Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2009-02-05-Speech-4-204"
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"en.20090205.21.4-204"2
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"− Madam President, the brutal regime governing Burma has, for some time now, been causing thousands of civilians to leave that country in search of a more secure future and a better standard of living in neighbouring Thailand or, via Thailand, in other South-East Asian countries.
Amongst these destitute people are the indigenous Rohingya community of Western Burma who, in recent years, have been the victims of ethnic cleansing carried out by the Burmese Government. Unfortunately, the Thai authorities have not provided those refugees with the humanitarian assistance they so clearly deserve. Instead, it is reported that these people have been fiercely persecuted. We call on the Thai Government to respect the human rights of Burmese refugees and to treat them with respect, compassion, dignity and humanity.
This resolution also gives me the opportunity to deal with the issue of the 41-year-old Australian writer of Cypriot origin, Harry Nicolaides, who was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment in Thailand for allegedly insulting the country’s Royal Family in a novel he wrote in 2005. Mr Nicolaides was teaching English at a Thai university at the time, and in his novel he only makes an anonymous reference to a member of the Thai Royal Family, and the incriminated work is clearly fictitious.
During his trial, Mr Nicolaides was paraded in front of the international media in chains and told reporters that he had endured unspeakable suffering. Mr Nicolaides has apologised to the Thai Royal Family and has made an appeal for royal grace.
We believe that Mr Nicolaides has been subjected to enough punishment and ill-treatment by the Thai authorities, who have handled this case most insensitively and inappropriately, and we call on them, as well as the Royal Family, to effect Mr Nicolaides’ immediate release and return to his home in Australia. To not do so would be most unwise, pitiful and damaging to Thailand."@en1
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