US to accept Myanmar refugees

A 22-year-old Karen hill tribe woman cleans the ring around the neck of her mother at a village near Mae Hong Son province, north of Bangkok in this picture taken September 7, 2006. For the past two decades, hundreds of ethnic Padaung "long-neck" people from military-ruled Myanmar have enjoyed relative peace and security as refugees in the hills of northern Thailand.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has waived a provision of the Patriot Act to allow thousands of refugees from Myanmar's Chin state to be considered for asylum in the US.

Strict laws passed after the 11 September 2001 attacks prevent people who have provided "material support" to armed groups from resettling in the US. Many Chin refugees had provided such help to rebel groups such as the Chin National Front and Chin National Army. The majority of Chin refugees from Burma live in camps in Malaysia, Thailand and India.

Washington has already issued similar exemptions for Burma's Karen people, who were in a similar situation.

"Exercising the exemption authority allows the US to resume significant processing of the thousands of extremely vulnerable ethnic Chin refugees living in Malaysia and elsewhere," the US State Department said in a statement. But it added that the applicants must meet other eligibility requirements for resettlement, "including that they pose no danger to the safety and security of the United States."

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