UN help sought to protect 220 Uighurs
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United Nations refugee officials and rights organisations are set to take care of a group of 220 people smuggled to Songkhla on Wednesday, who have been found to be Uighurs who fled Xinjiang, the mainly Muslim province in western China, Human Rights Watch
The group was on their way to Turkey through Malaysia, he said. Efforts were underway to try to verify reports that their passports were seized by smugglers based in Malaysia.
Police and Thai officials were initially unsure what nationality of the group was. They were first thought to be Turks, or Kurds or Arabs.
The Chinese embassy has coordinated with immigration police on obtaining information from the group, which consists of 78 men, 60 women and 82 children.
The Nation
