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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Angkhana Neelapaijit is the Commissioner of the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand. She is also the wife of disappeared human rights lawyer Somchai Neelaphaijit. In March 2004, her husband was abducted in central Bangkok and never seen again whilst he was defending a group men from the South of Thailand who were arrested on terrorism charges and claimed they were tortured in police custody. The people involved were never charged with anything more than coercion and gang-robbery as the body of Somchai Neelaphaijit was never found.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Yupin Saja is a member of the Save Lahu group and a family member of Chaiyaphum Pasae who was shot dead at an army checkpoint in the province of Chiang Mai. For the last few years she has been forced to live in a safe house with her family as her village is deemed to dangerous for them to return to.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Chutima Chuenhuajai is a member of the Rak Ban Heang environmental group in Lampang Province, Thailand, who are fighting against the construction of a large open-pit coal mine.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Pornthip Hongchai is a local leader of the Khon Rak Ban Kerd Environmental Group in Loei Province, Thailand. For the last decade this community group has been fighting against a gold mine located around their village, that they allege has contaminated their water supply and affected their crops.
5 of 20
© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Chamnan Karam is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT). Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Wilai Buangoen is a member of the Rak Ban Heang environmental group in Lampang Province, Thailand, who are fighting against the construction of a large open-pit coal mine.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Nawa Chaoue is the co-founder of Save Lahu group, was the caretaker of Chaiyaphum Pasae who was shot dead at an army checkpoint, and a member of the Lahu Youth Protectors Group and Network of Indigenous Peoples in Thailand (NIPT).
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Janya Kaewsukhon is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT). Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Vipapon Chumbangmang is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT). Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
10 of 20
© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Jiraphan Ratchathani is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT). Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
11 of 20
© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Mai Chanta is a member of the Empower Foundation. For 8 years she has fought for the rights of sex workers as part of the foundation and in early 2017 she testified on the treatment of sex workers to a Committee of the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in Geneva.
12 of 20
© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Manee Chaisuwan is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT). Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Kunya Panmue is a member of the Empower Foundation. The name stands for "Education Means Protection of Women Engaged in Recreation" and also known as Centre for Sex Workers' Protection. It is a non-profit organization in Thailand that supports sex workers by offering free classes in language, health, law and pre-college education, as well as individual counselling. The organization also lobbies the government to extend regular labor protections to sex workers and to decriminalize sex work.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Oranuch Pholpinyo of the Esan Land Reform Network. She has worked with many communities facing eviction in the Northeast of Thailand advising them on their rights and how to present their testimonies to officials.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Bonraeng Promthong is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT).Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Rungnapa Torwat, member of the Esan Land Reform Network and villager in the middle of an attempt to forcibly evict her community from their land in Chaiyaphum Province.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Samai Mangta is a member of the Rak Nam Oum Group in Sakhon Nakhon Province who are objecting to several polluting industrial projects in the area of her community particularly a large sugar-cane processing plant.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Sopha Ngamsombat is a member of the Rak Ban Heang environmental group in Lampang Province, Thailand, who are fighting against the construction of a large open-pit coal mine.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Nang Kham Swe is a member of the Empower Foundation. The name stands for "Education Means Protection of Women Engaged in Recreation" and also known as Centre for Sex Workers' Protection. It is a non-profit organization in Thailand that supports sex workers by offering free classes in language, health, law and pre-college education, as well as individual counselling. The organization also lobbies the government to extend regular labor protections to sex workers and to decriminalize sex work.
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© 2021 Luke Duggleby
Watcharee Petpong is a member of the Southern Peasant Federation of Thailand (SPFT). Formed in 2008 but with its roots in a land reform movement that started in the early nineties in the province of Surat Thani, SPFT works on behalf of landless farmers to secure them land with which to farm. It’s very being rose from the inability of farmers to count on the Government to act independently or the companies in question to regulate themselves by following the laws.
Public Story
Sewing a Message
Credits:
luke duggleby
Date of Work:
10/01/18 - 11/01/18
Updated: 11/26/18
A community struggle against an outside entity is all consuming for those involved. They are the people of the land but are forced to use all their energy, time and money in repelling something that is not welcome by them for the gain of outsiders.
For such women human rights defenders living in remote communities there is very little space for expression. In fact, very little space exists for anything else outside the constant struggle and attempt to maintain some sort of normalcy in the family environment.
So, when you give the opportunity to such women and ask them to try to illustrate their life experiences the results can be remarkable. That’s exactly what happened when the human rights NGO Protection International with funding from the Canadian Embassy in Bangkok selected 20 Thai women human rights defenders from around Thailand and asked them to produce small quilts that illustrate their life, their stories and their struggles.
The idea was inspired by the colourful, three-dimensional quilts known as arpilleras produced in South America. Arpilleras became particularly significant when made by groups of women (also known as arpilleristas) in Chile during the military dictatorship (1973–90) of Augusto Pinochet where they depicted scenes of hardship and violence that the many women experienced during the dictatorship due to impoverished living conditions and government repression.
Not only does this activity produce a hand-made testimony of atrocities, and a shared space for expression, but it also strengthens bonds between themselves and others in a similar situation.