Description:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
"This report documents sexual trafficking and human rights abuses committed against Burmese women
and children from 19 Townships in Mon State, Karen State, Tenasserim Division, Pegu Division, Rangoon
Division and Mandalay Division.
From 2004 to July 2009 the (Mon) Woman and Child Rights Project (WCRP)—Southern Burma
documentation program compiled 40 separate incidents totaling 71 victims. This number represents
only a small percentage of the instances of sexual trafficking from Burma to Thailand and other
bordering nations, though the case studies of this report provide an important lens through which to
view the present-day situation.
Sexual trafficking and related human rights abuses are pervasive and arguably growing problems
systematized by a harsh economic reality under the military rule of the State Peace and Development
Council (SPDC).
Whereas the illegitimate junta has become a signatory of anti-trafficking protocols from the United
Nations and founded internal regulatory committees to deal with such issues, the last decade has seen
flagrant corruption along the border of Burma and Thailand.
Government-organized NGOs dedicated to defending the rights? of its people serve more as roadblocks
than as catalysts for social advancement and equitable access to state resources.
Facing a broken educational system most likely to betray them, women and girls inside Burma are left
with few employable skills and must seek money in any way they can. A reeling marketplace stunted by
the government?s economic mismanagement, increased militarization in rural and especially border
areas, and the ear-ringing echoes of Cyclone Nargis and price fluctuations from a global economic
downturn leave the women of the mainly-agrarian regions of Southern Burma with a glaring ultimatum:
migrate or starve.
The draw of being able to send money back to their home country in the form of remittances often
cannot be tempered even by stories of corrupt traffickers, arrests, or dangerous and abusive living
conditions upon arrival.
Most of the incidents detailed in this report point to violent sexual abuses that took place during the
trafficking process or upon arrival in Thailand, Malaysia, and other destinations. The interview subjects
often narrate the types of factory and domestic jobs they were promised to contrast the illegal sex work
and other exploitive labor they were forced to perform."
Source/publisher:
Women and Child Rights Project (WCRP); Human Rights Foundation of Monland (HURFOM)
Date of Publication:
2009-08-00
Date of entry:
2009-08-31
Grouping:
- Individual Documents
Category:
- Human Rights
- Discrimination
- Race or Ethnicity: Discrimination based on
- Racial or ethnic discrimination in Burma: reports of violations
- Racial or ethnic discrimination in Burma: reports of violations against specific groups
- Discrimination against the Mon
- Women and Child Rights Project (WCRP)
- Women and Child Rights Project, home page, articles and reports
Language:
English
Local URL:
Format:
pdf
Size:
1.44 MB