156 illegal Cambodian immigrants nabbed in Thai East

SA KEAO, THAILAND, October 2 (TNA) – Police in Thailand’s eastern Sa Keao province has captured 156 illegal Cambodian immigrants while they were to depart to work in the country’s capital of Bangkok. Signaled by intelligence reports that numerous illegal Cambodian workers were hiding out in shop-houses behind Dejthai Market opposite the Rong Klue Market near the Aranyaprathet border crossing, the provincial police along with other concerned agencies moved in Tuesday to make the arrests of the illegal immigrants. The police found, in the almost 200 rooms of the shop-houses, 156 illegal Cambodian workers, 15 of whom were children. The illegal immigrants were then taken to the Klong Leuk Police Station for further questioning. According to the Cambodian workers, they were from many provinces of Cambodia and had been trafficked into Thailand through the Aranyaprathet border checkpoint by a Cambodian middleman. They were to wait at the shop-houses to be picked up and moved to Bangkok for work, in which they had to pay 2,500 baht each for an overhead cost. The police plans to prosecute the illegal Cambodian workers for illegally entering Thailand and expatriate them back to Cambodia. (TNA)