TRAT - Five Cambodian sailors -- three on Koh Kut and two as they were fleeing to Koh Kong in Cambodia -- have been arrested over the alleged rape of two French tourists and assaulting their male compatriots.

The three detained on the resort island of Koh Kut were identified only as Yim, 25, Pai, 22, and Goen 25. They were arrested in a forested mountain area at Moo 5 village of Ban Ao Phrao in tambon Koh Kut between 4am and 5am on Sunday after a 50-strong force of marines, police and administrative officials supported by villagers sealed off their escape route...

...Border Patrol Police, defence volunteers and rescue workers formed a cordon around the five suspects as angry local residents tried to mob them.
One resident managed to reach one of the suspects and punched him before being hauled away.
The reenactment showed the five young men acted in two groups on Saturday night, one targeting a 57-year-old French woman and the other going for her 28-year-old female compatriot...

A statement signed by the [Cambodian Foreign ]minister ... said the men were drunk when they set upon the holidaymakers. It did not identify the men but said all five were under the age of 25 and poorly educated.

Cambodian Embassy staff “must find ways to help the five fishermen and provide a lawyer during court questioning” in Thailand, it added.
Chum Sounry, spokesman for the Foreign Affairs Ministry, said by telephone that the suspects were scheduled to be questioned at the Trat provincial court on Tuesday.
“It is not the first time Cambodians have gone to court in Thailand,” he said, explaining that the embassy in Bangkok employed a lawyer to handle such cases...

5 Cambodian fishermen jailed for brutal attack on French tourists in Thailand


BANGKOK (AFP) - A Thai court has sentenced five Cambodian fishermen to 50 years each for a violent 2016 attack on French tourists in which two women were raped, an official said on Monday (March 5).

The men were given the maximum allowable sentence on a raft of charges, including rape, following their arrest more than two years ago for the attack on the Thai island Koh Kut, also known as Koh Kood.

"All five defendants were found guilty of rape, light assault and serious assault," a court official in Thailand's Trat province told AFP, adding that they were also fined.

One was also convicted of attempted murder, said the official, who did not identify the defendants by name.

The secluded and underdeveloped island of Koh Kut is close to Thailand's eastern border with Cambodia, and police say the men swam to the beach to attack the group of four French holiday-goers at knife point in February 2016.

Two injured men escaped to alert authorities and the fishermen were arrested shortly afterwards.

While Thailand remains a safe destination with 35 million visitors last year, a number of gruesome, headline-grabbing crimes against foreigners have hurt the country's reputation as a tourist haven.

In 2015, two Myanmar migrant workers were sentenced to death for the 2014 murder of two British backpackers, one of whom was raped, on the diving island of Koh Tao after an investigation and trial that was widely criticised as unfair.

markd wrote: ↑Mon Mar 12, 2018 9:23 pm nothing ever surprises me when alcohol is involved