NAKHON SI THAMMARAT, Jan 12 — Police in this southern province on Sunday arrested two alleged Thai human traffickers and 98 Rohingyas Muslims from Myanmar, including many women and children who were in weak condition.
Police said three other alleged human traffickers escaped during the arrest.
The Rohingyas were being transported in five pickup trucks, police said, adding that the three alleged human traffickers who were drivers abandoned their vehicles and their passengers before fleeing.
The exhausted Rohingyas were sent to a hospital in Hua Sai district, police said. One girl died later, probably due to starvation and exhaustion.
The drivers picked eup the Rohingyas in the southern province of Phangnga and were sending them to Songkhla province.
They reportedly told police that they had been transporting Rohingyas in the deep South for a long time and were never before caught.
Many Rohingyas hav left their native Rakhine State on the western coast of Myanmar for fear of persecution.
Police in Hua Sai district said human trafficking gangs have now switched their escape route from the previous Andaman Coast to the opposite Gulf of Thailand in a bid to avoid police arrest. (MCOT online news)
