Over 200,000 Cambodian migrants leave Thailand as junta rounds up illegal foreign workers

PHNOM PENH, June 16 (Xinhua) -- More than 200,000 Cambodian migrant workers have been either deported from or fled Thailand since early this month in the wake of a junta-led clampdown on illegal migrant laborers, Major General Pich Vanna, chief of Cambodia-Thailand Border Relation Affairs Office, said Monday.

"As of Monday evening, more than 200,000 Cambodian workers have been repatriated from Thailand," he told Xinhua over telephone, adding that the figures were collected from all seven border checkpoints along the Cambodia-Thailand border.

He estimated that nearly 400,000 Cambodian workers have been working legally or illegally in Thailand.

"Many more will be returned to Cambodia in coming days," he said.

Hundreds of military trucks and buses are still standing by to bring those workers back to their hometowns "free of charge" as local authorities and charitable organizations have provided them with food and water, he said.

Cambodian Minister of Labor Ith Samheng estimated Monday that only more than 200,000 Cambodian laborers, including 80,000 legal migrant workers, are working in Thailand.

"We calculated that Cambodian migrant laborers working in Thailand had sent home about 200 million U.S. dollars every year," he told reporters.

The minister said in order to assist those returnees to find new jobs in Cambodia, the Ministry of Labor has been running advertisements in newspapers and broadcasting on televisions with phone numbers, so returnees can call to apply for new jobs or register for vocational training programs.

"Currently, there are a lot of employment opportunities in Cambodia in the sectors of industry, construction, tourism and agro-industry," he said. "If workers do not have skills, the ministry's 38 vocational schools will offer them training courses free of charge."

Koy Kuong, the spokesman for the Cambodian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said last week that the massive deportation was due to the Thai military coup, which forced factories and enterprises to stop using illegal foreign workers.

Editor: Luan

Ruling Thai military dismisses rumored plans to repel Indochinese migrant workers

English.news.cn   2014-06-16 18:48:09

BANGKOK, June 16 (Xinhua) -- The ruling Thai military on Monday dismissed rumors that they are currently cracking down on Indochinese migrant workers who may have been employed in Thailand, many of whom have already returned home.

Assistant army chief Gen Sirichai Dithakul, who concurrently heads a Coordinating Subcommittee on Foreign Workers Administration, said the National Council for Peace and Order, the official name of the military junta who staged the May 22 coup, had had no policy to drive back alien workers, especially those who had come from Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia, but was merely working on measures to keep them under control and abiding by the law.

"The rumors that the authorities had been instructed to crack down on alien workers were categorically groundless. In fact, the Policy Committee on Foreign Workers Administration is yet to set a major policy for that matter," said Gen Sirichai, referring to the ad hoc panel headed by supreme commander Gen Thanasak Patimaprakorn.

More than 130,000 Cambodian migrants have reportedly scrambled across the Thai-Cambodian border from Aranyaprathet to Poi Pet inside the Indochinese state amidst unconfirmed hearsay that the Thai authorities would shortly arrest them at varied workplaces in Thai territory and finally deport them out, following the military coup which overthrew a civilian government said to have been close and cordial to the Cambodian government headed by Prime Minister Hun Sen.

An exodus of many more Cambodian migrants from Thailand is widely speculated amidst unconfirmed rumors that all the Thai- Cambodian cross-border checkpoints might be closed shortly.

Gen Sirichai, who visited Samut Sakorn province on the southwestern outskirts of the Thai capital where an estimated 400, 000 Myanmar migrants are currently employed, about half of whom in illegal fashion, said the Indochinese workers will be duly taken care of under Thai law and need not panic or scramble back home.

Deputy army spokesman Col Winthai Suvaree said all foreign workers, either legally or illegally employed, will be taken care of under humanitarian and internationally-recognized procedures.

He categorically dismissed speculation that the alien workers will be quickly repelled to their native countries neighboring Thailand.

"The National Council for Peace and Order has had no policy to drive back any foreign workers but problems pertaining to the illegal employments and abuses of alien labor have remained unresolved since the past decade. So the authorities are yet to take legal measures to keep those foreign employees under control and abiding by the law.

"Besides, they will be given health care and other humanitarian aid not only for their own sake but for the sustainable interests of their employers and national economy," said the colonel.

There are an estimated 2 million Indochinese workers currently hired, either in legal or illegal fashion, at varied factories, restaurants and other workplaces throughout Thailand, according to labor officials.

Under the Thai law, Indochinese migrants may be legally employed as unskilled workers at manufacturing factories and fishing industry or as waiters or waitresses at restaurants and foodshops.

Editor: Luan