Some history about the ex Vietnam Camp in Batam :
The Tragic Past of Galang Camp
Galang – The Island of Both Hope and Hell
Galang Island rests quietly in the calm sea, indistinguishable from thousands of other green Indonesian islands near the Equator south of Singapore. But for tens of thousands of Vietnamese “boat people,” the United Nations refugee camp on this island represented a single, thin ray of hope. For most of those who boarded small, rickety boats to escape Vietnam after the war in search of new and happier lives, Galang will not be what they hoped to find.
Laying a thick trail of oily diesel smoke low across the glassy sea, the noisy boat violates nature’s tranquility as it slices toward the wooden dock on this tiny, emerald isle. One would never suspect this forested point of land protruding unassumingly from the warm ocean was be home, at any one time, to nearly 20,000 desperate people who had no idea what their futures would hold. They risked everything in the belief that their new lives, or the lives they hoped to live someday in another country, would prove better than those they left behind.
The people who arrived on Galang already passed a difficult test. They rolled the dice on a dangerous ocean voyage and won. Many others lost that gamble. Pirates troll the seas in search of easy prey, and often find it. Many Vietnamese were robbed, killed or raped shortly after they gathered their meager possessions and set off in the cloak of darkness in search of freedom and opportunity. A small shrine on the island pays tribute to three women who, after suffering the humiliation of rape during their journey, took their own lives.
Statistics from United Nation shows that 850,000 refugees have settled in foreign nations, equal to that number are 850,000 victims, eternally resting along their journey to find freedom and happiness. There are many bitter tales to tell, on how the courage and faith brought the survivors to better living environment. At the same times, many forgotten souls who are the fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters and friends of the fortunate survivors, cannot make it, but rested in the remote forests or deep in the ocean bed.
This article means to pay tribute to the courageous souls, and not let this tragic history of humanity be forgotten.
How Galang Camp Came About
The Vietnamese refugee camp on Galang Island in Riau province of Batam, Indonesia, have many bitter tales to tell of the tragedy that befell countless victims of the conflict between two opposing ideologies at the peak of the Cold War.
More than 250,000 boat people who made the perilous trip to escape the war between communist North Vietnam, and first France, and then America in South Vietnam, may have arrived on this island as refugees. They left their country in wooden boats. Hundreds of refugees were packed like sardines in boats capable of carrying only around a dozen passengers. The first Vietnamese boat, carrying 24 refugees, reached West Bunguran in the Riau Islands on May 22, 1975. The refugees used as a guide the flames from an oilfield in Udang. They staked their lives to come to Galang, braving the huge waves of the South China Sea.
More and more refugees arrived that numbered as many as 250,000, housed in a number of different places: Air Baja, Tanjung Unggat and East Bintan. In 1979, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) took the responsibility of caring the refuggee and decided, after reaching an agreement with the Indonesian government, to setup a refugee camp on an 80-hectare site on Galang island. From then on, Galang Camp was born.
Situation Turned Bitter
With the funding given by UNHCR and other foreign humanitarian organizations, life was in order in Galang Camp until the number of refugees far exceeded the initial estimated number. Initially Galang was established at the end of the Vietnam war and built to house only a quarter of the population living there.
At that point, the United States had accepted 82,060. In 1991, Canada became home to 13,516 people, followed by Australia’s acceptance of 6,470. Other countries had not stretched their arms as widely. Japan accepted only 113 people. Spain, Italy, Argentina and Ireland took fewer than 20 each. Meanwhile, scores of people continued to arrive from the open sea on overloaded vessels. An additional 50 were being born in the camp each month.
The hardship for Galang refugees intensified as many nations strengthened their resolve not to accept any more boat people. Often, the overloaded boats arriving in countries throughout southeast Asia were simply pushed back out to sea.
The camp staff and U.N. workers had a very difficult job, beyond providing meager shelter, rations and minimal health care. They were to determine which of those people arriving would quality for refugee status and possible resettlement in other countries. In a way, they were burdened by the grave decision making of assigning life and death to them, literally. Under a small open-air shelter, the serious business of casting fates was being conducted. Each person was interviewed when arrived, soon determining whether an applicant’s qualifications for resettlement could be met – whether the individual was to be ‘screened in’ or ‘screened out.’
Those unable to prove themselves political refugees under United Nations definition – or with no close relatives in other countries to sponsor them – faced a bleak future. Some eventually returned to Vietnam, some remained for years in the camp, hoping against hope to someday be “saved.” That crucial decision made all the difference for tens of thousands of people. With the passage of time since the war, increasing numbers of applicants were found to be economic migrants, technically not refugees, and therefore they did not qualify for resettlement in the United States. The interview sometimes lasted more than an hour. Eighty percent of the time, in 1991, the decision rendered was unfavorable.
The Dark Moments in the Camp
Besides the future was doomed for most boat people in the camp, life was never easy, especially for the women. It was reported on the newspaper called South China Morning Post, June 6, 1993, titled “Terrorised in the Camp of Shame” how tormenting life was in Galang camp. The story goes like this:
"Twelve years ago, Ton, his sister and brother risked their lives to flee Vietnam in a small, overcrowded and leaky boat, reaching what they thought was safety after five harrowing days at sea. But the nightmare was only beginning.
For more than three months, Ton spent sleepless nights in the notorious Galang first asylum camp in northern Indonesia clutching his beautiful younger sister in terror. “I used to go to sleep hugging my sister, otherwise the Indonesian guards would pick her up and put her back three hours later,” Ton said, his face alive with emotion.
Based on interviews with former inmates of Galang, the Sunday Morning Post has pieced together a shocking and continuing story of widespread bribery, brutal beatings and sexual assault. Inmates identified one senior guard who abused women sexually and brutally beat men."
In the newspaper report, it was said that UNHCR representatives were instructed not to stay overnight in the camp. But it is at night when almost all the atrocities happen. “If you are beautiful then you are in trouble,” said Jin Ching Danh, 30. Women being raped and men got beaten up became a thing of common in the camp.
Over the years, at least 12 Galang inmates who had been screened out as economic migrants have tried to commit suicide. More trouble could lie ahead as the country winds down its refugee determination process and inmates realise they have no hope of resettling abroad.