Thailand as a regional haven for human trafficking

Kavi Chongkittavorn

The Nation May 12, 2014 1:00 am

Throughout the past five months, a total of 426 asylum-seekers from Central Asia landed in various parts of Thailand. These new arrivals were unusual and different from the Rohingya arriving in boats from the Andaman Sea, a pattern set over the past few years.

Thai authorities were perplexed by the Turkic-looking undocumented visitors, who were detained in Songkhla, Chiang Rai and along the Thai-Cambodian border. Last year, 88 were detained at Bangkok's immigration office. Just a few days ago a dozen more were apprehended. 

Various reports identified them as Uighur Muslims originating from Xinjiang, China. They had been smuggled overland to northern Thailand through a labyrinth of networks arranged by international traffickers. From Kunming, they were transported to the borders with Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia, attempting to enter Thailand. All would have a rendezvous in Songkhla, southern Thailand, before their journey would have ended with a border crossing to Malaysia, from where they hoped to go to Turkey. 

The recent influx of Uighurs to Thailand has been due to two unrelated developments. The exodus to Thailand is a new one, which comes about due to tighter border administration among members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisations, especially those bordering China such as Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, which literally sealed off the traditional trafficking route.

Secondly, after the Malaysia Airline MH370 tragedy and suspicion of strangers, the Malaysian government has cracked down on foreign Muslim refugees, forcing them to flee into Thailand.

Among human traffickers, Thailand is known as a haven due to its easy access, the weak law enforcement and border controls. Authorities working in collusion with traffickers near and far ensure that their victims' illegal entries are carried out in systematic ways in various parts of Thailand. Prior to their arrival in the Kingdom, transit countries normally turned a blind eye to avoid future complications of having to deal with these asylum-seekers.

Those who have shown up in Songkhla, according to local officials, comprised women and children - each family has parents along with three-four children. Diplomats from the Turkey's and China's embassies recently met and talked with them, trying to determine their backgrounds. At the moment, they are under the care of the Thai government, pending confirmation of their identities. Thailand has sought assistance from the International Organisation of Migration, which has been helping the Rohingya refugees stranded here. 

Influx of the Uighur 

Muslims and other displaced persons in the South cannot be viewed in isolation because some have crossed over from Malaysia, where the demand for labour is very high. Human traffickers have used the porous Thai-Malaysian border to repatriate undocumented migrant workers from Myanmar, Bangladesh and Central Asia to the Thai border. Once they are found inside Thailand, they continue to be subject to exploitation by local officials and international human smugglers. Only the asylum seekers from North Korea receive better treatment. Once they arrived at the Thai border in Chiangsaen, Chiang Rai, they would immediately come under the care and protection of the South Korean government, which would accept their resettlement. As the Uighur Muslims continue to make their way to Thailand, the battle with human traffickers has taken a new twist. The US government will issue its annual Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP) in June with an assessment of the country's efforts to fight against human trafficking, especially involving the Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar. 

Last week, major human rights and refugee organisations urged Washington to punish Bangkok for not doing enough to combat human trafficking. Worse, they cited evidence of complicity between local authorities and traffickers.

Currently, Thailand belongs to the "Tier 2" watch list since the past four years. The pending report could have a devastating outcome if it is downgraded to Tier 3, with possible sanctions from the US government. In past years, Thai authorities have strengthened law enforcement and pursued trafficking cases vigorously.

Last year alone a total of 483 persons were prosecuted out of 386 trafficking cases, compared to 64 persons out of 38 cases in 2010. To Thailand's critics, it was too little too late.In addition, the ongoing domestic political turmoil rubs salt into the wounds because the Thai government has to cope with multiple external pressures in taking care of thenew arrivals and pressure for their forced repatriation. 

However, the plight of the Rohingya dominates the discourse on human trafficking internationally for the time being. Besides Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia also suffer greatly from the influx of Muslim asylum seekers. Attempts to forge a regional approach with Myanmar and Bangladesh have failed. 

Since the 1970s Thailand has had a long history of settling nearly 3 million refugees and displaced persons from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. Now it hosts more than 4 million migrant workers, most of them illegal. Even though Thailand is not a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention, it cooperated with various UN agencies and foreign countries in those difficult decades. The time has now come for Thailand to sign the convention. Concerned Thai authorities, in particular the Ministry of Interior, are still hung up with a myth that such a deal would increase the influx of refugees.

The truth is displaced persons and refugees will continue to come to Thailand nonetheless. International criticism often targets Thailand for the unhealthy conditions and inhuman exploitation that illegal immigrants face, ignoring the refugee-producing countries. 

Thailand, like Pakistan and other developing countries, has to host large numbers of refugees relative to its economic base. The 1951 convention enables UN agencies and foreign governments to help defray unfair criticism and to determine the status of refugees and assist in repatriation and settlement. As of now, with increased asylum-seeker arrivals, Thailand should take more responsibility for determining the status of refugees.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Thailand should be liable to potential U.S. sanctions for failing to crack down on trafficking in migrant workers, a group of human rights and labour organisations said on Friday.

In a letter to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, 19 organizations, including Human Rights Watch and the American Federation of Labor, said Thailand "does not meet the minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, nor is it taking real steps to meet those standards."

As such, Thailand, although an important U.S. ally, should be downgraded to Tier III of the State Department's 2014 Trafficking in Persons Report, the letter said.

Such a downgrade would make Thailand liable to sanctions, which could include the withholding or withdrawal of U.S. non-humanitarian and non-trade-related assistance.

It would also mean that Thailand could face U.S. opposition to assistance from international financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

The letter to Kerry noted that Thailand had been placed on the Tier II watch list in the 2013 Trafficking in Persons Report, which cited "pervasive trafficking-related corruption and weak interagency coordination" that "continued to impede progress in combating trafficking."

"Nothing about this system has changed significantly in the course of the last year, and the government continues to be at best complacent, at worst complicit, in the trafficking of migrant workers from neighbouring countries to provide inexpensive labour for export industries," the letter said.

It cited a December 2013 Reuters report that showed Thai government officials sold hundreds of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar to human traffickers.

"The United States should make very clear its concern about the systematic abuse of migrant workers in Thailand, who produce products destined for the U.S. market," the letter said.

"Far from making credible efforts to fight trafficking, the Thai government has perpetuated policies that foster trafficking of migrant workers within its borders and deny them access to protection and redress," it said.

Last month, U.S. lawmakers called on the Obama administration to punish countries that do too little to fight human trafficking, including Thailand and Malaysia, and said Myanmar should not receive a waiver to avoid possible sanctions over its record.

Countries on Tier 2 for two years are downgraded to Tier 3 unless they receive presidential waivers, available for two additional years.

(Reporting by David Brunnstrom; Editing by Tom Brown)

CROSSROADS: VIDEO STORIES OF MIGRANTS & REFUGEES IN MALAYSIA

Crossroads is a video advocacy project aimed at developing and strengthening the advocacy and documentation capacity of migrant workers, refugees, stateless persons, and their support organisations in Malaysia. It is a collaboration between EngageMedia and Citizen Journalists Malaysia.

Malaysia has the highest numbers of migrant workers in Southeast Asia. According to government statistics from July 2013, the country has 2.1 million registered migrant workers and an estimated 1.3 illegal migrant workers within its borders. This means one in three workers comes from outside Malaysia.

Workers without valid documentation are considered illegal and are often subjected to various forms of abuse – ranging from illegal withholding of salaries, to engagement in bribery, and rape. However, the reality of the workers’ situations are not widely known or reported in the media. Various negative stereotypes exist in a hostile climate in the host community.

EngageMedia believes that by supporting migrant workers to take the lead in telling their own stories through video, Malaysians will gain a better understanding of their personal experiences, in order to correct the stereotypes and foster a climate of tolerance. The workers will also have the necessary skills to use video for evidence and documentation as aid in advocacy. 

In the past year, we organised a total of 12 workshops in Klang Valley, Selangor, and Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. For the 15 participants which included Indonesians, Nepalis, Malaysians, and Burmese, we provided skills in storytelling, video advocacy, storyboarding, video shooting and editing, online/offline video distribution, and online subtitling with Amara.

A young migrant worker describes the challenges of living in Malaysia as an undocumented worker. Cupin, as he is fondly known by his friends, now lives in constant fear.

Cupin's Tale: Even Chickens Listen

Our participants came from various backgrounds, such as Karmadi (pictured top-right), who is an Indonesian migrant in Malaysia working in the construction sector. He made the time to attend all the training sessions despite his difficult work schedule, and recently purchased Malay-language books on photography to continue practicing around his various job-sites. He hopes that he “can use his new video and photography skills to do more than construction work”. In the video, Karmadi explains the hardships experienced by undocumented workers:

The authorities are not interested to know why the migrants are undocumented. They just want to punish them. No one wants to be an undocumented worker, but due to poor laws and enforcement, it gives agents a lot of opportunities to deceive desperate migrant workers.

The final videos produced by Karmadi and the other particpants were compiled into a DVD toolkit featuring 12 videos organised in five chapters according to the theme of migration they touch upon, namely, The 6P Programme, Support Systems for Migrant Workers, The Role of Law Enforcement Authorities, Seeking Protection, and Protecting Children. It also includes a Study Guide designed to give context to these videos for use in educational and advocacy purposes.

Bapak Petrus starts a school for children of migrant workers, building the house himself and using a syllabus of education that is similar to the one from their country of origin, Indonesia.

School of Hope

On 15 December 2013, a launch screening was organised in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in collaboration with Tenanganita, a migrant rights NGO. The event was graced by its founder, the late Dr. Irene Fernandez, who reminded the 200 migrant worker guests of their fundamental human rights and stressed the importance of using video, among other means, as tools for evidence and documentation.

As project lead, I learned as much from the participants as I shared with them. These are not only stories of struggle in a foreign land, but also of resilience and hope for a better future. All the videos from the project and a PDF version of the Study Guide can be viewed and downloaded here.

Thailand ! Burmese Refugee Couple Allegedly Murdered by Thai Employee

CHIANG MAI, Thailand — A Thai employer has been accused of murdering two Burmese refugees—a married couple—who were working on his farm in Thailand’s Tak Province.

The couple were owed three months of wages when they were killed on Wednesday night inside a hut in the cornfield where they worked, according to security officials at the Mae La refugee camp, where they lived.

Saw Hla Htay and Naw Paw Mu, ethnic Karen refugees from Burma, were owed more than 10,000 baht (US$300) for their labor on the cornfield in Kar Klo village, Tha Song Yang District.

Their bodies were buried on Thursday, as Thai police officers arrested and detained the suspect, according to Saw Shi Sho, a camp security official.

“The employer attacked them at about 9 pm. But two of the couple’s children were able to escape. They said their father’s face and their mother’s head had been badly hacked,” he said.

“The Thai police have arrested the murderer and detained him in Kar Klo village. The Thai police will pursue the case in accordance with Thai law. We need to let them handle it.”

The Mae La refugee camp houses more than 40,000 refugees and is the biggest Burmese refugee camp in Thailand. Many residents leave the camp to find employment outside in nearby towns, risking extortion or arrest by Thai authorities.

Murders have been reported inside and outside camps, but in many cases Thai authorities have failed to take action against suspected criminals. Family members of victims say they have not received compensation and have been ignored because they lack legal status in Thailand.

In September last year, a Karen refugee woman, Shwe Hla Aye was found dead outside Mae La camp after disappearing for two days. She was found wearing only a bra. Her body was buried without a proper investigation into the cause of her death.

Migrant workers worse off here than back home, say Asian MPs

BY JENNIFER GOMEZ

APRIL 16, 2014

(From left) Malaysian member of parliament Charles Santiago; Sabiha Nazir from the National Assembly of Pakistan; Cambodian member of parliament Phirum Keo; Malaysia Bar Council member Datuk M. Ramachelvam; and Zakir Hussain, member of Constitutional Assembly of Nepal, during the Advisory Committee for Asian Inter-Parliamentary Caucus on Labour Migration held at Petaling Jaya today. – The Malaysian Insider by Afif Abd Halim, April 16, 2014.An Asian parliamentary caucus on labour migration has called on Putrajaya to reveal details of MoUs it signed with nations who send their citizens to Malaysia for work, following reports of abuse and exploitation of migrant workers in the country. 

Nepal MP Zakir Hussain said his embassy officials told him that one Nepali death was recorded at detention camps in Malaysia every week due to starvation and limited access to healthcare. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Afif Abd Halim, April 16, 2014.

Nepal MP Zakir Hussain said his embassy officials told him that one Nepali death was recorded at detention camps in Malaysia every week due to starvation and limited access to healthcare.

"A total of 346 Nepalese nationals died here last year, with 52 deaths in detention camps.

"What I don't understand is how Malaysia has adequate laws on migrant labour but practises low standards of human rights," Zakir said at a press conference today.

The caucus, which is on a fact-finding mission to Malaysia, also accused Putrajaya of being a stumbling block to the finalising of the Asean Framework Instrument on the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights of Migrant Workers which has been in the works since 2007.

Klang MP Charles Santiago, a member of the caucus, said there is no reason for the MOUs signed between Putrajaya and participating countries to be shrouded in secrecy. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Afif Abd Halim, April 16, 2014.Klang MP Charles Santiago, who is a member of the caucus, said the government has signed MoUs with Bangladesh, Nepal and Indonesia, among others, but details of these were unknown.

"It appears that those who are familiar with the content of the MoUs are labour brokers, who use it to manipulate migrant workers. This is the common complaint among the embassies and workers themselves.

"There is no reason for these MoUs to be shrouded in secrecy," Santiago added.

One of the recommendations of the caucus is for Putrajaya to have a government-to-government approach in the recruitment of migrant workers in order to minimise recruitment costs and exploitation by outsourcing to companies and labour brokers.

The caucus’s findings said that in addition to violation of labour rights including poor wages and long working hours, migrant workers in Malaysia continue to live in poverty, leading Pakistan MP Sabiha Nazir to say that in some instances, the workers are worse off than they were before in their country of origin. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Afif Abd Halim, April 16, 2014.The caucus also found that in addition to violation of labour rights including poor wages and long working hours, migrant workers in Malaysia continue to live in poverty.

"In some instances, they are worse off that they were before in their country of origin," said Pakistan MP Sabiha Nazir.

According to Santiago, the Malaysian Labour Department declined an invitation from the caucus to attend the three-day meeting which ends today.

Mariquit Melgar, a representative from the Philippines, also called on the Malaysian government to practice fair play, saying that Filipinos working in Malaysia since the 1970s have contributed to the development and economy of Malaysia. – The Malaysian Insider pic by Afif Abd Halim, April 16, 2014.Mariquit Melgar, a representative from the Philippines, also called on the Malaysian government to practice fair play, saying that Filipinos working in Malaysia since the 1970s have contributed to the development and economy of Malaysia.

"In a session with our workers last month, they told us that they are not here to create trouble, and that they are doing their best, working long hours.

"They are not terrorists, they are not robbers, they just want better treatment and fair wages, is that too much to ask for?" she said.

In calling for recruitment of migrant workers to be conducted on an inter-governmental basis, Santiago said this would protect them from being exploited by outsourcing companies and labour brokers who were practicing "contract substitution".

"The Pakistan MP revealed that workers from her country had signed agreements with high wages and wonderful terms in Pakistan, but when they got here, these outsourcing companies would substitute their contracts, where they would end up with poor wages and bad living conditions.

"The MP said that workers she met here yesterday were practically crying over allegations that they had been cheated by these middlemen," Santiago said.

Bar Council's chairperson for migrants and refugees Datuk M. Ramachelvam said that what was needed was another amnesty programme following the failure of the previous 6P programme by the government, which was aimed at regularising undocumented migrant workers.

"In one 6P processing centre in Wangsa Maju, the agent was collecting about RM2,000 from each migrant worker and there were about 8,000 there applying, which means the agent collected about RM16 million.

"But not one of them got their documents," he said.

He called on Putrajaya to take charge of both the recruitment and amnesty programme to prevent migrant workers from being fleeced by third parties.

The Asian parliamentary caucus representing 15 countries also called on Putrajaya to practise strong political will in restructuring the management of migrant workers. – April 16, 2014.

Teaching Filmmaking to Burmese Refugee Students Was An Eye-opening Experience

Azmina Karim - Bangladesh

We achieve success at Connecther.org when our stakeholders achieve success. Azmina Karim, a young woman from Bangladesh who is passionate about uplifting the voices of women and girls in her country, is one such stakeholder. The winner of last year's People Choice award for Connecther's Girls Impact the World Film Festival, she is also one of Connecther's first international fellows and she received a grant to travel to help uplift the voices of Burmese refugees in Thailand. The opportunity to help advance Azmina's dream to be a social advocate is beyond exciting. I admire her courage to fight for gender equality in her country and am so grateful that we can provide opportunities for her and our other fellows to thrive. Lila Igram, Founder, Connecther

Teaching Filmmaking to Burmese Refugee Students Was An Eye-opening Experience

By Azmina Karim

Edited by Elaine Robbins

It has been an exciting year since my short film, Because I Am a Girl, won the People's Choice Award at the Connecther's Girls Impact the World Film Festival in 2013. Supported by a grant from Connecther, a communication and crowd-funding platform that works to advance women and children globally, I taught filmmaking to migrant Burmese students at Minmahaw School. The school is in Mae Sot, Tak province, western Thailand, on the border with Myanmar, where 30,000 school-age Burmese migrant students live. The project enabled me to make an impact by sharing the voices of young refugees--a marginalized group who rarely have their voices heard.

Azmina (in green) spends her final day with Burmese migrant students in Thailand

My film was about domestic violence in Bangladesh, so I thought I knew something about fear and oppression. Alas, nothing prepared me for the heartbreaking stories I heard from my students as they wrote about their lives in their journals for my creative writing class. One student expressed the anger he felt at the Burmese military when he described how his village was burned and people lost their homes. Another recalled how she and her mother had to sell bread everyday and walk for miles to nearby villages, so they could earn enough money to buy food. "Sometimes I couldn't walk any further, she wrote, "because I was hungry and starving to eat something. But I had to; otherwise, my family wouldn't have enough money to buy their meal."

Working with co-teacher Jonathan Birtwell, we asked the students to investigate the most pressing issues affecting Burmese migrants. They came up with several topics: selling of young daughters, child marriage, and a lack of educational opportunities and health facilities faced by Burmese migrants living in Mae Sot (films can be seen here: Burden or Boon, Out of the Frying Pan & Sex-trafficking, Modern Day Slavery in Thailand). To follow up, we conducted interviews with young Burmese girls who got trafficked along the Thailand-Myanmar border. Most of the girls we talked to revealed that they had been given false promises of getting a decent job with a high salary.

When they arrived in Mae Sot, however, they were forced to work as sex workers. Due to the social stigma associated with sex workers, they were reluctant to go back to their families and lived miserable lives for years. The students also learned about the lives of Burmese migrants in Thailand, especially those living in the refugee camps. On a positive note, they found organizations that work for the betterment of refugees, and one group of students focused their work on an organization that helps Burmese women living with HIV.

As I got to know my students better, I started to understand more about the reality of their lives as refugees in Thailand. They lived in constant fear and could not move around easily because getting caught by the police would mean having to pay a huge bribe to be set free. Once, a sex worker we interviewed asked us to take her to the hospital because she was having severe shoulder pain. However, on the day we showed up, she refused to go with us to the hospital for fear that she might be arrested without an ID card.

In the end, our students produced three revealing documentaries about sex trafficking and the plight of Burmese immigrants in Thailand. This project was particularly very challenging for the students, as this was their first time to conduct interview and field research work. It offered an opportunity for them to actualize what they had learned in the classroom and use it to give back to their community.

For me, getting to know these students was the most eye-opening part of the experience. Despite the hardships they carried in their hearts every day, they were always full of life, and they displayed warmth that melted my heart. Their positivism seemed to lighten their suffering. They asked me many questions about the world and were so appreciative about my effort to teach them something new. When I spent time with them, life seemed just right. While my students found their voices, I found a new appreciation for life.

Azmina's short film Because I Am a Girl, a powerful indictment of domestic violence in Bangladesh, won the People's Choice Award at Connecther's Girls Impact the World Film Festival 2013. She is a research study coordinator at the Asian University for Women, where she is currently working along with other principal investigators researching the effects of women's education and employment on gender relations in the family in South and Southeast Asia, a project funded by the Ford Foundation.

The Girls Impact the World Film Festival is an initiative of Connecther, co-sponsored by the Harvard College Social Innovation Collaborative and co-directed by Ara Parikh, Kerry Hammond and Lila Igram.