MIZORAM, India (AP) – Myanmar police officers who fled to India after saying they defied orders to shoot people protesting their country’s military coup are asking the Indian government not to send them back and grant them asylum for humanitarian reasons.
One of the policemen who sought refuge in a village in the state of Mizoram, in northeastern India, along the border with Myanmar, said he did not want to return to his country until the problems were resolved.
This officer and others who spoke to the Associated Press did so on condition of anonymity out of concern for the safety of family members who still live in Myanmar.
Another police officer who fled told the AP that the soldiers ordered them to “arrest, beat and torture the protesters” and that the police were always sent to the front whenever there was a protest. She said officials “had no choice” but to leave Myanmar.
The crackdown on security following the February 1 Myanmar coup forced many refugees to cross the border with India. Indian state and federal authorities have not provided figures, but some state ministers said the number could be in the hundreds. An Indian village has sheltered 34 policemen and a fireman who crossed the border into India in the past two weeks.
The AP was unable to independently verify allegations that they were forced to shoot demonstrators, although images and reports of the crackdown on security forces in Myanmar have shown increasing violence against civilians. More than 200 people have been killed by security forces since the coup.
The federal government of India and the state of Mizoram are at odds with the influx of refugees. Previously, the Mizoram government had allowed refugees to enter and provided them with food and shelter.
But last week, India’s Interior Ministry told four Indian states bordering Myanmar, including Mizoram, to take steps to prevent refugees from entering India, except for humanitarian reasons.
The ministry said the states were not allowed to grant refugee status to anyone entering Myanmar, as India is not a signatory to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention or its 1967 Protocol.
On Thursday, Mizoram’s top elected official, Zoramthanga, wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and said that “India cannot turn a blind eye” to the humanitarian crisis unfolding in her state.
Zoramthanga, who uses a name, wrote in the letter that the people of his state, who share ethnic ties with refugees from the Chin communities in Myanmar, “cannot remain indifferent to their situation”. He urged the federal government to review his order and allow refugees to enter India.
Earlier this month, Myanmar asked India to return the police who crossed the border. India shares a 1,643-kilometer (1,020-mile) border with Myanmar and is home to thousands of Myanmar refugees in different states.