In a move to stem the flow of illegal Burmese migrants into Thailand, Thai officials have proposed that the amount of time visitors from Burma can spend in Thailand after crossing the border at Ranong should be reduced from one week to one day.

The proposal, raised at a meeting between Thai and Burmese officials, follows the deaths of 54 Burmese illegal migrants who suffocated in a truck carrying them through southern Thailand after they had landed in Ranong, a port just across a river estuary from Kawthaung in southern Burma.

Colonel Pornthep Vacharaphun, commander of the 29th infantry unit of Surasee Task Force, said the restriction on the length of stay by Burmese visitors could help prevent a similar tragedy occurring.

He also proposed that Burmese sent back after entering Thailand illegally should be repatriated at Kawthaung.

The one day meeting was attended by Thai police officers and some 24 Burmese officials and policemen, including Col Kyaw Kyaw Oo, chairman of the Border Committee in Kawthaung, and Ye Min, a senior police officer from Naypyidaw, according to a source close to the Burmese authorities.

Burmese police officers from Kawthaung attending the meeting included Kyi Lwin, Win Myint and Aung Myint Htun, the anonymous source said.

Border trade issues were also reportedly discussed at the meeting.

The Hong Kong-based Asian Human Rights Commission, meanwhile, issued a statement on Thursday urging the Thai government to conduct a transparent investigation into the deaths of the 54 migrants.

“The Asian Human Rights Commission reiterates its call that top-level investigators from Bangkok, be they from the Department of Special Investigation or other agencies, be put in charge of this case and be obliged to report to the highest levels of government and to the public on what is being done to bring all the perpetrators of these deaths, not just a few of the small people who were directly involved, to justice,” the statement said.

Senior officers of the Thai Justice Ministry’s Department of Special Investigation are quoted as saying a full special inquiry into the deaths would not be held since they were not technically the result of human trafficking. The migrants had not been forced to travel to Thailand but had done so voluntarily, the officers reportedly said.

Fourteen of the 67 survivors are currently being held at Ranong’s immigration office as witnesses.

By SAI SILP AND SAW YAN NAING