BANGKOK, Aug 5 (TNA) — Thailand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) is seeking help from Somalia and an international organization to rescue many Thai fishing crewmen abandoned in the sea.
MFA spokesperson Busadee Santipitaks said on Monday that the Consular Affairs Department and the Thai embassy in Nairobi were asking Somalian authorities and the International Organization for Migration to help Thai fishing workers off the Bosaso coast of Somalia.
The Thai workers had been lured into working in the Somalian fishing industry only to finally find that they would not receive a wage for their work over the past five months. They were left aboard two fishing boats. They could have only one meal a day as they were running out of food, water and petrol.
Their distress was made known when a fishing worker from Buri Ram province made a video call from his abandoned boat to a friend who worked in Phuket. About 50 Thai fishing workers were left desperately on two trawlers and 18 of them were from Lahan Sai district of Buri Ram. About 10 workers from other countries were with them, waiting for help in the Somalian sea. (TNA)
