US Congress to Mount Pressure On Cambodia's Human Trafficking
 A senior United States congressman is moving to have Cambodia's human trafficking ranking downgraded in bid to cut foreign aid to the Indochinese state.
US House Foreign Committee member Ed Royce (Republican-California} said he will push for an amendment to a bill calling for the reclassifying of the State Department's human trafficking for Cambodia from Tier 2 to Tier 3, Phnom Penh Post website reported. "The amendment would cut off non-humanitarian aid to Cambodia in order to push for real reform to human trafficking problems in that country," said the US congressman. Royce's amendment bill is yet to pass approval from the Capitool Hill. In the Trafficking in Persons Report 2011, released by the US Department of State in June, Cambodia was classified as a Tier 2 country, which groups countries that do not fully comply with minimum standards of the US Trafficking Victims Protection Act but are making "significant efforts" to do so. Countries placed on Tier 3 are considered not to be making significant efforts to comply with the standards and could be subject to penalties, including trade and economic sanctions. Thai MP Chuvit Kamonvisit produced a video clip during a parliament meeting on Thursday showing dozens of Cambodian workers being trafficked across the Thai-Cambodian border in Aranyaprathet. The Cambodians, believed to be employed as illegal, cheap labor inside Thailand, slipped into Thai territory through a strip of land declared off-limits to civilians. Besides, the Cambodians were hired to smuggle Cambodian rice across Aranyaprathet's border canal for sales in Thailand where it will make 15,000 baht a ton under the Yingluck government's rice price-pledging policy, according to Chuvit. They also allegedly brought empty canisters to fill up cooking gas in the Thai border district and take them back to the neighboring state. Produced by VoiceTV |
