Panel Discussion: Fragmented Aid & Resistance along the India–Myanmar-Thailand Borders

Описание: This discussion built on findings from extensive fieldwork in Mizoram and Delhi, offering a window into the realities faced by Myanmar’s refugee and resistance communities as they navigate fragmented support systems, legal precarity, and repression in exile.

Our panel explored how the politics of borders shape humanitarian access, protection, and organizing spaces — comparing the India–Myanmar and Thai–Myanmar borderlands. While Thailand’s border has long served as a base for civil society organizing, India’s northeast presents a more fragmented and constrained environment.

Key themes included:
• Cross-border solidarity, donor engagement, and grassroots support networks.
• Tensions between formal and informal systems of aid and refugee identity.
• Lessons from Myanmar’s borderlands for global humanitarian action in complex political contexts.

Thank you to all who joined us for this conversation and to the frontline researchers and analysts who shared their insights.

The panel took place at Brick X @ NSP in Science and Technology Park, Chiang Mai University on September 16 and co-hosted in partnership between Exile Hub & digi-cnx, and School of Public Policy, Chiang Mai University.


The panel was moderated by Lotty (Exile Hub) with the following speakers:

Yucca Wai the lead researcher of the paper and Program Director at Exile Hub. Her work focuses on documenting the lived realities of Myanmar’s resistance networks and displaced communities in exile, with a focus on humanitarian response, civil society resilience, and evidence-based advocacy. She brings experience working at the intersections of activism, research, and grassroots organizing.

Sirada Khemanitthathai
Dr. Sirada Khemanitthathai is a lecturer at School of International Affairs, Faculty of Political Science and Public Administration, Chiang Mai University. She also currently serves as a Research Chair on Forced Displacement in Southeast Asia at the Regional Center for Social Science and Sustainable Development (RCSD). She graduated with a PhD in Politics and
International Studies from SOAS, University of London. Her research interests include the contemporary politics of Myanmar, human rights in International Relations, and the politics of international migration. Her ongoing research projects are related to border security at Myanmar-Thailand border after the 2021 coup and internationalization of Myanmar’s political crisis, especially migration from Myanmar.


Hayso Thako
Hayso Thako is a post-doctoral researcher based at Chiang Mai University in Thailand. He has been working with the refugee community in Thai-Burmese border since 2015. He was former chair of Karen Peace Support Network and currently serves as technical assistant to
Karen Refugee Committee (KRC) and member of Asia Pacific Network of Refugee (APNOR). His latest publication is Schooling, Identity and Nationhood: Karen Mother-Tongue-Based Education in the Thai-Burmese Border Region.

June Nilian Sang
June Nilian Sang is a conflict and political analyst on Myanmar, in particular the country’s north-west and India-Myanmar Border. He holds a Master of Social Science degree from Chiang Mai University, and built a background in academic research and local journalism. June has over ten years of experience in observing Myanmar’s peace and conflict. He worked with peace negotiators from Myanmar’s ethnic revolutionary organisations, delivering technical support to the office of the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement signatory groups between 2019-2022. He continues to engage in facilitation work with the Chin stakeholders while delivering regular analysis on conflict and political issues in Myanmar’s north-western border region