A Struggle To Live (new edit)

STORY SUMMARY: As the military junta continues in Myanmar, many lives unfold under the climate of fear. The Chins are an ethnic minority group that fled oppression into Thailand, then into Malaysia, another dead end. The country is an Islamic state and has not signed the 1951 Geneva Convention. In 2006, according to the United Nations, there were approximately 23,000 ethnic Chin refugees in Malaysia and only 6,000 registered. This number is increasing and refugee registration is only based on availability. Because refugees and asylum seekers are not recognized in the country, the Chins are left to fend themselves as illegal immigrants and lesser human beings hiding in remote jungles and urban areas, facing threats of detention, exploitation, whipping and deportation. Isolated from basic necessities and infrastructures, the Chins pull together as a community to live. For the Chins, it is a struggle to live as they pull together as a people. (Photographs by Marcus Yam)