BANGKOK - Thai police have arrested 9 people on suspicion of killing 13 Chinese sailors in the Golden Triangle on Mekong River earlier this month, Zhang Xinfeng, China's Vice-Minister of public security, said Friday.

Zhang declined to identify the suspects, saying further investigation is under way. He made the announcement after meeting Thai police chief Pol Gen Priewpan Damapong.

The victims aboard two cargo ships were hijacked and shot dead by a group of unidentified gunmen on October 5 in a section of Mekong River that forms the border of Thailand, Laos and Myanmar. Their bodies were found and salvaged from the river in northern Thailand afterward.