<p>Prachatai talks to Jiraporn Laocharoenwong from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Faculty of Political Sciences, Chulalongkorn University, the anthropologist who started the project, and Nuankhanit Phromchanya, the director, about the making of the documentary &quot;Capital of Mae La&quot; and the idea of the myth of the nation, which turns refugees, who are citizens of the world like everyone else, into second-class citizens.</p>

<div><p>Last March, the Thai Immigration Police visited Henry&rsquo;s apartment six times. Henry is a Nigerian MBA student, with a valid student visa. &ldquo;They accosted me on my way to campus&rdquo;, he said. &ldquo;They went through my phone a couple of times during the harassment. They came into my room and searched through my wardrobes and desk drawers. They took photos of me and my room number&rdquo;. According to Henry, his room was &ldquo;ransacked&rdquo;. Henry&rsquo;s crime? He says it is simply being a black African. &ldquo;To me, this is nothing less than racism and harassment.&rdquo;</p></div><div>&nbsp;</div>

<div> <div> <div>On 5 January 2018, the Thai authorities detained Sam Sokha, a prominent labour activist, and deported her to Cambodia on 8 February. The incident has raised concerns among various human rights organisations that Hun Sen and the Thai military government are covertly making a deal on exchanging political refugees.&nbsp;</div> <div>&nbsp;</div> <div>The Thai and Cambodian government officials cooperated in arranging a hurried deportation of the activist. She was deported little more than a month after she was arrested. </div></div></div>

<p dir="ltr">Tens of thousands of migrant workers without proper documentation travelled back to their homelands or were fired by their employers who feared legal repercussion as soon as the Royal Decree on Managing the Work of Aliens B.E. 2560 (2017) went into effect on 23 June.</p> <p></p>