by Our Foreign Desk

THAI police announced the arrest of officials yesterday and launched investigations into 50 of their own officers over people trafficking.

At an urgent meeting of senior officers in the capital Bangkok, police chief General Somyot Poompanmoung admitted that members of his force had colluded with brutal gangs smuggling immigrants from neighbouring Myanmar and Bangladesh.

He warned corrupt officers: “If you are still neglecting or involved with or supporting or benefiting from human-trafficking networks, your heads will roll.

“I have warned, but you didn’t listen. I have warned, but you still did it.”Gen Poompanmoung acknowledged that previous pledges to root out corruption had come to nought but claimed: “This time it will be different,” as the world was watching.

Last week police exhumed two dozen bodies from shallow graves at migrant-smuggling camps in the southern mountains.

Since then more people-trafficking camps have been discovered in the jungle and the number of dead has risen to 33.

Some 96 neglected and hungry immigrants have been found in other camps on Khao Kaew mountain, near Padang Besar in southern Songkla province, since Thursday.

Traffickers have reportedly held migrants captive while demanding ransoms from their relatives.

Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chanocha, head of the military government, called on Malaysia and Myanmar to help control the traffickers, saying Thailand could not solve the problem alone. He repeated his promise to prosecute any officials linked to the syndicates.

Eight people, mostly local officials and police, have already been arrested on suspicion of aiding the gangs, including Padang Besar Mayor Banjong Pongphon.Gen Poompanmoung said that the mayor was a “key suspect” who has “wielded great influence” in the region during his 10 years in office.

Mr Pongphon denied charges of human trafficking, helping illegal aliens entering the country, detention and ransom.

The day before his arrest, he joined a march in Padang Besar that united hundreds of people in calls to oppose human trafficking.