The US State Department has blocked the visa of an Akha woman who is married to a US NGO worker. Together they have four children who have US passports, age 5, 3 1/2, 2 and 8 months.
Newspaper Articles Continue to Report Akha Case Regarding Visa Discrimination
The Keizer Times of Keizer, Oregon, USA ran the following article about discrimination by the US State Department Against an Akha woman.
Our case with the Swiss Government regarding visas for the Akha to attend the UN continues.
BY SCOTTA CALLISTER
Of the Keizertimes
Keizer, Oregon
A Keizer man has run into delays and frustration as he tries to get his wife and four children out of Thailand.
Matthew McDaniel says that although his children have U.S. passports, officials are quietly blocking a visa petition submitted months ago for his wife, Michu Uaiyue, a member of the indigenous Akha hill people. He believes the reason is retribution for his activism on behalf of the Akha people.
"A woman from a mountain village who is married to a U.S. citizen and has four kids who have passports - What kind of security threat can she be?" McDaniel said.
McDaniel has enlisted the help of U.S. Congresswoman Darlene Hooley's office. Her staff was helpful in getting the children's passports processed, he said.
Congressional aide Misha Isaak said that confidentiality policies prevent him from discussing specific cases. However, McDaniel provided copies of three letters sent since April by Hooley to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office, relaying McDaniel's complaint about the delay in processing paperwork for his wife.
The most recent letter, dated June 20, noted that noted that a petition for her alien spousal visa was turned in at the California Service Center Jan. 12.
McDaniel said the agency's own timelines indicate that applications received at that time should have been processed long before now.
"It should be a standard case," he said.
Adding to his frustration is the fact that he has received no contact from the agency about the reason for the delay.
"It's been five months, and nothing," he said. "And you have no recourse."
The background
McDaniel traveled to Thailand in 1989 and was drawn to the plight of the hill people. Some 70,000 Akha live in remote areas of Thailand, where they have farmed for hundreds of years.
But in recent years, the Thai government has forced hill people from their homes in a grab for forest and farmland, McDaniel said. He said Thai government has imprisoned Akha men and left their families in poverty. Another threat comes in the efforts by missionaries to assimilate the Akha, obliterating their traditional culture in the name of education.
McDaniel said the persecution is possible because of the "interwoven" goals of the mission programs, the Thai government, and U.S. interests in Thailand.
McDaniel's activism began with simple first aid efforts, but grew into a quest to end what he sees as genocide. He presses his case through the Akha Heritage Foundation and has testified about the hill people's plight at the United Nations.
He was forced to leave Thailand in April 2004, but he says he will continue to fight for Akha rights.
The future
McDaniel said that as long as his wife and his children, who range in age from 8 months to 5 years, remain in Thailand, they are in danger. He noted that an Akha woman was shot and killed just a few weeks ago by government troops. The soldiers had run into a land mine earlier and apparently shot the woman out of anger about the incident, even though she wasn't involved, he said.
McDaniel said that while he worries about his family, the government's balk on the visa process won't silence his protests on behalf of the Akha people.
Earlier this year, he spoke before a U.N. panel in New York about the history of human rights violations in Thailand.
He also has spoken to groups elsewhere, including a recent community meeting in Salem. He encounters scant awareness of the plight of the Akha.
"It's really hard to get the story out about Thailand," he said.
Information about the hill tribes is posted on the foundation's website, www.akha.org. McDaniel also is distributing posters urging a boycott of Thai products and businesses until the persecution of the Akha ends.