Sex Slaves Smuggled From Burma>

[cojones]

Trafficking on the Thai-Burma Border

By Colin Baynes/Tachileik and Mae Sai

November 2004

Informal Burmese networks supply teenaged girls to customers of Thailand’s commercial sex industry.

Michael, a Burmese man, spoke with little remorse. As he gazed at the brothel, behind dark sunglasses, from the backseat of a tuk-tuk his voice barely wavered from its matter-of-fact tone.

A girl was loitering in front of the compound, before a wall decorated with Chinese graffiti. Pointing to her, he uttered: “Two weeks ago for 2,000 baht I took a girl like that across the border to give to foreign customers.”

Michael lives in the Burmese border town of Tachilek, which abuts Mae Sai, Thailand. He vows to have ended his career as a child trafficking agent, having seen his partner in crime sentenced to 16 years in prison. Michael now sells cigarettes and serves as a freelance tour guide to foreigners.

Human trafficking can be especially lucrative for agents, he says, as they get paid for both bringing the girl first to Tachilek and then across the border. According to Michael, agents also get a cut of the trafficked girls’ earnings once they enter prostitution.

“Half of the money goes to the brothel owner… some comes to the agents and more to the girl’s family… the girl is left with nothing but diseases and she cannot go back home.”

“Most of [the trafficked girls] that become prostitutes come through Mae Sai,” says Aye Aye Maw of Social Action for Women, or SAW. “This is because many girls from Shan State come to Thailand to flee the civil war. Thais and foreigners think they are more beautiful also—if you make them look good, people will think that they are real Thai.”

Along with brothel owners, customers looking for sex place a high value on virginity.

“The typical age for a trafficked girl to become a prostitute is 15 or 16 because the customers like virgins that are young,” claims Aye Aye Maw. “The brothel owner and the trafficking agents like that more too because young girls are easier to fool—they can pay them less or extort them more.”

Somporn Kempetch, coordinator of the Child Protection and Rights Center, or CPRC, in Mae Sai, highlights the connection between child smuggling and the difficulties faced by marginalized ethnic minorities from Burma and Thailand.

“In the Lahu, Shan and Akha villages where the trafficked girls come from, large families live in only one room and have a hard time finding enough food to eat,” he says. “Because of this, many families sell their daughters to trafficking agents.”

“Once a girl is trafficked into a brothel she is immediately indebted,” says Somporn Kempetch. “If the agent pays her family 60,000 baht for her she will have to work until she makes 120,000 baht until she is out of debt to the agent.” Once the debt is paid, work remains.

“The girl must pay the brothel half of her earnings and keep half to both send to her family and keep for herself,” reports Aye Aye Maw.

Many of the minority girls from Burma and northern Thailand speak Thai poorly, if at all, and are incapable of reading the language making them more vulnerable to being cheated by brothel owners, agents or customers.

“I don’t think the girls I brought over ever got money,” says Michael. “This was their first time in Thailand… they were scared … they couldn’t talk to anyone. I brought them to the karaoke and the foreigners paid the owner in advance. Usually they don’t get money for the first time because the owner has to pay me.” The trade, at least overland to Thailand, appears dominated by small-scale operators.

Recent reports by the International Labor Organization and the United Nations Development Program suggest that anti-trafficking policies that target criminal networks are not effective. Rather, they point out that most girls leaving their villages destined to become sex workers are trafficked informally though household networks, with the consent of communities and their families, all of whom profit from the trade.

“People are getting spoiled by globalization,” says Kham Chuen, founder and director of Opportunities for Poor Children, an organization that gives education and promotes the rights of vulnerable youth on the Thai-Burma border. “Many families have gone beyond selling their daughters to make ends meet and do it because they want to live in comfort. They are poor when they come to Thailand, but soon they start to want cell phones, motorbikes and nicer housing.”

Somporn agrees: “What we are finding is that many girls do not want to end their lives as prostitutes. [but] once they eventually start making money, they don’t want to give up wearing the nice clothes, the mobile phone and life in the city.”

[meemiathai]

This is the human race.

[poolcleaner]

This is the human race.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Not a race with an honest winner though!

[gburns57au]

and so it continues.......

[cdnvic]

Anytime I go to Tachileik without my wife with me I get hounded by these fat smelly lazy bastards on the other side of the border trying to sell me "long neck girl...very young", or some similar sick offer. I'd have at least some respect for these (I refuse to call them men) greasy lowlifes if they bent over and made an honest living for themselves.

Is it wrong to have fantasies about taking a carpet knife to their genitalia?

cv

[kat]

Cojones, thanks you for posting a very informative article.

I want to add that not all of the young girls trafficked are done so with the consent of their families. Burma is a Least Developed Country under the boot of a corrupt, inept, genocidal military and government elite. Criminal and drug networks own the largest share of wealth in the country (this includes the government - if you can call it one).

There are many desperate people who are looking for a way to eat and support their families. The currency has plummeted several times, and the price of rice and food at one time had something like a 70% inflation rate. This is a story that is about much more than the pursuit of consumer goods. Also, there are obviously conspirators and profiteers on both sides of the border, otherwise it wouldn't work.

In the case of Burma, there are many, MANY factors that make this story what it is which I can't get into at the moment. In another study by the UN, it was found that many of these girls are already infected with HIV within three months of arriving into Northern Thailand. They are then rotated to brothels around the country for a "fresh" supply of girls.

[Gazza]

Is it wrong to have fantasies about taking a carpet knife to their genitalia? 

cv

No. Nor is it wrong to fantasize about sticking a red hot poker up their jacksies (cold end first).

[Dickie]

This stuff has always gone on and always will.

If you really want to stop it long term you'll need to remove the reasons these girls are sold. That would take foreign intervention/invasion, the removing of the corruption at the top and investment to bring standards of living up. That won't happen.

If you want to do something short-term then buy one of these girls yourself and give her work, place to live, etc. It'll take money (your money) but it would work. What chance of that happening?

This stuff has always gone on and always will.

[LaoPo]

This stuff has always gone on and always will.

If you really want to stop it long term you'll need to remove the reasons these girls are sold. That would take foreign intervention/invasion, the removing of the corruption at the top and investment to bring standards of living up. That won't happen.

If you want to do something short-term then buy one of these girls yourself and give her work, place to live, etc. It'll take money (your money) but it would work. What chance of that happening?

This stuff has always gone on and always will.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Unfortunately you are so right; it's IN the 'system' of the Far East for hundreds of years already (if not thousands). The change has to come from inside the (Thai) morality and culture about 'using' these poor girls. I fear it will be Utopia.

LaoPo

[remmy]

who are the main customer? local thais or tourist?

[anna234cn]

who are the main customer? local thais or tourist?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Any handsome guys?

My roommate and I are looking for a handsome and strong and... one. hahaha

[LaoPo]

who are the main customer? local thais or tourist?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thai, and..maybe much later tourists...

[Khutan]

I heard a rather sobering recount from someone yeaterday about these girls. In my opinion its like the WWF, cut off the demand and the supply will disappear.

There is nothing else to say.

[kat]

The majority of trafficked girls end up in the local Asian market. This means Thai, Burmese, migrants, middle and low-end venues.

[richardb]

I am particularly interested in this thread as my ex ( whom I still look out for for reasons not relevant here) was/is such a girl. Lahu ethnicity displaced I guess a decade ago. I have been to Taichelik/Mae Sai numerous times where her immediate family live just over the border in Burma. She lives in Thailand completely illegally. Girly is somewhat disabled and cannot speak and I have been trying to get some answers from her family on why she cannot simply go and live back with them. Her family don't seem to grasp the question and girly goes into a charade of bad soldiers robbing and shooting ( Though that does not happen in Taichelick as far as I have seen ). She manages to sneak over for the day when I am with her and I have seen her then cross back into Thailand legitimately with a copy of these blue books all the Burmese have when they cross.

The original post sais these girls cannot go back. Why?

Is it cause their families dont want them back but want theme "working" ?

Is it cause the local gangsters will assume she has made a few quid and come calling for extortion money.

Will she have broken some Burmese law by leaving the country and then returning after 7/8 years?

Any reasons why girly may be at risk if she returns to Burma appreciated.

Richard

[NaiGreg]

This is a serious topic that should be addressed seriously. Can the MODs move it to somewhere other than Farang Pub - fun, food, entertainment and Expat life ?

[kat]

I am particularly interested in this thread as my ex ( whom I still look out for for reasons not relevant here) was/is such a girl. Lahu ethnicity displaced I guess a decade ago.  I have been to Taichelik/Mae Sai numerous times where her immediate family live just over the border in Burma. She lives in Thailand completely illegally. Girly is somewhat disabled and cannot speak and I have been trying to get some answers from her family on why she cannot simply go and live back with them. Her family don't seem to grasp the question and girly goes into a charade of bad soldiers robbing and shooting ( Though that does not happen in Taichelick as far as I have seen ). She manages to sneak over for the day when I am with her and I have seen her then cross back into Thailand legitimately with a copy of these blue books all the Burmese have when they cross.

The original post sais these girls cannot go back. Why?

Is it cause their families dont want them back but want theme "working" ?

Is it cause the local gangsters will assume she has made a few quid and come calling for extortion money.

Will she have broken some Burmese law by leaving the country and then returning after 7/8 years?

Any reasons why girly may be at risk if she returns to Burma appreciated.

Richard

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I'm not sure how "girly" lives here completely illegally and then uses a blue book to cross the borders. If she is illegal in the first place, how is she crossing and re-crossing the border legally?

Many migrants who cross the border illegally cannot re-enter Burma legally because they risk arrest or extortion for leaving illegally. Women in this case are especially vulnerable to rape, imprisionment, extortion, and trafficking.

Edited December 21, 2004 by kat

[richardb]

]

I'm not sure how "girly" lives here completely illegally and then uses a blue book to cross the borders. If she is illegal in the first place, how is she crossing and re-crossing the border legally?

Many migrants who cross the border illegally cannot re-enter Burma legally because they risk arrest or extortion for leaving illegally. Women in this case are especially vulnerable to rape, imprisionment, extortion, and trafficking.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Thanks I thought there might be some exit visa procedure this indeed may be the problem. Though of course the Burmese authorities don't know she has left I would imagine the neighbors do and someone might rat. I suppose its extortion she must fear, she got traficked already.

In answer to your question as to how girly lives in LOS illegally I am not sure what to say. In the words of the immortal song ....no income tax no VAT......

She stays out of trouble and places where she has to show her id card.

As for crossing the border mai sae / tichalek. There are severely "ferrymen" who will take you across round each bend of the river outside of sight of the border bridge its what 6 meters across I think the price is 50 Baht. By the time I have qued at Thai Immigration qued at Burmese immigration and crossed the bridge girly has already crossed and is waiting on the back of a scooter. I am sorry I have no idea how she crosses into Thailand legally but she does with all the others comming over for the day brandishing a book which her family take back. Sometimes though she does the ferry thing. The only time we get serious trouble is at the checkpoints you find all over the Chaing Rai area particularly on the way to the airport. The checkpoint boys are very religious though and always solicit a donation for Buddah it being some festival every time we are stopped. So happy are they at me devotion to their faith they always forget to ask for girlies ID card.

Seriously any further info as to the risks she runs in Burma would be appreciated.

Richard

Edited December 21, 2004 by richardb