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Human Trafficking Summit Hears Prosecutions Have Risen

May 29, 2006

Human trafficking remains a problem in South East Asia and increasing numbers of victims are being identified. Officials stated this after a three-day summit in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.  ¹

But the number of trafficking prosecutions has risen, and there is no indication that the problem is increasing, said Dr Susu Thatun, of the Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative Against Trafficking.

"We have begun to notice ... an increase in the number of victims we have been able to identify," Thatun said.

"That ... does not indicate that trafficking is on the rise. On the other hand, it might indicate that law enforcement officials, civil society and the NGOs are now more alert to the issue," she said.

Thatun was speaking as more than 30 officials from Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam ended a review their three-year plan to combat trafficking in the region.

The six countries, which adopted the plan last year, also outlined new ways to combat trafficking over the next decade.

Thatun said that cooperation between individual countries had increased over the past year, and that governments were more readily recognising trafficking as a problem.

Widespread forms of trafficking include the smuggling of people from Cambodia, China, Laos and Myanmar into Thailand for work, and the trafficking of Cambodian children to Thailand and Vietnam to beg.

Trafficking of boys for adoption, and of women and girls for forced marriage and the sex trade, is also common.

¹ Adapted from: Reuters. 12 May 2006. (Source: UNIAP Thailand)