IJM MENDS FENCES, FACILITATES TRAFFICKING

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 BANGKOK 000827 SIPDIS SENSITIVE DEPT OF LABOR FOR ILAB - MARK MITTELHAUSER AND BRANDIE SASSER; STATE FOR G/TIP, EAP/MLS, DRL/IL E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ELAB KCRM KWMN PREF PHUM TH SUBJECT: IJM MENDS FENCES, FACILITATES TRAFFICKING CONVICTIONS IN THAILAND ¶1. (SBU) Summary. The U.S.-based anti-trafficking NGO, IJM, is improving its image in Thailand and received qualified praise from NGO stakeholders during a final evaluation of its three-year TIP project funded by the Department of Labor. Separately, RTG police officials have credited IJM's instrumental assistance in over a dozen completed and pending TIP prosecutions since 2004. IJM's new staff has also reached out to improve coordination with local NGOs, and has assisted subgrantee organizations in providing legal assistance to thousands of disadvantaged hill tribe members seeking Thai citizenship and education to reduce their vulnerability to trafficking. While IJM continues to face suspicion that it is too closely tied to USG anti-TIP policy, its recent accomplishments have convinced many, especially in Thai law enforcement, that it plays a valuable and results-oriented role combating TIP in Thailand. End Summary. ¶2. (SBU) The International Justice Mission (IJM),in the course of a final evaluation by Department of Labor (DOL) officials of a three-year, USD 700,000 project for anti trafficking-in-persons (TIP) work in Thailand, received extensive praise for its recent work, combined with residual criticism for past problems, at a February 3 workshop with project stakeholders in Chiang Mai. The workshop was moderated by the project's local evaluation team, a group of three researchers who were contracted by DOL from Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. The workshop stakeholders' review focused on IJM's ability to meet original objectives of the project, "Thailand Sex Trafficking Taskforce: Prevention Placement Program," which ran from 2003 to 2005. The project aimed to put in place a comprehensive, replicable strategy to combat TIP through prevention, victim removal and rehabilitation activities. The workshop was attended by three Emboffs and two visiting DOL reps, and included subgrantee organizations in the IJM project as well as other NGO partners, hill tribe representatives, law enforcement officers and other RTG officials. The workshop concluded a week of on-site meetings by DOL evaluators with IJM's partners in Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai provinces. -------------- Overcoming an Image Problem -------------- ¶3. (SBU) IJM's office in Thailand, by the open admission of its current staff, has fought an uphill battle in recent years against allegations that it overzealously pursued TIP cases in dramatic, well-publicized raids that ran roughshod over local authorities and sensitivities. Early after its establishment in 2001, IJM was accused of removing prostitutes from brothel establishments against their will, failing to provide for post-removal care and shelter for rescued women, and allowing ordinary migrant workers to be rounded up and detained along with legitimate TIP victims. In truth, IJM was not the only NGO in Thailand subject to these accusations. But Thai observers at the time questioned the authority of a U.S.-based NGO conducting law enforcement operations in a sovereign country. The prominent U.S.-supported anti-TIP coordinating NGO in northern Thailand, TRAFCORD, complained that IJM, as a newcomer unqualified to investigate trafficking in Thailand, was hampering the Thai court system by filing cases that lacked acceptable evidence and unsettling existing NGO relationships with Thai prosecutors and judges. ¶4. (SBU) In interviews this month, however, anti-trafficking NGOs in northern Thailand indicate that IJM's current staff has worked hard to mend fences with Thai civil society over the past two years, and local police officials especially are grateful for the technical and investigative assistance that IJM has provided in securing the prosecution of numerous trafficking rings. IJM has shown a greater regard for local sensitivities by working with Thai counterparts behind the scenes, eschewing publicity and allowing Thai law enforcement partners to take credit for recent courtroom successes. TRAFCORD has also reached a modus vivendi with IJM, and, although it does not cooperate with IJM as much as IJM would like on TIP cases brought to the attention of both organizations, TRAFCORD tacitly admits that IJM has achieved solid recent results, and accepts that the two NGOs can work concurrently, if separately, in the same region. -------------- IJM A "Great Benefit to Thailand" -------------- ¶5. (SBU) At the February 3 stakeholders' workshop, IJM received strong praise from a Thai police captain who serves as a principal investigative inspector of trafficking in Thailand's Region 5 - northern provinces. (Although the workshop did not specifically focus on IJM's assistance in prosecutions, which was outside the scope of the DOL project, these activities were considered relevant by law enforcement in the deterrence of future trafficking.) The captain said IJM's cooperation with Thai police over the past year, especially for its provision of technological expertise, was crucial to local prosecutors in securing trafficking convictions. "IJM is world-renowned for its investigative experience," the captain said, "and they've provided a degree of technical support and equipment to which we've never before had access." The captain added, "In a world where we have limited resources to perform our jobs, where we sometimes have to use our own money for transportation to trafficking sites, IJM is like having a free set of investigators - they help us do our jobs in a very clever and supportive manner, and are performing a great benefit to Thailand." ¶6. (SBU) Another workshop participant, representing an NGO with 18 years of experience providing counseling services for hill tribe members, also praised IJM for its recent work: "When IJM first came to Thailand, they forced their will on us - they acted as if they found a car that didn't work and needed to replace every single part in order to make it run. Now, they look at the car to determine what's wrong and how to fix it. Their current leadership is much more understanding and, although some of their work still duplicates the work that other NGOs were already performing, they are ultimately benefiting children and indeed all trafficking victims. As much as you might criticize them, it would be a very sad day indeed if IJM departed Thailand." ¶7. (SBU) A balanced assessment of IJM's activities was provided by Sompop Jantraka, the Nobel Prize-nominated director of the Development Education Program for Daughters and Communities (DEPDC),who stressed that "IJM has done much positive work in Thailand and has dramatically improved its operating style, but needs to continue to prove itself." He asked that IJM focus on "opening itself" to the Thai public by working with other NGOs and thinking of itself as "a tool for the entire community." "Some of us have been here for a long time and have broad experience in combating trafficking," Sompop said. "You (IJM) are like a younger brother to us, but we all need brothers and sisters and you cannot operate independently. You have to trust us (the NGO community),and I believe you have been doing so recently," Sompop added. ¶8. (SBU) Separately, a representative from the RTG's Human Resource Development Office who also serves as a government representative on TRAFCORD, said he was pleasantly surprised at the scope of IJM's progress outlined in the workshop. "I didn't really know what IJM was doing until today," he said, "but there is still the perception that IJM is an arm of the U.S. government." He said he had three recommendations for IJM: 1) to recognize that there are "good and bad cops" everywhere - and make the choice to work with the good ones; 2) to support NGOs in a more sustainable manner, and avoid providing short-term subgrantee funds that are cut off too quickly; and 3) to work towards more of a partnership with other NGOs rather than a boss/employee relationship. (Comment: In a separate meeting with IJM and TRAFCORD, TRAFCORD program coordinator Ben Svasti, a noted IJM critic in the past, also remarked that relations between the two organizations had improved, and differentiated the two by saying that IJM was "more concerned with results" while TRAFCORD focused on "building a process.") ¶9. (SBU) IJM's Thailand Director and Thai police investigators, in separate meetings with Emboffs and DOL officers, provided further details on IJM's collaboration with Thai prosecutors: IJM facilitated a total of ten trafficking convictions in 2004-2005, with six cases pending trial in 2006. Although classified as "trafficking" cases by IJM, the convictions were obtained under a variety of penal code provisions, ranging from hiring aliens without permission to procuring women and children for the purposes of prostitution, with sentences as follows: -- LU Trafficking Case, Chiang Rai, 2 convictions (15 years) -- HARDING Pedophilia Case, Chiang Mai, 1 conviction (8 mos.) -- SUREERAT Trafficking Case, Chiang Rai, 4 convictions (4-5 years) -- NAREEDANG Child Labor Case, Chiang Rai, 1 conviction (2 years probation) -- MAYA Karaoke Trafficking Case, Chiang Rai, 1 conviction (3 months) -- JARIWALA Pedophilia Case, Chiang Mai, 1 conviction (9 months) ¶10. (SBU) In an indication that Thai courts are increasingly accepting IJM's investigative techniques, prosecutors secured the LU convictions and 15 year jail sentences through the use of videotape evidence, provided by IJM and Chiang Rai immigration police using hidden cameras as they negotiated the procurement and "sale" of a 15-year old Burmese girl for sexual purposes. The SUREERAT case conviction was also obtained through hidden camera evidence, with the sole defendant who pleaded not guilty receiving the most severe sentence of 5 years. (The judge in this case, upon seeing IJM's videotape of the prostitution transaction, asked the defendant if she wished to reconsider her plea. When she refused, the judge handed her the harshest sentence of the four defendants.) -------------- -------------- Concerns Remain About Sustainability, "Loyalties" -------------- -------------- ¶11. (SBU) At the stakeholders' meeting, the Chulalongkorn evaluation team also gave their own one-hour presentation of findings which credited IJM and its subgrantees with raising awareness of TIP through the use of the arts and sporting events, and with providing scholarships, legal services and shelter homes for TIP victims or women and children at risk of being trafficked. The evaluators acknowledged that IJM had made a significant impact on improving NGO networks on anti-TIP activities and improving the capacity of immigration police to investigate trafficking rings. The evaluators also noted the high number of hill tribe members that was reached through awareness raising activities. Several thousand hill tribe members were granted Thai citizenship during the project period, although it was difficult to determine the impact of IJM and subgrantee activities on the citizenship decisions by Thai authorities. Despite these positive outcomes, the evaluators questioned the sustainability of IJM strategies upon completion of the DOL program, due to a lack of management capacity building among IJM's 17 total subgrantee organizations and their dependence on IJM funding for survival. ¶12. (SBU) Laboff and DOL officers also spoke at the workshop to counter the evaluators' stated belief that information obtained by IJM might unfairly tarnish Thailand's reputation on trafficking. The evaluators' power point presentation included a slide stating that the "release of information about some trafficking and child rights violation cases can tarnish Thailand's reputation in sex trafficking suppression and has implications on other aspects of the U.S.-Thai relationship." Ask to expand on this concern, the evaluators noted the perception among some Thai NGOs that IJM was in effect a "front" for the USG and was established primarily to channel information to the USG for inclusion in the State Department's annual TIP report. The evaluators also said that the phrase "other aspects of the U.S.-Thai relationship" referred to trade relations and possible implications of Thailand's trafficking and child labor record on ongoing Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations as well as trade preference programs such as GSP. The evaluators asked for clarification of the use of IJM's case histories in the U.S. TIP report and the use of other sources in evaluating Thailand's efforts to combat TIP. ¶13. (SBU) Laboff said that the TIP report is a comprehensive review of TIP activities around the world that reviewed not just the prevalence of TIP in each country studied, but the extent of government activities to combat TIP and its root causes. Laboff said that the Embassy, and the USG in general, relied on a diverse set of sources for information on TIP, including (but not limited to) local and international NGOs, the media, host country law enforcement and immigration agencies, and academic researchers. Laboff said much of the information received from IJM (and other NGOs including TRAFCORD) included difficult-to-obtain statistics on recent successful TIP prosecutions and convictions which could only reflect well on Thailand's efforts to combat TIP. ¶14. (SBU) DOL officers also said that they had an obligation to properly monitor the results of IJM's activities, as with the activities of all NGOs receiving USG funding, to ensure that funds were used as intended and achieving measurable results. Laboff added that U.S.-Thai relations could only be strengthened by an open exchange of information on these issues, and that trade relations would continue to progress on the understanding that both countries were already committed to upholding basic standards to combat child labor and TIP. There remained room for improvement, however, and Laboff asked that the stakeholders press their RTG contacts to ensure passage of the draft comprehensive Anti-Trafficking Law that is pending approval by the Thai parliament this year. ¶15. (SBU) Comment: Project evaluators' doubts about the sustainability of IJM's strategies will add impetus to IJM's efforts to pursue follow-on funding after the completion of the DOL project. While they will continue to address the northern provinces, IJM is also focusing their activities on trafficking routes to the South, which they believe are leading to Hat Yai in Songkhla province and beyond. Emboffs noted during this visit the number of interlocutors, including Thai police officials and representatives from the International Labor Organization (ILO),who concur that Hat Yai is becoming a major focal point of human trafficking in Thailand. Activities in Hat Yai will be a subject for future post TIP reporting. BOYCE