20 Myanmar migrants arrested in Hat Yai

Bangkok Post
ASSAWIN PAKKAWAN
6 JUN 2021

Twenty Myanmar nationals illegally entering Ranong from Kawthaung are arrested in Hat Yai district of Songkhla on Saturday. (Photo by Assawin Pakkawan)

SONGKHLA: Twenty Myanmar migrants were arrested in Hat Yai district on Saturday night, local media reported.

The arrests were made by a combined force of soldiers from the 5th Infantry Regiment, provincial and immigration police and administrative officials of Hat Yai district.

At about 8pm on Saturday, authorities searched a Bangkok-registered articulated lorry which stopped near Ban Rai village on Kanchanawanich road in tambon Ban Phru of Hat Yai district to pick up two Myanmar migrants. They found two other Myanmar migrants already in the lorry.

The Thai lorry driver, Hasdin Hasket, 67, was apprehended.

The authorities went on to search a forest near the road and found 16 Myanmar migrants hiding there. With them were two Myanmar guides identified as Thein Tan, 37, and Kyaw Thay, 27.

The 20 migrants, Mr Hasdin and the two guides were taken to Thung Lung police station in Hat Yai for questioning.

The two guides said they set off in Kawthaung, Myanmar, with 16 migrants about 20 days ago. The migrants had paid 15,000 baht each for an arranged trip. In Thailand, they travelled in pick-ups to wait in the forest in tambon Ban Phru of Hat Yai for further transportation across the border to Malaysia. However, the trip had been delayed as Malaysia was under lockdown from June 1-14.

As for the four migrants in the articulated lorry, the two guides said they had worked in Penang, Malaysia. They had slipped into Thailand and were being brought to to work at a factory in Sawi district, Chumphon province.

The 20 Myanmar migrants were charged with illegal entry and were to be deported after legal proceedings. The two Myanmar guides and Mr Hasdin were separately charged with human trafficking.

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