Sex work

expand all
collapse all

Individual Documents

Description: "A Myanmar woman trafficked to China seven years ago and who bore four children while in captivity has been returned to her family, an NGO worker and the woman’s sister told RFA Monday. The 47-year-old woman, whose leg had been broken by her captors, was found by Chinese police and transferred to Myanmar authorities in the border town of Muse in Myanmar’s northern Shan state on Nov. 1, they said. She was then sent back to her home in Bago city in central Myanmar’s Bago region on Sunday. Her relatives requested that RFA’s Myanmar Service not publish the name of the woman. “She has a broken leg and is mentally disabled,” said Thaung Htun from the Muse Humanitarian Organization which helped the woman return home. “She was trafficked, forced to get pregnant, and has had four babies,” he said. “She is now 47 years old. They must have thrown her out as she is getting old.” Thaung Htun said Chinese authorities found the woman throwing away Chinese currency notes along a road, Thaung Htun said..."
Source/publisher: "Radio Free Asia (RFA)" (USA)
2019-11-04
Date of entry/update: 2019-11-05
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
more
Description: "Sexual violence carried out by Myanmar's security forces against the country's Muslim Rohingya minority was so widespread and severe that it demonstrates intent to commit genocide as well as warrants prosecution for war crimes and crimes against humanity, a UN report charged on Thursday (Aug 22). The UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar said it found the country's soldiers "routinely and systematically employed rape, gang rape and other violent and forced sexual acts against women, girls, boys, men and transgender people in blatant violation of international human rights law." Its report on sexual and gender-based violence in Myanmar covers the Kachin and Shan ethnic minorities in northern Myanmar as well as the Rohingya in the western state of Rakhine. The report, released in New York, charges that the genocidal intent of Myanmar's military toward the Rohingya was demonstrated "by means of killing female members of the Rohingya community, causing Rohingya women and girls serious bodily or mental harm, deliberately inflicting on the Rohingya women and girls conditions of life calculated to bring about the destruction of the Rohingya in whole or in part, and imposing measures that prevented births within the group." Myanmar's government and military have consistently denied carrying out human rights violations, and said its military operations in Rakhine were justified in response to attacks by Rohingya insurgents..."
Source/publisher: "The Straits Times" (Singapore)
2019-08-23
Date of entry/update: 2019-10-26
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
more
Description: "“Traffickers target youths who have bad reputations or low moral character more than youths who don’t understand.” This is what Myanmar’s Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement Director General U Win Naing Tun was quoted as saying recently when talking about human trafficking. Most human trafficking in Myanmar involves the selling of women as brides to China. Naing Tun’s words seem, at least at first glance, to have a tinge of victim-blaming in them. Especially as he went on to explain that unlike youth of “low moral character”, other youths could testify against their human traffickers in court, “so they avoid them”. While it would be unfair to accuse Naing Tun of victim-blaming with such limited information available on the statements he made, it is also true that victim-blaming has been a rampant practice in Myanmar. Even people of authority have been reported as practicing victim-blaming, especially concerning rape. Back in 2017, in an interview with local news, Lunn Aung San, the head of police in Ah Pyauk, Taukkyi township, said that most cases of sexual assault or abuse arise due to the woman victim’s choices..."
Creator/author:
Source/publisher: "The ASEAN Post" (Malaysia)
2019-07-15
Date of entry/update: 2019-10-25
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
more
Description: "International Women’s Health Coalition and Human Rights Watch welcome the opportunity to provide input to the Special Rapporteur on the sale and sexual exploitation of children on the topic of safeguards for the protection of the rights of children born from surrogacy arrangements. We appreciate the Special Rapporteur’s attention to new issues arising from innovations around assisted reproduction. We share the view that these developments raise important human rights issues. International Women’s Health Coalition and Human Rights Watch have decades of experience examining issues relevant to this topic in countries around the world. IWHC has a long history advocating to advance sexual and reproductive rights at the global and regional levels. The organization currently supports grantee partners’ advocacy on these issues in Argentina, Brazil, Cameroon, Egypt, Fiji, India, Kenya, Lebanon, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Poland, South Africa, Turkey and Uruguay. We are also currently doing documentation work on the impact of the global gag rule in Nepal, Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa, as well as documentation on the impact of refusals to provide care on the ground of conscience in Chile. Human Rights Watch has extensive experience documenting human rights abuses including trafficking of children and women, sexual exploitation of children and women, violations of the sexual and reproductive rights of women and girls, and criminalization of sexual and reproductive actions and decisions. We have conducted research on these topics in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Chile, China, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Indonesia, Ireland, Mauritania, Mexico, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, Ireland, Papua New Guinea, Poland, South Africa, Sierra Leone, the United States of America and Zimbabwe. The issue of surrogacy arrangements, particularly compensated surrogacy arrangements, requires careful consideration of several sets of intersecting rights, and the interests of multiple rights holders. This is particularly important given that human rights analysis around surrogacy is relatively nascent and given the key principles of universality and interdependence of human rights. We have reviewed the Special Rapporteur’s previous work on this issue and appreciate the strong focus that work has brought to the rights and interests of children born of surrogacy arrangements. Our goal, in this submission, is to highlight the other rights and rights holders also essential to this discussion. We are concerned by any over-broad view of the applicability of the prohibition on the sale of children to surrogacy that would unnecessarily, disproportionately or in a discriminatory fashion limit the options of surrogacy as a means of founding a family and exercising reproductive rights. The optional protocol prohibits “any act or transaction whereby a child is transferred by any person or group of persons to another for remuneration or any other consideration.” People acting as surrogates may do so for no remuneration (money paid for work or a service) or no consideration (money in exchange for benefits, goods, or services), and in other cases may receive compensation that constitutes fair recompense for lost wages and other opportunity costs, health care and nutrition expenses, and restitution for the significant burdens and risks associated with pregnancy. We submit that such arrangements do not and should not in and of themselves constitute sale of children under the optional protocol. In this submission we outline our recommendations regarding: 1) relevant human rights that should inform discussions around surrogacy; 2) relevant rights holders who should be part of discussions regarding surrogacy; and 3) longstanding human rights principles that should guide and inform legal and policy framework development on this issue..."
Source/publisher: Human Rights Watch
2019-06-03
Date of entry/update: 2019-06-11
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: RANGOON, Feb 25, 2010 (IPS) - When Aye Aye (not her real name) leaves her youngest son at home each night, she tells him that she has to work selling snacks. But what Aye actually sells is sex so that her 12-year-old son, a Grade 7 student, can finish his education.
Creator/author: Mon Mon Myat
Source/publisher: IPS
2010-02-25
Date of entry/update: 2010-11-02
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: Drawn by dreams of jobs, many Burmese women end up selling sex and doing drugs on the Chinese border... "Jiegao, a small thumb of land jutting into Burma from the Chinese side of the Sino-Burmese border, is an easy place to fall into a life of suffering. Slide Show (View) There are more than 20 brothels in this otherwise unremarkable border town, and most of the sex workers are from Burma. They come to find work in factories and restaurants or as maids, but soon discover that well-paid jobs are few and far between. In order to pay off debts and support themselves, many have little choice but to take up prostitution. The life of a migrant worker in China is precarious, and for those in the sex industry, the risks are all the greater. Although Burmese citizens can get three-month residency permits to live in Chinese towns along the border, prostitution is illegal in China, and sex workers live in constant fear of arrest. The price of freedom, if they are caught, is typically 500 yuan (US $73)—a lot of money for a prostitute charging 14 to 28 yuan ($2-4) a trick, or 150 yuan ($22) for a night with a customer, especially when you consider that at least half of this amount goes to the brothel?s owner..."
Creator/author: Than Aung
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 18, No. 4
2010-04-00
Date of entry/update: 2010-04-19
Grouping: Individual Documents
Category: Sex work
Language: English
more
Description: Some poor country girls survive by turning tricks with truck drivers doing the lonely overnight run between Mandalay and Taunggyi
Creator/author: Ko Htwe
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 17, No. 4
2009-07-00
Date of entry/update: 2009-08-11
Grouping: Individual Documents
Category: Sex work
Language: English
more
Description: One area of the economy where Cyclone Nargis caused prices to drop... RANGOON — "THEY?re known fancifully as nya-hmwe-pan, or ?fragrant flowers of the night,? although the reality of after-dark life for Rangoon?s increasing number of prostitutes isn?t so romantic. The number of ?fragrant flowers? walking the streets and working the bars of Burma?s major city has reportedly soared since Cyclone Nargis ripped into the Irrawaddy delta and tore families apart. The arrival of desperate young women ready to trade their bodies for the equivalent of two or three dollars has depressed Rangoon prices still further, and the new girls on the block face not only police harassment but the hostility of the ?old timers.? One afternoon in central Rangoon, I went hunting for an interview subject in one of the city?s main thoroughfares, Bogyoke Aung San Street. I didn?t have far to look..."
Creator/author: Aung Thet Wine
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 16, No. 7
2008-07-00
Date of entry/update: 2008-07-15
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: Stories of murder and mayhem abound in Kachin State?s casino town... "Welcome to the Macao of northern Burma: Maija Yang, once a backward Kachin State border village but now a bustling boom town with more than a dozen casinos catering to Chinese gamblers sidelined by restrictions in their own country. The frontier-style administration of Maija Yang, 160km north of the Kachin capital Myitkyina, is effectively in the hands of the Kachin Independence Organization, which is said to earn around 8.5 million yuan (more than US $1 million) annually from the Chinese-run casinos. Prostitution, drugs and alcohol probably net the town even more money. The first of the casinos was built four years ago under a KIO development program originally intended to provide local people, traditionally reliant on the opium trade, with an alternative source of income. The high-minded plan went awry, however—the casinos employ mostly Chinese staff, and the drugs problem is only getting worse..."
Creator/author: Khun Sam
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 13, No. 7
2005-07-00
Date of entry/update: 2006-04-30
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: Rangoon girls swap the sweatshop for a hands-on job... "Owners of karaoke bars in Burma these days really have something to sing about. While other business sectors flounder in Burma?s moribund economy, most karaoke joints—known as KTV—are humming, their cash registers are playing sweet music. On a typical night in downtown Rangoon, the Royal is crowded with men looking for more than a song and with young women whose talents anyway couldn?t be described as vocal...Linn Linn, a 31-year-old widow with two children to support, has worked at several karaoke clubs, one of which, she says, was owned by a senior police officer and five businessmen. Club owners often invite government officials along for some ?relaxation,? she claims. Linn Linn worked in a Rangoon brothel until a 2002 police crackdown on prostitution. Since then she has been employed by a string of karaoke bars, conceding that sex as well as songs are on the menu. About 50 karaoke girls were arrested in a second police crackdown, in 2003, on nightclubs suspected of doubling as brothels. Linn Linn escaped arrest, but she admits it might be only a matter of time before the next police raid puts her out of work. ?What else can I do?? she says. ?I have two children to support. Everything is so expensive now and the cost of living just rises and rises. I?ve no other way to make money other than continue in the karaoke trade.?..."
Creator/author: Ko Jay
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 13, No. 5
2005-05-00
Date of entry/update: 2006-04-27
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: "...This report, "Migrating With Hope: Burmese Women Working In Thailand and The Sex Industry" attempts to present and highlight the needs, interests, and realities of undocumented migrant women from Burma working as sex-workers in Thailand. We look at the lives of women in Burma, the migration processes, processes of entry into the sex-industry, and factors which govern women's wellbeing or suffering during the time of migration in Thailand. The authors hope that the documentation presented will provide useful information to prospective migrants from Burma. We also hope that it can be used to instigate programmes to protect the rights of and to provide the necessary services for undocumented migrant workers, and by doing this, prevent more Burmese women from being exploited. This report is written in the knowledge that women can become empowered to make informed choices about their lives. It is also hoped that this report will provide the general public with information not only about Burmese migrant women, but also about the situation of undocumented migrant workers who flee from Burma, a country ruled by a military regime..."
Source/publisher: Images Asia
1997-07-00
Date of entry/update: 2005-05-19
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 284.25 KB
more
Description: "...An old elevator door creaks open and seven women walk through the rooftop restaurant cum nightclub on a wet Friday night in Rangoon. A few wear long shiny red raincoats and sunglasses, others have fedoras tilted to hide their eyes, and some walk with children by their side. Despite the urbane camouflage it?s easy to see the women are all tall, thin and gorgeous. They move quickly towards the dressing rooms backstage, past tables of middle-aged men drinking glasses of Myanmar Beer and a woman singing John Denver?s "Take Me Home, Country Roads" over the deafening roar of a synthesizer. Within minutes the music dies down, stage lights flash on and the seven women appear onstage to the first few strains of a Brittany Spears tune. The men in the crowd clap, cheer and ogle as the ladies strut in tight-fitting slinky black and white bell-bottomed outfits..."
Creator/author: Chris O’Connell
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol. 11, No. 8
2003-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-12-06
Grouping: Individual Documents
Category: Sex work
Language: English
more
Description: "Crackdowns on Burmese migrants in Thailand push many women into the flesh trade... When 22-year-old Sandar Kyaw first arrived in Thailand from Burma two months ago, she worked 12-hour days, sewing clothing in one of the many garment factories around the border town of Mae Sot. Now she sits in a hot, dimly lit room in a brothel, watching TV with her co-workers, and waiting for a man to pay 500 baht (US $12.50) for one hour of sex with her. With six younger siblings and her parents struggling to make ends meet in Rangoon, making money is her main priority. "I want to save 10,000 baht and go home," she says. Since factory wages for illegal Burmese migrants average roughly 2,000 baht per month, saving such a sum on her sewing wages would have taken months. When her friend suggested they leave the factory for the more lucrative brothel, Sandar Kyaw agreed. Since she retains half her hourly fee, just one customer a day can net her three times her factory wage..."
Creator/author: Kevin R. Manning
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy" Vol 11, No. 8
2003-10-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-12-06
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: The flesh trade is flourishing along the Thai-Burma border, where the wages of cheap sex are adding to the toll taken by decades of poverty and military conflict. Tachilek, a border town in the Burmese sector of the Golden Triangle, has a reputation for many things, few of them good. Most recently in the media spotlight as the center of a pitched battle between Thai, Burmese and ethnic insurgent forces that has claimed lives on both sides of the border, Tachilek is best known as a major conduit for opium and methamphetamines flowing out of Burma. It also has a Thai-owned casino and a thriving black market in everything from pirated VCDs to tiger skins and Burmese antiques. But stroll across the Friendship Bridge from Mae Sai, Thailand, and would-be guides will waste no time making sure you don?t miss the main attraction. "Phuying, phuying," they whisper in Thai, clutching photos of Tachilek?s very own Shwedagon pagoda and other local sights. "Phuying, suay maak," they repeat: "Girls, very beautiful."
Creator/author: Neil Lawrence
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy", Vol. 9. No. 2
2001-02-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more
Description: "Are young Burmese girls working in the brothels of Thailand victims or players in the lucrative sex trade? Perhaps a look at two typical cases can shed light on this question..."
Creator/author: Aung Zaw in Mae Sai, Chiang Mai & Min Zin in Ranong
Source/publisher: "The Irrawaddy", Vol. 9. No. 2
2001-02-00
Date of entry/update: 2003-06-03
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
more