverage of the anniversary may be part of the regime’s efforts to maintain the current diplomatic momentum.

“It’s remarkable,” said Peter Ward, a North Korea researcher at Seoul National University. “On this day of all days it’s nowhere to be found.”

“North Korean anti-Americanism may have popular roots (nourished by decades of agitprop), but what we see is what the state wants us to,” he added.

At their landmark Singapore talks, Trump and Kim signed a joint statement in which Pyongyang committed to “work toward complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula”.

But critics have said the encounter between the two mercurial leaders was more style than substance, producing a document short on details about the key issue of the North’s atomic weapons.

Hong Kong actor Julian Cheung Chilam had a blast shooting Herman Yau-helmed action thriller The Leakers, which was filmed in Penang a year ago.

Malaysians first discovered that the Hong Kong action thriller was being shot in George Town when video clips of car chase scenes at Campbell Road went viral last year.

In a phone interview from Hong Kong last week, the 46-year-old shared that although he was again portraying a law enforcement officer, it was very different from his usual cop roles.

In The Leakers, Cheung plays a Malaysian police inspector named Lee Weng Kan who is investigating a criminal case which takes him to Hong Kong.

His co-stars include Francis Ng who plays a Hong Kong cop, Kent Cheng who portrays a Malaysian pharmaceutical tycoon and Charmaine Sheh, Sam Lee, and Louis Cheung who play investigative journalists. Supporting acts include Chrissie Chau, Wilfred Lau, Michelle Wai and Dominic Lau.

Portraying a Malaysian for the first time, Cheung says he was not sure whether to appear fair or tanned when he was making the initial physical preparations for his role.

“I found that many of my Malaysian friends are actually fairer than me, so I tried to make my complexion a bit fairer,” the Hong Kong actor said.

“Initially, I went out to sun myself in order to look darker. Later, I realised when I didn’t have to be tanned, I started spending most of my time indoors to get fairer again!”

Although he prides himself on having a flair for languages, Cheung admitted that having to deliver his lines in Bahasa Malaysia was quite tough.

“Speaking in Malay was actually very challenging for me. There were quite a number of scenes of me speaking in Malay. But very few probably made the final cut. They were beyond comprehension, I can imagine,” he said.

“This being my first time speaking Malay, I had no idea what I was saying. Apparently, neither did the other actors whom I shared scenes with!

“The Malaysian actress playing the domestic helper got a bit confused when I delivered my lines in Malay.”

But his favourite part of shooting in Malaysia was getting to feast on durians.

“We became durian experts. We’ve eaten so many durians that we can even do blind tastings now. We know what durians we are eating even when blindfolded!” said Cheung with a laugh.

Cheung also expressed surprise that the durians in Penang are named after real people.

“In Penang, there are so many varieties of durians. Apart from Musang King, they have varieties such as Joan Lin (Jackie Chan’s wife), Wong Fei Hung and Aunt 13.

“Unfortunately, the Joan Lin variety was sold out, so we only got to try varieties such as Musang King, Sultan, and Red Prawn.

“We didn’t get to taste Centipede either, but we learnt a lot. Hopefully, one day I can also have durians named after me too!”

Canberra has pledged to step up efforts to protect the reef as it reels from mass coral bleaching and coral-eating crown-of-thorns starfish, which have proliferated due to pollution and agricultural runoff.

But the groups said the federal government had failed to stop a key threat to the World Heritage-list area — the impending bulldozing of large swathes of land in reef catchments.

Experts have warned that deforestation increases runoff into the reef, reducing water quality and the light needed for coral growth, while fuelling outbreaks of crown-of-thorns starfish.

In a letter to the United Nations, the Wilderness Society, WWF-Australia, the Australian Conservation Foundation and the Australian Marine Conservation Society called for an urgent investigation as the UNESCO World Heritage Committee’s annual meeting starts in Bahrain.

“Allowing this clearing to go ahead is not consistent with the promises the Australian government has made to the international community to protect and restore the Great Barrier Reef,” Australian Conservation Foundation chief Kelly O’Shanassy said in a statement.

The conservationists said some 36,600 hectares (90,000 acres) of old-growth forest — about half the size of Bahrain — was earmarked to be cut down in reef catchments under permits issued by the former Queensland state government, but that Canberra had the power to stop them from going ahead.

Environment Minister Josh Frydenberg refuted the allegations and said the responsibility for planning and approval of land clearing lay with states.

He added that Canberra had won “significant praise” from the UN for a Aus$2.0 billion (US$1.5 billion) “Reef 2050” plan to protect the reef.

“On top of this investment the… government has also invested an additional Aus$500 million, representing the single largest investment in reef protection and restoration in Australia’s history,” Frydenberg said in a statement to AFP.

The bulk of the new Aus$500 million funding — just over Aus$200 million — announced in April was earmarked to improve water quality by changing farming practices and adopting new technologies and land management.

UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee last year decided not to place the reef on its list of sites “in danger” despite concern over the mass bleaching, citing Canberra’s conservation plans.

The Great Barrier Reef is one of Australia’s best known natural wonders and stretches more than 2,300 kilometres (1,400 miles) along the northeastern coast.