This year’s festival is overshadowed, however, by the tragic death of 54 Burmese illegal migrants who died from suffocation as they were being smuggled into Thailand in a sealed truck.

The victims, along with 67 survivors, sneaked by night into Ranong Province, opposite Burma’s southerly Victoria Point, and were then packed into a truck container measuring 2.2 meters by 6 meters.

The air conditioning of the container, which normally carried seafood, appears to have failed or to have been switched off, at time when outside temperatures climb towards 40 degrees Celsius.

One survivor, 30-year-old Saw Win, said that about 30 minutes into the trip the occupants pounded from the inside of the truck, screamed for air and used a mobile phone to call the driver, who briefly turned on the air-conditioning. It later shut down, and they called the driver again 30 minutes later but his phone was off.

They continued pounding and screaming until he stopped the truck about an hour later, unlocked the door and ran off when he saw the state of the victims.

While some may characterize this as a tragic accident, or even criminal negligence on the part of the driver of the truck, “it is clear that this occurrence is an indication-indeed a consequence-of a much larger problem,” said Bill Salter, Director of the Sub-regional Office for East Asia of the International Labour Organization.

Thailand is a magnet for millions of migrants from its poorer neighbors-Cambodia, Laos and especially Burma. They take unhealthy, unskilled and dangerous jobs avoided by Thai workers.

The US State Department, in a report on human trafficking last year, said many are forced into “involuntary servitude in agricultural work, factories, construction, commercial fisheries, domestic work, and begging.” However, the illegal workers lack legal protection and are often brutally exploited by their employers.

Burmese leave their homeland because of political oppression and socio-economic hardship, despite Thailand’s attempts to formalize a system of cross-border employment agreements with its neighbors.

The formal systems of recruitment in Thailand are not working, however, the ILO claims. The reasons vary-a slow and expensive migrant registration system, a breakdown in the ability of migrants’ countries to provide the initial documentation required and the legitimate concerns of migrants, worried that they will not be able to change employers, even if they suffer abuse.

“Within such an environment, trafficking for labor exploitation is bound to flourish,” the ILO warned.

It’s time for the environment to be changed if tragedies like the needless deaths of 54 Burmese migrants are to be avoided. Let’s hope that this particular incident is a wake up call to both Thailand and Burma to do something about the lack of protection of migrant workers.