Cambodian monks arrested for ‘inappropriate’ conduct
Chon Buri Immigration Police rounded up six Cambodian monks on Wednesday following public complaints that they allegedly asked some women to sell to construction workers the food they had obtained from alms collecting.
Chon Buri Immigration superintendent Pol Colonel Songprod Sirisuk led police officers to surround a wooded area in Soi Nong Hin 2 in Tambon Nong Preu where the monks with “inappropriate” conduct were camping.
Officers apprehended the six Cambodian monks at their makeshift hut. Although the monks could show their Buddhist monk identification cards, they didn’t have passports, so police deemed them as having illegally entered the country.
Police took them to Wat Thamsamakkhee in Southern Pattaya, where they were defrocked, before taken them into custody to face the illegal entry charge. They would then be deported, Songprod said.
The operation stemmed from public complaints that the Cambodian monks stayed at a makeshift hut in the woods – which was inappropriate, as monks would normally stay at a temple – and had food offered to them as alms re-sold to construction workers, Songprod said.
