BANGKOK: At least 22 people from Myanmar, including four boys and seven women, have died after a boat capsized off a small island near the maritime border with Thailand, Thai police said Sunday.

The bodies were discovered floating at sea Saturday off Thailand’s Ranong province, 570 kilometres (350 miles) south of Bangkok, police said.

Thai police Colonel Teerawat Rattanachai said none of the victims, whose bodies are thought to have floated from the Myanmar side of the border, had any identification, and that others may have been on board the boat when it sank.

"Doctors said they had already been dead for two days when the bodies were found, so the accident probably happened Thursday night," said Teerawat of Ranong police.

"We don’t know who they are because nothing, not any kind of identification, was found with the bodies," he added.

Hundreds of thousands of people have fled Myanmar, one of the world’s poorest countries, to escape harsh repression by the ruling junta or to seek better economic opportunities in Thailand.