Over 100,000 Cambodians flee Thailand amid fears of military crackdown

More than 110,000 Cambodians have fled Thailand to return home in the past week, an official said Sunday, amid fears of a crackdown on migrant workers after last month's military takeover of the Thai government.

Laborers from Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar play a key role in Thai industries such as seafood, agriculture and construction, but they often lack official work permits.

On Wednesday Thailand's military regime, which seized power in a coup on May 22, threatened to arrest and deport all illegal foreign workers.

"They're returning en masse like a dam collapsing. They've never come en masse like this before in our history," Kor Sam Saroeut, governor of northwestern Banteay Meanchey province, where a major Cambodian-Thai border crossing is located said.

More than 110,000 Cambodian migrants had returned from Thailand in the past week as of Sunday morning, many of them transported to the border by the Thai military, he said.

"They said they are scared of being arrested or shot if they run when Thai authorities check their houses," Saroeut added. "Most of them went to work in Thailand without a work permit."

Facebook rumors — including one post that claims Thai police have killed 30 Cambodians since the military took power in Bangkok — have fueled the exodus, the Phnom Penh Post reported.

ADHOC has confirmed the death of one Cambodian in a Thai police-led raid, according to the Post.

The Thai military's ruling National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) insists Cambodians are leaving of their own accord and said 60,000 had crossed the border as of Saturday. It estimates there were 90,000 illegal immigrants in Thailand.

The government also denied that it was pressuring the immigrants to leave.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Sirichan Ngathong said in a release that the military would only go after immigrants if they were involved in illegal activities such as drugs or gambling.

Cambodian authorities have arranged nearly 300 cars and military trucks to transport workers from the Aranyaprathet-Poipet border checkpoint to their homes.

Thailand is usually home to more than 2 million migrant workers, according to rights groups.

In the past, the authorities would turn a blind eye to the presence of illegal laborers because they were needed when the economy was booming.

But now Thailand is on the verge of recession after the economy contracted by more than 2 percent last quarter.

The recent coup followed years of political divisions between a military-backed, elite establishment and the family of fugitive former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

Al Jazeera and wire services