However, some are rescued by authorities with the assistance of non-governmental organizations corresponding to Agape International Missions (AIM) – the one group with two SWAT teams allowed by Cambodian authorities to conduct investigations and raids.
Two members of the nonprofit organization, which has not only saved lots of of girls but in addition provided support and created employment opportunities for each victims and at-risk individuals, visited Hong Kong this month to satisfy with donors and seek recent ethical business partnerships.
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“We’re meeting with people here and discussing ways to create more jobs… I’m coming back with jewelry samples for women to make and we’ll be working with corporations that wish to source things ethically,” said Melissa Stock, director of international development at CEL .
Most of this Christian organization’s supporters are based in Hong Kong and the United States. “One of our employment centers does what it does thanks to a businessman from Hong Kong. We could have been one of his satellite factories in Cambodia,” she said.
Stock notes that 90 percent of rescued girls will turn into victims of human trafficking again in the event that they aren’t supplied with the abilities they need to seek out work and a greater life.
All 25 provinces of Cambodia have been described as sources of human trafficking.
“Cambodian and ethnic Vietnamese women and girls are moving from rural areas to cities and tourist resorts, where they’re subjected to sex trafficking in brothels and, more often, in such “intermediate” sex establishments as beer gardens, massage parlors, salons, karaoke bars, industrial spaces and non-commercial facilities” – describes the most recent annual report on trafficking in individuals by the US Department of State.
Vietnamese children lost out to the booming Chinese “buy a bride” trade.
Matthew Stock, AIM’s Cambodia director, noted that human trafficking in Cambodia is fueled by some deep-seated issues. Most Cambodians survive lower than $2 a day, and young children are sometimes seen as a source of income.
“It’s poverty and desperation. Some families have huge debts, others don’t have the means to support the rest of the family and they are offered $5,000 for that child,” said Matthew Stock, noting that AIM consistently rescues children under five.
Cultural issues, corresponding to the idea that ladies are less precious than men and have a responsibility to supply for his or her families, have also contributed to the expansion of the illegal trade.
They accompany recent internal aspects, corresponding to the booming casino industry, and external trends, including the gender imbalance in mainland China.
“Whenever you open a casino, there are certain elements and things that come with it. This is accompanied by some kind of entertainment. However, we cannot say that a specific casino or game is associated with it,” noted Matthew Stock.
He added that AIM had not identified any specific casino-related cases.
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Across the border, AIM leaders noted that the trafficking of women into China was also an emerging problem that, without appropriate intervention, could worsen in the coming years. At the heart of the demand is the disproportionate number of single men in China who cannot find partners in their home country.
“We are helping the Cambodian government, which is trying very hard to deal with the problem where girls are promised jobs abroad. “They get there and find out that someone paid between $10,000 and $20,000 for the bride, so what happens is that they’re going to be ‘married,'” Matthew Stock described.
“Their passports are being held. And when they have a child, the guy sells the girl again to pay off his debt and the cycle repeats.
As of October 2016, AIM had rescued 50 girls from China and provided them with support in Cambodia.
No recent data available. However, less than three months ago, Cambodian authorities and the AIM Swat team intervened in a case involving a 21-year-old woman who was imprisoned in China due to an abusive marriage.
On January 24, T’bong Khmom police and the Swat team arrested two women suspected of selling the woman.
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The victim was a victim of mental and physical violence from her “husband” and his family. She eventually escaped and was repatriated to Cambodia with the help of the AIM China team.
According to Stock, no further details can be provided because the case is still under investigation.
While it is difficult to say how many Cambodian women have been trafficked to mainland China in recent years, the latest Human Trafficking Report notes that “a significant number of rural women are recruited under false pretenses to go to China to marry Chinese men, who often find themselves $20,000 in debt to the brokers facilitating the transaction; some of these women, as a result of this debt, are then forced to work in factories or forced prostitution.”
Matthew Stock said that while “human trafficking is certainly gaining momentum” in Cambodia, government authorities have made greater efforts to combat it.
“They are trying very hard and we have worked with very conscientious officers. There has been a change of perspective and some people are really trying to make a change in the country.” But “crime adapts and changes… When we first came to Cambodia [in 2013] they used to be open-faced brothels, but now it’s more of an underground process. There is a dark web…We are also trying to adapt and be creative.”
The victim, who was trafficked and exploited as a young person, is now 23 and has turn into a social employee at AIM. Her story became a part of an anti-sex trafficking awareness campaign that features bracelets constructed from recycled bullets with the words “22” written on them – the times she needed to spend in a brothel. “It’s a number we can’t forget,” Melissa Stock said.
This article appeared within the print edition of the South China Morning Post as: the fight against sex trafficking involves Hong Kong
