Fattigdom og begrænsede jobmuligheder gør mange desperate cambodjanere til et let bytte for menneskehandel. Korruption, huller i loven og dårlig beskyttelse betyder, at mange migrantarbejdere ikke kan stille deres gerningsmænd for retten.
PHNOM PENH, 27 June 2012 (IRIN): Nara had paid people smugglers in Cambodia, who promised him a factory job in Thailand, but they tricked him and he ended up as a slave on a fishing vessel on the high seas.
“I worked on the boat for three years but was never paid anything,” Nara said. Like other trafficking victims (ofre for menneskehandel) interviewed by IRIN, he asked that his real name not be used.
Nara was just 20 when he was approached by a smuggler in 2008, who offered him a factory job in Thailand with a monthly salary of 200 US dollar (ca. 1.100 DKR) roughly three times what he would get for similar work in Cambodia.
By the time he realized that he had been tricked, he was already in a foreign country and under the control of violent bosses. He soon found himself forced onto a boat that set out for Malaysian waters and docked once a month on desolate islands.
Poverty and limited job opportunities make desperate Cambodians easy prey (bytte) for middlemen, who procure slave labour for Thailand’s huge fishing industry.
No recourse
A lack of real recourse (andre udveje) for the victims feeds this cycle of exploitation, say monitors. Official corruption, legal loopholes and poor protection means migrant workers are unable to take perpetrators (gerningsmænd) to court, or even seek compensation.
Nara escaped at last when the boat had to put into port, and eventually, through the help of an anti-trafficking NGO, was repatriated to Cambodia. When he got back, the police met with him only once for a short interview about his ordeal.
Rights workers who monitor the trafficking of Cambodians to Thailand to work in the fishing industry say despite the scale of abuse, they are not aware of a single successful prosecution.
“Under Thai criminal and labour law, such a person should have a chance to pursue justice against his offender, as well as receive financial compensation,” says Lisa Rende Taylor, chief technical advisor at the United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking (UNIAP).
Victims fear reprisal or are reluctant to step up as witnesses because they are kept in government shelters during subsequent legal processes, and this might prevent them from working and being with their families while their case is going forward, she said.
Stranded on land
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http://www.irinnews.org/Report/95740/CAMBODIA-No-recourse-for-enslaved-migrant-workers
