26 dead bodies have been removed from a mass grave site in southern Thailand after a second day of digging near a human trafficking camp deep inside the jungle.
The decaying corpses are all that remain of illegal migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh who were brought to the country via vast trafficking networks which activists say are 'out of control'.
More than 30 people are thought to be buried in shallow graves at the chilling site in Songkhla province, just 300 metres from Malaysia.
How they died is still a mystery but a Thai police chief made the ominous prediction they suffered a 'violent death'.
The Sadao district where they were kept prisoner is a known stop-off for traffickers who can hide away in the remote woodland before taking their captives across the border and beyond.
Illegal immigrants - many of them Rohingya Muslims - make the dangerous journey by sea to escape religious persecution and find jobs in Malaysia and Thailand.
Their captors keep them trapped in bamboo cages until they received their ransom money in full, while sick and disabled migrants were abandoned to die when traffickers were forced to leave.
One man and two children survived the tragic fate that befell their fellow migrants and were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.
Authorities have known about the camp's existence for quite a while, the Deputy Commissioner General of the Royal Thai Police.
Aek Angsananont said: 'We heard news about this camp and tried to find it many times but because it was deep jungle, it was very difficult.'
The police believe the horrific deaths were due to 'a disagreement within the human trafficking
Identifying the victims could take a long time because their relatives would need to travel from Myanmar and Bangladesh to give DNA samples, Police General Jarumporn Suramanee said.
The abandoned camp - hidden on a high hill deep inside a Thai jungle - was strewn with the shoes and clothing which once belonged to the migrants who died there.
Jarumporn added: 'From the evidence given by witnesses who were in the camp, we believe there was violence here and people died from the violence.'
Human Rights Watch has now called for an independent investigation headed by the UN to find out exactly what took place there.
Its Asia Director Brad Adams said: 'The discovery of these mass graves should shock the Thai government into shutting down the trafficking networks that enrich officials but prey on extremely vulnerable people.'
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3065332/Dozens-corpses-discovered-mass-grave-site-near-Thai-human-trafficking-camp-captives-abandoned-die-bamboo-cages-smugglers-row.html