BURMA: THREE ETHNIC TRAFFICKING VICTIMS RETURN

C O N F I D E N T I A L RANGOON 001829 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR INL/HSTC; STATE FOR EAP/MLS; STATE FOR G/TIP E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/26/2016 TAGS: KCRM KWMN PHUM BM SUBJECT: BURMA: THREE ETHNIC TRAFFICKING VICTIMS RETURN FROM BEIJING REF: A. CHENGDU 1087 ¶B. RANGOON 1076 Classified By: Poloff Dean Tidwell for Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (U) SUMMARY: The recent case of three Kachin women who were trafficked to China to be brides for Chinese men illustrates how the lack economic opportunity for Burma's ethnic minorities makes them increasingly vulnerable to human traffickers. After being lured to the Chinese border by an acquaintance who promised them work in China, the victims realized they had been sold. Forced to travel across China with multiple handlers, they escaped their captors in Beijing and appealed to a police officer for help. After month-long negotiations, China repatriated the three victims to Kachin State. END SUMMARY. ¶2. (C) Reverend Dr. Saboi Jum (PROTECT),a prominent ethnic Kachin leader and close Embassy contact, recently related how his niece was trafficked to China in the summer of 2006. A Kachin woman named Nhkawng Lu, a resident of Myitkyina whom the victims knew, promised to help the niece and two female friends in their early 20s find jobs in China. She did not request them to pay her a service fee. The three women accompanied their Kachin compatriot to the border crossing point at Laiza. Once in Yunnan Province, the women observed their new Chinese handlers paying the Kachin woman and realized their "friend" had sold them. The Chinese handlers confined the women inside a house and kept them under constant guard. The three Kachin women could speak basic Chinese and understood their handlers planned to sell them as brides for Chinese men. ¶3. (U) The Kachin women tried unsuccessfully to escape their captors in Yingjiang. After traveling by road to Kunming, they were handed over to new handlers and again tried to escape. The Kunming handlers physically abused them as punishment for attempting to flee. Their handlers included both men and women. From Kunming, they traveled by train to an unknown city where new handlers took custody of them. Next, their handlers took them by train to Beijing. In the confusion at the Beijing station platform, the Kachin women saw a Chinese policeman, rushed over to him, and begged him to help. Their captors immediately disappeared into the crowd. ¶4. (U) After initially confining them in a jail for a few days while questioning them about the experience, the Chinese authorities transferred the three Kachins to a welfare home for women. The Burmese Embassy and the Chinese Foreign Ministry contacted the Burmese government, and local police in Kachin State visited one victim's home to verify that she was missing. After a month-long investigation, both governments were satisfied the three women were trafficking victims and the Chinese government transported them to the Burma border. Upon arrival home, the women gave statements to Burmese police identifying the woman who trafficked them, who has reportedly gone into hiding. ¶5. (U) COMMENT: Although this case is a positive example of how Chinese and Burmese authorities are cooperating on cross-border trafficking, better training and enforcement by authorities is necessary to stop the victims before they leave the country. Additionally, Burma has yet to address the root cause of trafficking -- the dearth of economic opportunities for youth in Kachin State caused by the regime's policies of giving prime jobs in government and business to ethnic Burmans and shutting out the ethnic majority Kachins. Chinese companies with concessions to log timber and mine in Kachin State frequently use their own workers and supplies from China, doing little to support the local Kachin economy or provide desperately needed jobs for locals. Note: There are many Burmese working in the mines, according to NGOs working on HIV/AIDS in Myitkyina. End Note. As long as the regime's short-sighted economic discrimination continues, young Kachins will continue to look elsewhere for economic opportunity, making them even more vulnerable prey for human traffickers. END COMMENT. VILLAROSA