CAMBODIA
Human trafficking suspects arrested
Authorities arrested three people in the Cambodian capital for allegedly trying to sell women and a three-month-old boy to a Malaysia-based criminal network, police said.
Human trafficking suspects arrested
Authorities arrested three people in the Cambodian capital for allegedly trying to sell women and a three-month-old boy to a Malaysia-based criminal network, police said.
Lam Thimay and Nguyen Taing of Vietnam, and Ros Mayan, a Cambodian woman, were expected to appear in court on Monday on charges of trafficking the women and the infant, said Meng Se, Phnom Penh anti-trafficking police chief.
Police arrested Lam Thimay, 40, and Ros Mayan, 33, on Thursday.
They nabbed Lam Thimay with the boy on a bus she was taking to Banteay Meanchey province in Cambodia's northwest. From there, Ros Mayan was to act as his mother and carry him into Thailand at a promised fee of 1,000 baht ($A33.58), Meng Se said.
Lam Thimay bought the toddler from an unknown person for $US180 ($A238). It's not clear where the boy was being taken to in Malaysia. He was being cared for at a government-run centre.
Police used Lam Thimay to catch Nguyen Taing, a 44-year-old Vietnamese man who was supposed to smuggle two Vietnamese women out of Cambodia via Thailand on Friday.
"These people had been under our surveillance for quite some time, but we lacked enough evidence to apprehend them until recently," Meng Se said.
The Vietnamese suspects lived in Kuala Lumpur and were part of a larger criminal network run by Vietnamese nationals in Malaysia. They told police that "their big boss is in Kuala Lumpur waiting to receive them" and the smuggled people, Meng Se said.
The Cambodian woman, who lives in Banteay Meanchey province, helped Lam Thimay smuggle two babies into Thailand before. From Thailand, Lam Thimay would travel with the children to Malaysia.
Human trafficking has become a lucrative business in Cambodia, which is recovering from three decades of civil war that forced thousands to flee their homes and in some cases seek refuge abroad.
Cambodian children have been forced to beg on the streets of Thailand and Vietnam, young men to work as forced labourers on fishing boats in Thailand, and women have been pressed into prostitution in Malaysia and Cambodia.
If convicted, the three could face from 10 to 20 years in prison.