Children of Norwegian fathers and Thai mothers in Thailand often end up as social losers. In many cases the Norwegian father is 30 or 40 years older than the mother. The risk of him dieing before the children have grown up is therefore high. The mothers are often left without enough money to take care of the children, writes the Norwegian Seamans Church in Pattaya.
Thai women who have had children with Norwegian men are often not well respected. Because there are no social security systems in Thailand to support widows or single mothers, the mothers do not have any economical possibilities to take properly care of the children when the father dies. Many of them choose to leave their children with their families and work as prostitutes. The children are often stigmatized as unwanted.
Because the children are Norwegian citizens, they have the right to receive social support from Norway but many of the Thai mothers are not aware of this. We might today be experiencing the beginning of a huge future problem warns The Norwegian Seamans Church in Pattaya. Therefore the Church has asked the Norwegian Minister for Equal rights to take action in order to help the Children a dignified life.
Today 228 Thai-Norwegian children are registered in Thailand. In total the number is estimated to be much higher.
