The recent fatal shooting of a Cambodian dissident in Thailand, combined with possible deportations of Uyghur refugees has once again shone a spotlight on Bangkok's failure to protect dissidents and political refugees.

Former Cambodian lawmaker Lim Kimya was gunned down on January 7 in Thailand's capital. He had only arrived in Bangkok earlier that day on a bus from Cambodia.

Separately, there are reports of the Thai government preparing to send 48 Uyghurs who have been detained in Bangkok for over a decade back to China.

"Both Lim Kimya's killing and the current predicament of the Uyghurs show that (...) Thailand is not a safe place for refugees," Patrick Phongsathorn, a senior advocacy specialist for Fortify Rights, told DW.

The assassination of Lim Kimya and the alleged deportations are only the latest in the long line of violent or legally questionable incidents concerning migrants in Thailand.

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In November 2024, Thai authorities forcibly returned six opposition activists to Cambodia to face treason charges, despite them having a UN-recognized refugee status.

In mid-2024, Bangkok also arrested Y Quynh Bdap, a Vietnamese ethnic minority rights activist, following an extradition request from Hanoi.

A year earlier, Bounsuan Kitiyano, an exiled Lao political activist who also had UN refugee status, was killed in Thailand's northeastern Ubon Ratchathani province.

Thai authorities have also deported Uyghurs, a mostly Muslim ethnic group in China's northwestern province of........

© Deutsche Welle