Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – Eleven Burmese refugees injured in a car accident while they were travelling to a course to prepare for the United States as part of a resettlement programme have recovered sufficiently to leave Thailand by next week, a refugee agency said.

More than 30 Burmese refugees from Mae La Oo refugee camp on the Thai-Burmese border were on their way to Mae Sot on May 26 to learn American lifestyle and language skills when one of their cars had a head-on collision with a pick-up truck.

The eleven refugees were treated at Mae Sot hospital and the two Thai nationals on the pick-up truck were critically injured.

They were supposed to leave Thailand for the US in refugee resettlement programme on June 3 and were going to Mae Sot on that day to attend a one-week training course arranged by the International Organisation for Migration.

“I was very worried about our journey to the US when we had the accident. I felt happy only after knowing about our training that night”, Maria, 17, one of the injured, said.

About 90 refugees from Mae La Oo and Mae La Moe refugee camps are attending orientation training for their resettlement in the US.

Mae La Oo refugee camp had more than 18,000 refugees, most of whom are Karen. They left Burma from their homes in Taungoo and Papon districts after civil war flared up, Karen Refugee Committee chairman Robert Htwe told Mizzima.

More than 130,000 refugees were taking refuge in seven camps along the Thai-Burmese border contiguous with Karen State in Burma. About 50,000 refugees had left for third-party countries in the resettlement programme from 2006 to last year, he said.