Govt urged to allow boats carrying necessities to supply hard-hit IDP camp
Mae Hong Son province is asking the government to reopen a route for merchant boats, as 2,374 people in a camp for the internally displaced are short of food supplies.
Santipong Moonfong, chairperson of the Legal Status Network Foundation in the province, said that a camp of internally displaced persons (IDP) was in trouble because people there could not buy rice or groceries as all access on the borders have been closed.
He said the camp leader had told him they were seriously in need of food, medicines and other necessities after the checkpoint for border trade was closed three weeks ago. The camp houses 529 children.
Merchants who usually sold food and supplies by boats were now prohibited from continuing the business. The leader appealed for a change in the government’s directive that would allow merchant boats to stop near the camp at least once in a week.
Santipong said that he has sent a complaint letter to the Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administration in Mae Hong Son.
The solution is to let merchant boats sail on Salween River to transport rice and other supplies to the Thai border and distribute it to the camp.