But this week, the first of 5,000 refugees from Bhutan arrived in Canada, offering a reminder of the dark side of the country’s recent history. The refugees — ethnic Nepalese and mostly Hindu — were effectively forced out of Bhutan by that same, Buddhist royal family almost 20 years ago and have been languishing in camps in Nepal ever since.

Their unusual story has continued with the Canadian resettlement offer. Some Bhutanese refugees believe no one should leave the camps until their homeland lets them return and, as part of a sometimes violent internal dispute, have spread misinformation about Canada to discourage immigration here.

Prospective migrants have even been told they will be forced into labour camps in the Arctic if they move to Canada.

“There are lots of rumours circulating,” said Yogendra Shakya of Access Alliance, a Toronto-based social service agency, who visited some of the camps in August. “I was asked a lot ‘Is it true that Canada is so cold that you can’t have children there, and that’s why they want us to go there?’ ”

The resettlement program is also part of a new approach by the federal government to sponsor large groups of refugees en masse. In support of the project, Citizenship and Immigration Canada this month put out a $1.3-million contract to conduct advance health screening of the Bhutanese coming to Canada and provide treatment for tuberculosis and other conditions if necessary before they relocate.

Refugee sagas usually begin with an infamously despotic leader, or with years of war and strife. This one unfolded differently. Jigme Singye Wangchuck, Bhutan’s king until recently, has been widely praised for lifting his people from near-medieval conditions, beefing up public education and health care and opening the window to the outside world. He also promoted Gross National Happiness, a creed which holds that material wealth should not come at the expense of spiritual wellbeing, the environment or culture.

Two years ago, the hugely popular king converted Bhutan into the world’s newest democracy and abdicated in favour of his Western-educated son. Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck was crowned just last month, earning glowing press coverage as a handsome and charismatic monarch of the people.

Almost forgotten was a period in the late 1980s and early 1990s when more than 100,000 Bhutanese of Nepalese origin — a sixth of the population — departed the country, leaving Bhutan largely to the majority Kruk people.

According to a 2006 article by the UNHCR, the United Nations’ refugee agency, “tens of thousands” were evicted, often after being made to sign “voluntary” migration certificates. An Immigration Canada spokeswoman said the camps’ residents were “forced” to leave Bhutan, while a 2007 Human Rights Watch report states that most, if not all, the refugees in Nepal have a right under international law to return to Bhutan.

A spokesman for the Bhutanese government, however, argued on Tuesday that few of the refugees are actually from his country, suggesting that many impoverished residents of the region settled in the camps to take advantage of services funded by the international community.

Bhutan has no ill feelings toward its remaining Nepalese minority, with some even serving now as cabinet ministers, added Tshewang Dorji, counsellor with Bhutan’s mission to the UN.

“Nobody was forced to leave … The government didn’t want the [ethnic Nepalese] people to leave,” he insisted. “People who have ill feelings toward Bhutan have blown this issue out of proportion.”

Regardless, repeated efforts to win the refugees’ repatriation failed, until eventually a group of seven Western countries, including the United States, Australia and Britain, agreed to accept about 70,000 of them. Canada is taking 5,000 over the next five years.

And yet the humanitarian offer met some stiff resistance in the camps, with certain groups fearing that mass resettlement would spell the end of their efforts to get back to Bhutan itself.

“There have been fairly organized efforts to discourage migration,” said Janet Dench, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees. Word spread, for instance, that refugees who ended up here “would have to work at camps at the north pole,” she said.

To try to set the record straight, Canada has distributed leaflets with accurate information about this country, and is further briefing those selected to come here, said Danielle Norris, an Immigration Canada spokeswoman.

The years of living in refugee camps, unable to officially work to support themselves, has taken its toll on the displaced Bhutanese, said Mr. Shakya, who is of Nepalese origin himself. “Depression, stress is very, very common in the camps,” he said.

And yet, he said the refugees have strived to make the most of their grim predicament. Levels of education are higher than in the Nepalese population outside the camps, and many speak fluent English, he said.

Lately, it seems the refugees have also come around to the idea of setting down roots in the West, with many believing they can continue to fight for return to Bhutan from their new homes, said Mr. Shakya.

Bhutanese refugees tell dark side of Himalayan kingdom

“I have a question,” Gautam says, holding up a bottle of shampoo. “Do I put this in my hair before going in the shower or after?”

Gautam, 19, his parents and his two siblings are among the first of about 5,300 ethnic Nepalese refugees from the tiny south Asian country of Bhutan who this year started leaving refugee camps to resettle in the United States. The U.S. has agreed to take in 60,000 of them.

Unlike other, high-profile refugee groups such as Iraqis and Burmese, the ethnic Nepalese have gone largely unnoticed. Since there are no Bhutanese communities in the United States, most are being resettled near cities like Pittsburgh, where housing is affordable and officials hope diverse populations will reinvigorate urban areas hurt by deindustrialization.

Charitable organizations responsible for resettlement get the families apartments, food, Social Security cards and English classes, and help them find jobs. After three months, the families will have to provide for themselves, usually working minimum wage jobs.

Bhutan is a predominantly Buddhist constitutional monarchy bordered by China and India. In the early 1990s, the monarchy instituted sweeping legislation that effectively stripped the ethnic Nepalese, a Hindu minority also known as the Lhotsampas, of their citizenship, their right to own property and their ability to get government jobs.

Since then, an estimated 100,000 ethnic Nepalis have fled to refugee camps.

Bhutan has significantly opened up in recent years, embracing democratic freedoms and coronating a young king on Nov. 1. Nevertheless, the tiny Himalayan kingdom remains tightly controlled. Traditional robes and colored sashes indicating class rank are mandatory and only 20,000 foreigners are permitted to enter the country annually on supervised trips.

Like most others in Bhutan, the Gautams were farmers. Chitra Prassad Gautam and his sister, Uma, 17, were born in Bhutan. Their younger brother, Raju, 15, is part of the generation born in refugee camps in Nepal. They were educated in schools run by the United Nations, an education that gives these children an advantage over their parents, many of whom are not even literate in their native Nepalese.

In 1992, the Gautams moved into a one-room, dirt-floored hut in a camp about 25 miles from the Nepalese city of Damak. They often had to wait in line for hours to fill two cans with water. They shared a latrine with another family and bathed in a river.

But now they are in their new apartment in the Pittsburgh suburb of Castle Shannon. They have suddenly had to adapt to running water, indoor toilets, carpeting, closets, a refrigerator, electric sweepers and clock radios — because, as their caseworker explains, promptness is important in America.

“I’ve never seen a house like this,” Gautam said when caseworker Molly Ferra took them through the three-bedroom unit, showing them the small kitchen already furnished with bags of rice, tea, hot pepper sauce and a box of pots and pans.

She explained the use of the refrigerator and freezer to Gautam, the only member of the family who speaks English. “Very cold,” Gautam noted of the freezer.

Although life in the United States is far easier, some of the refugees do not want to leave the camps.

“Most of us want to return to Bhutan because we love our country and our roots,” D.P. Kafle, a resident of one of the camps, said in an interview in Nepal. “We are patriotic Bhutanese and there is no way we will go anywhere else.”

However, Larry Yungk, a senior resettlement officer with the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said 55,000 refugees from Bhutan have already signed up for relocation.

Norm-Anne Rothermel, Pennsylvania’s refugee coordinator in the Department of Public Welfare, said most cities are eager to take in the ethnic Nepalese.

“Refugees are excellent workers,” she said. “They do not want government assistance … all they want is a fresh start, so it’s a win-win situation when it comes to refugees.”

Mark Hetfield, senior vice president for programs and policy at the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, said his group has settled 117 refugees from Bhutan this year and expects to double the number in 2009. HIAS is focusing its Bhutanese program on Charlotte, N.C.; Springfield, Mass.; Columbus and Cleveland, Ohio. Some will likely be resettled in Pittsburgh as well.

“There is no well-established Bhutanese populations in the U.S., so it is better to put them in places where housing is affordable and they could have the opportunity to buy a house in a few years,” he said.

Despite the refugees’ struggles with the language barrier, bureaucracy, job hunting and learning to live with modern amenities, Gautam had a question about something that to him seemed equally basic.

“A computer, will we get a computer?” he asked the caseworker. “I need the Internet to send e-mail to my teacher.” — his U.N.-run school had Internet access.

Ferra told him the family will receive a TV but they will have to purchase their own computer. At the library, she explained, they can access the Internet.

“Yes, the library,” Gautam says grinning. “My teacher told me I can get a card and use for free.”

The Associated Press:

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