The suspects reportedly confessed to the murders, saying they were hired by an influential Laotian woman identified only as “Nang” to kill the victims in exchange for a payment of Bt400,000, Kalasin police chief Pol Maj-General Apichit Thianphermpoon told a press conference yesterday.

The bodies of Kong Phomsalee, 40, and Jansamon Sensakda, 26, were found last Thursday in a wooded area between Ban Kudwa and Nong Hang villages in Tambon Nong Hang. Both had gunshot wounds to the head.

One of the slain women reportedly was involved in a romantic relationship with the husband of the woman who allegedly commissioned the killing...

Apichit said the two women were from Xaiphuthong district in Laos’s Savannakhet province and had entered Thailand on August 28.

They were reported to have been lured into two trucks by the group, which killed them and disposed of their bodies in the forest.

The bodies were transported back to Laos yesterday for religious rites.