Myanmar 'slave' crews rescued from Chon Buri boats
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A team of Department of Special Investigation (DSI) officials rescued 11 Myanmar workers who were forced to work on a fishing boat 20 hours per day for a mere Bt30 a day, DSI chief Tarit Pengdith said recently.
Following complaints from the Labour Rights Promotion Network Foundation, the DSI team, along with Area 2 Provincial Police and the coastguard, raided two boats in Tambon Saem San in Chon Buri’s Sattahip district.
They also arrested three Myanmarese suspects, aged 15, 21 and 35, on a charge of forcing the victims to work with threats and assault.
Each worker was reportedly made to work 20 hours a day for 10 days in return for Bt300, with the rest of their payment confiscated to repay their “debt”. The trafficked workers were given seven months to repay the Bt23,000 per head that the suspects had paid a Myanmar trafficking agent.
Tharit said Wednesday the DSI was also on the trail of human-trafficking gangs that lured foreign youths to sell their labour or serve as sex workers in Thailand.
Pol Lt Col Paisit Sangkhahapong, head of the DSI anti-human trafficking centre, said gangs were smuggling foreign workers into a northern province before moving them south to Sattahip and other locations for hard labour, usually in the fishing industry.
