Thai authorities intercept illegal immigrants

BANGKOK, April 25 (TNA) - Thai authorities have intercepted two groups of illegal immigrants and arrested six people charged with trafficking dozens of illegal Myanmar workers into the Kingdom. The Thai authorities arrested the six people in Ramintra area on the outskirts of Bangkok on Friday, when they were about to send 66 illegal migrant workers from Myanmar to factories and houses in the capital and surrounding provinces. The six-member ring had taken the 66 illegal Myanmar immigrants from Mae Sot District of Thailand's northwestern Tak Province bordering Myanmar. In Sa Kaeo Province in the Thai East, bordering Cambodia, Thai soldiers of the Burapa Task Force intercepted a group of 16 illegal immigrants, comprising men, women and children, who were travelling by a pickup truck from a border area. An initial probe found that the arrested people are ethnic Muslim Uighurs who were travelling to Malaysia without legal entry documents. All were then sent to local police for prosecution on charge of illegal entering into Thailand. Meanwhile, at least seven Cambodian illegal immigrants died in a road accident on early Friday morning in Chonburi Province in the Thai East, after a pickup truck carrying 14 illegal Cambodian immigrants skid off a road, hit a tree and landed upside down on the side of the Ban Bueng–Klaeng Road in Chonburi’s Nong Sua Chang Sub-district. Local police investigators and rescue officers who rushed to the scene said seven Cambodians riding in the back of the truck were all killed, while seven others and the pickup driver were injured and sent to a nearby hospital. A tyre explosion was initially assumed to be the cause of the accident, after the driver speedily escaped a police checkpoint while taking the 14 illegal Cambodian immigrants from Sa Kaeo to work in adjacent Rayong Province. (TNA)