Looters - Khao Lak

[chickeee]

Thai tsunami victims plagued by thieves
29 Dec 2004 05:19:52 GMT

Source: Reuters

BANGKOK, Dec 29 (Reuters) - Thieves disguised as police and rescue workers are preying on southern Thailand's Khao Lak beach, where the tsunami may have killed up to 3,000 people, witnesses said on Wednesday.

They were emptying tourist luggage, looting hotel safeboxes and robbing villagers on the beach north of Phuket island, with most police in the area dedicated to search and rescue operations in the worst hit place in Thailand.

Some local people blamed Burmese fishermen who crew many of the boats in Thailand's vast fishing fleet for a $1 or $2 a day.

"We've been hit by both natural disaster and thugs," the owner of one of the dozens of resorts and hotels on the beach told Reuters.

"Some pretended to be police and walked inside some hotels and broke open safeboxes for guests," he said. "Money was taken from tourists' bum bags and their baggage was left open with nothing inside."

"Please send police here," an elderly woman told a Bangkok television station from her mobile phone on Khao Lak, a tourist magnet on the Andaman Sea.

"All the food and drink I've received from the aid workers have been taken away by those fishermen."

"People steal because they are hungry," Phang Nga governor Anuwat Methiwibulwut told Reuters. "We will send more aid relief and more police today."

Rescue workers have retrieved at least 1,200 bodies from the beach and district police chief Col Aroon Klaewvatee said the toll could rise to 3,000.


http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/BKK245938.htm

[anubis]

unbelieveble how some people can behave

[dawsey]

Originally Posted by anubis

unbelieveble how some people can behave

I agree.Feeding on the misfortune of others is beneath contempt