A Thai immigration official has been transferred and an investigation launched following allegations of corruption. The officer is accused of demanding common bribes from an immigrant within the Hat Yai district of Songkhla, in southern Thailand. Officers from Immigration Division 6 have now launched an investigation into the claims. Secure insist the investigation will be clear and neutral, adding that if the officer is discovered responsible, he shall be punished accordingly.
The alleged corruption got here to mild on account of a recording printed by the anti-corruption Facebook web page, Strong Thailand. The sound clip is allegedly a conversation that took place between the immigration officer and an unnamed migrant, in which the officer asks about cash he says is owed to him.
According to a Nation Thailand report, the migrant can be heard answering that he is at present unable to pay, due to monetary hardship from Covid-19. The particular person alleged to be the immigration officer responds by threatening the man with arrest if he doesn’t pay.
Late final yr, immigration officials at border crossings were accused of inflicting a resurgence in Covid-19 as a end result of corrupt practices that allowed unlawful migrants to cross into Thailand for work within the central province of Samut Sakhon, where the second wave of the virus broke out..