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The Hmong are also known as the Meo and they claim that they have their roots in the icy north. They had arrived in Laos by 1850 and by the end of the 19th century had migrated into the northern provinces of Thailand.

They value their independence and tend to live at high altitudes, away from other tribes. This independence and their association with poppy cultivation and their siding with the US during the Vietnam war has meant that of all the hilltribes it is the Hmong who have been most severely persecuted. Like most hilltribes, they practise shifting cultivation, moving their villages when the surrounding land has been exhausted. The process of moving is stretched out over two seasons; an advance party finds a suitable site, builds temporary shelters, clears the land and plants rice or maize. Only after the harvest do the rest of the inhabitants follow in their steps. They also raise animals and hunt and forage to supplement their diet. Opium poppies are the main cash crop.

Hmong villages tend not to be fenced, while their houses are built of wood or bamboo at ground level. Each house has a main living area, and two or three sleeping rooms. The extended family is headed by the oldest male; he settles family disputes and has supreme authority over family affairs. The Hmong are spirit worshippers and believe in household spirits. Every house has an altar, where protection for the household is sought. As animists, the Hmong believe everything from mountains and opium poppies to cluster bombs has a spirit — or phi — some good, some bad. Shamans or witchdoctors play a central role in village life and decision-making. The phi needs to be placated incessantly to ward off sickness and catastrophe. It is the shaman's job to exorcise the bad phi from his patients. Until modern medicines arrived along with the Americans, opium was the Hmong's only palliative drug.

The Hmong are the only tribe in Laos who make Batik; indigo-dyed batik makes up the main panel of their skirts with appliqué and embroidery added to it. The women also wear black legging from their knees to their ankles, black jackets (with embroidery), and a black panel or 'apron,' held in place with a cummerbund. Even the youngest children wear clothes of intricate design with exquisite needlework. Traditionally the cloth would have been woven by hand on a foot-treadle/back-strap loom; today it is increasingly purchased from markets. The White Hmong tend to wear less elaborate clothing from day to day, saving it for special occasions only. Hmong men wear loose-fitting black trousers, black jackets (sometimes embroidered), and coloured or embroidered sashes. The Hmong particularly value silver jewellery; it signifies wealth and a good life. Men, women and children wear silver tiers of neck rings, heavy silver chains with lock-shaped pendants, earrings and pointed rings on every finger. All the family jewellery is brought out at New Year (which normally takes place in December) and is an impressive sight, symbolising the wealth of the family. There are three main groups of Hmong Living in Laos — Black, White and Striped — and they are identifiable by their traditional dress and dialect.

Persecution of the Hmong
In the 19th century, Chinese opium farmers drove many thousands of Hmong off their poppy fields and forced them south into the mountains of Laos. They did not have a written language before contact with the Europeans and Americans and their heritage is preserved mainly by oral tradition. Until a few years ago, other Lao and the rest of the world knew the Hmong as the Meo. Unbeknown to any one except the Hmong, 'Meo' was a Chinese insult meaning 'barbarian' — conferred on them several millennia ago by Chinese who developed an intense dislike for the tribe. Returning from university in France in the mid-1970's, the Hmong's first highly qualified academic decided it was time to educate the world. Due to his prompting, the tribe was renamed Hmong, their word for 'mankind.'

The Lao Loum — the lowland Lao people — regard the Hmong as their cultural inferiors. These feelings are reciprocated and the Hmong have an inherent mistrust of the Lao Loum. In the dying days of the French administration in Laos, thousands of Hmong were recruited to help fight the Vietnamese communists and then later they were recruited and paid by the CIA to help fight the Pathet Lao and the Vietcong. An estimated 100,000 Hmong died during the war and when the war ended there was a mass exodus of Hmong and today more than 100,000 live in the US — mostly on the west coast and in Minnesota. They also fled into Thailand and thousands went to France too.

The details of the plight of the Hmong first came to light in June 2003 when two European journalists and their Lao guides visited the Hmong but were caught and arrested and sentenced to 15 to 20 years' imprisonment after a two hour trial. The Europeans were soon released (they were working for Time Asia) and the two Lao still in prison (a third escaped) were included in the 2003 and 2007 Greetings Card campaign. The Lao government appear to be hunting the Hmong to extinction.

Amnesty International Press Release in September 2004
AI reported that Lao forces had been raping, disembowelling and murdering Hmong children. It said that it had creditable evidence that "scores of civilians, mainly children, were killed by troops or later died from their injuries, lack of medical aid and starvation. In one incident up to 40 Lao soldiers were said to have been responsible for mutilating and killing five children aged from 13 to 16. Four of the victims, who were girls, were "apparently raped before being killed." The attacks, carried out three months prior, constituted war crimes and were violations of international humanitarian laws.

Back to the page about Thao Moua and Pa Fue Khang.