THAILAND -- 2009 TIP REPORT: PRESS GUIDANCE AND

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 06 STATE 060449 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: KTIP ELAB KCRM KPAO KWMN PGOV PHUM PREL SMIG TH SUBJECT: THAILAND -- 2009 TIP REPORT: PRESS GUIDANCE AND DEMARCHE REF: A. (A) STATE 59732 ¶B. (B) STATE 005577 ¶1. This is an action cable; see paras 5 through 7 and 10. ¶2. On June 16, 2009, at 10:00 a.m. EDT, the Secretary will release the 2009 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report at a press conference in the Department's press briefing room. This release will receive substantial coverage in domestic and foreign news outlets. Until the time of the Secretary's June 16 press conference, any public release of the Report or country narratives contained therein is prohibited. ¶3. The Department is hereby providing Post with advance press guidance to be used on June 16 or thereafter. Also provided is demarche language to be used in informing the Government of Thailand of its tier ranking and the TIP Report's imminent release. The text of the TIP Report country narrative is provided, both for use in informing the Government of Thailand and in any local media release by Post's public affairs section on June 16 or thereafter. Drawing on information provided below in paras 8 and 9, Post may provide the host government with the text of the TIP Report narrative no earlier than 1200 noon local time Monday June 15 for WHA, AF, EUR, and NEA countries and OOB local time Tuesday June 16 for SCA and EAP posts. Please note, however, that any public release of the Report's information should not/not precede the Secretary's release at 10:00 am EDT on June 16. ¶4. The entire TIP Report will be available on-line at www.state.gov/g/tip shortly after the Secretary's June 16 release. Hard copies of the Report will be pouched to posts in all countries appearing on the Report. The Secretary's statement at the June 16 press event, and the statement of and fielding of media questions by G/TIP,s Director and Senior Advisor to the Secretary, Ambassador-at-Large Luis CdeBaca, will be available on the Department's website shortly after the June 16 event. Ambassador de Baca will also hold a general briefing for officials of foreign embassies in Washington DC on June 17 at 3:30 pm EDT. ¶5. Action Request: No earlier than 12 noon local time on Monday June 15 for WHA, AF, EUR, and NEA posts and OOB local time on Tuesday June 16 for SCA and EAP posts, please inform the appropriate official in the Government of Thailand of the June 16 release of the 2009 TIP Report, drawing on the points in para 9 (at Post's discretion) and including the text of the country narrative provided in para 8. For countries where the State Department has lowered the tier ranking, it is particularly important to advise governments prior to the Report being released in Washington on June 16. ¶6. Action Request continued: Please note that, for those countries which will not receive an "action plan" with specific recommendations for improvement, posts should draw host governments' attention to the areas for improvement identified in the 2009 Report, especially highlighted in the "Recommendations" section of the second paragraph of the narrative text. This engagement is important to establishing the framework in which the government's performance will be judged for the 2010 Report. If posts have questions about which governments will receive an action plan, or how they may follow up on the recommendations in the 2009 Report, please contact G/TIP and the appropriate regional bureau. ¶7. Action Request continued: On June 16, please be prepared to answer media inquiries on the Report's release using the press guidance provided in para 11. If Post wishes, a local press statement may be released on or after 10:30 am EDT June 16, drawing on the press guidance and the text of the TIP Report's country narrative provided in para 8. ¶8. Begin Final Text of Thailand,s country narrative in the 2009 TIP Report: -------------- THAILAND (TIER 2) -------------- Thailand is a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children trafficked for the purposes of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Thailand,s relative prosperity attracts migrants from neighboring countries and from as far away as Russia and Fiji who flee conditions of poverty and, in the case of Burma, military repression. Significant illegal migration to Thailand presents traffickers with opportunities to force, coerce, or defraud undocumented migrants into involuntary servitude or STATE 00060449 002 OF 006 sexual exploitation. Following migration to Thailand, men, women, and children, primarily from Burma, are trafficked for forced labor in fishing-related industries, factories, agriculture, construction, domestic work, and begging. Women and children are trafficked from Burma, Cambodia, Laos, the People,s Republic of China, Vietnam, Russia, and Uzbekistan for commercial sexual exploitation in Thailand. Ethnic minorities such as northern hill tribe peoples, many of whom do not have legal status in the country, are at a disproportionately high risk for trafficking internally and abroad. Media reports during the year alleged trafficking of some Burmese migrants, including some refugees, from Malaysia to Thailand. Most Thai sex trafficking victims repatriated to Thailand were trafficked to Bahrain and Malaysia. Some Thai men who migrate for low-skilled contract work in Taiwan, Malaysia, the United States and elsewhere are subjected to conditions of forced labor after arrival. There are no reliable estimates of the number of trafficking victims in Thailand. Sex tourism in Thailand may encourage trafficking for sexual exploitation. The Royal Thai Government does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so. The government began implementing a new, comprehensive anti-human trafficking law that came into force in June 2008 and trained the law enforcement community on the new legislation. In recent years, the number of annual convictions for sex trafficking has declined. Three sex traffickers were convicted, and the government initiated prosecutions of 54 individuals for trafficking offenses, including forced child labor, during the reporting period. The government did not, however, achieve a conviction for a labor trafficking offense during the year. The government initiated prosecution for multiple trafficking offenses of three owners of a Samut Sakhon shrimp processing factory raided in 2006. Recommendations for Thailand: Increase efforts to investigate labor trafficking and prosecute labor traffickers; improve efforts to identify victims of trafficking among vulnerable groups, such as undocumented migrants; ensure that adult foreign trafficking victims who are willing to work with local law enforcement are not confined to shelters involuntarily; develop and implement mechanisms to allow adult foreign trafficking victims to seek and find employment outside shelters; educate migrant workers on their rights, their employers' obligations to them, legal recourse available to victims of trafficking, and how to seek remedies against traffickers. Prosecution -------------- The Royal Thai Government continued some law enforcement efforts to combat trafficking in persons. A comprehensive anti-trafficking law that went into effect in June 2008 covers all forms of trafficking and prescribes penalties that are sufficiently stringent and that are commensurate with penalties prescribed for other grave crimes, such as rape. Prescribed punishments are doubled if the convicted trafficking offender is a public official. The government initiated prosecutions against at least 54 individuals for trafficking offenses, eight of whom are being prosecuted for forced child labor. During the reporting period, there were at least three convictions for sex trafficking offenses; two Thai women were convicted and sentenced to 34 and 50 years, imprisonment, respectively, for brokering children for prostitution, and another Thai woman was sentenced to 14 years in prison for the 2006 trafficking of two young women to Italy for prostitution. The government trained police officers, immigration officers, prosecutors and social workers on the new anti-trafficking law. A police division established in 2006 ) the Children and Women Protection Division ) continues to have nationwide jurisdiction to conduct anti-trafficking investigations. In addition, the police's newly established Transnational Crime Coordination Center collects and analyzes trafficking information and conducts strategic planning for anti-trafficking efforts along with the Office of the Attorney General's Center Against International Human Trafficking. Nevertheless, investigations for trafficking offenses were disrupted or delayed because of frequent personnel turnover, and observers reported that cooperation between police and prosecutors on criminal (including trafficking) cases could be improved. There were reports that local police protected brothels, other sex venues, and seafood and sweatshop facilities from raids, and occasionally facilitated the movement of women into or through Thailand. In the absence of specific, credible allegations of official complicity in trafficking, the government did not report any investigations or prosecutions of Thai officials for trafficking-related corruption. A police officer suspected of trafficking in 2007 was convicted, fined, and fired for alien smuggling. STATE 00060449 003 OF 006 The government reported that available evidence did not support a trafficking prosecution. The government initiated prosecution of three owners of a shrimp processing factory, in which 66 trafficking victims were found in September 2006, for multiple trafficking offenses. Authorities also initiated prosecutions of six individuals in the March 2008 raid of a separate shrimp processing facility, but their trial is not yet complete. In July 2006, a fleet of six fishing vessels returned to a Thai port and surviving crew members reported the death while at sea of 39 seafarers, most of whom were Burmese. Although survivors have testified that the 39 died from conditions of malnutrition due to captains' failure to provide food and freedom to the seafarers ) as they were confined to the fishing boats for over three years ) and that their bodies were disposed of at sea, the government has been unable to locate the captains to arrest them for unlawful disposal of corpses and believes it is unlikely that available evidence will support trafficking-related charges. Protection -------------- The Thai government continued to provide impressive protection to foreign and Thai victims of trafficking in Thailand and Thai trafficking victims abroad. The government expanded its network of temporary shelters for trafficking victims by 99 to 138, with at least one temporary shelter in each Thai province. The government refers victims of trafficking to one of eight longer-stay regional shelters run by the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security (MSDHS),where they receive psychological counseling, food, board, and medical care. The new anti-trafficking law extended victim protection provisions to male trafficking victims, and one of the government's long-stay shelters exclusively serves adult male victims and their families. In 2008, the government,s shelters provided protection and social services for at least 102 repatriated Thai victims and 520 foreigners trafficked to Thailand. The Department of Consular Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported that 443 Thai nationals classified as trafficking victims were repatriated from a number of overseas locations, including Bahrain (360 victims),Malaysia (73 victims),and Taiwan (5 victims),between October 2007 and September 2008. Most of the victims were sex trafficking victims held in conditions of debt bondage. The Thai government, with NGO assistance, has implemented trafficking victim identification procedures, and has since conducted trainings for approximately 2,500 government officials. The government claimed that it screened undocumented migrants for trafficking victims, but informed observers asserted that it did not systematically do so. The government provides shelter and social services to all identified Thai and foreign trafficking victims pending their repatriation to their country or town of origin. Foreign trafficking victims in Thai custody, including those who cooperate with law enforcement, cannot leave shelters unsupervised, are not offered legal alternatives to their removal to countries where the victims may face hardship or retribution, and are not permitted to work outside shelters. Some foreign victims have been confined to shelters for as long as two years. The government encourages victims, participation in the investigation and prosecution of trafficking crimes, and some victims do participate. NGOs have reported complaints by some foreign victims in shelters who feel that the government does not handle their repatriation in a timely fashion, and who feel pressured to remain in shelters in order to assist with prosecutions. Language barriers, fear of traffickers, distrust of Thai officials, slow legal processes, and the financial needs of victims all played a role in the decision of some victims to not participate in the Thai legal process, including criminal prosecutions. The 1998 Labor Protection Act allows for compensatory damages from employers in cases of forced labor, and the government ordered compensation in one of the shrimp factory cases and funded plaintiffs' attorneys in a successful civil action in the other shrimp factory case. Prevention -------------- The Thai government continued to support prevention and public awareness activities on trafficking during the year, including through &public dialogues8 on trafficking and television advertisements. Informed observers report significant forced labor among migrants who participate in Thailand,s temporary work program, suggesting victims, inability to seek assistance from the government without fear of punishment or deportation and a lack of efforts to inform migrant workers of options for remedies against exploitative employers and labor brokers. Government efforts to reduce domestic demand for illegal commercial sex acts and child sex tourism were evidenced through the prosecution of approximately 20 child sex tourists, as well as occasional STATE 00060449 004 OF 006 police raids to shut down brothels and awareness-raising campaigns targeting tourists. Thailand has not ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol. ¶9. Post may wish to deliver the following points, which offer technical and legal background on the TIP Report process, to the host government as a non-paper with the above TIP Report country narrative: (begin non-paper) -- The U.S. Congress, through its passage of the 2000 Trafficking Victims Protection Act, as amended (TVPA), requires the Secretary of State to submit an annual Report to Congress. The goal of this Report is to stimulate action and create partnerships around the world in the fight against modern-day slavery. The USG approach to combating human trafficking follows the TVPA and the standards set forth in the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (commonly known as the "Palermo Protocol"). The TVPA and the Palermo Protocol recognize that this is a crime in which the victims, labor or services (including in the "sex industry") are obtained or maintained through force, fraud, or coercion, whether overt or through psychological manipulation. While much attention has focused on international flows, both the TVPA and the Palermo Protocol focus on the exploitation of the victim, and do not require a showing that the victim was moved. -- Recent amendments to the TVPA removed the requirement that only countries with a "significant number" of trafficking victims be included in the Report. Beginning with the 2009 TIP Report, countries determined to be a country of origin, transit, or destination for victims of severe forms of trafficking are included in the Report and assigned to one of three tiers. Countries assessed as meeting the "minimum standards for the elimination of severe forms of trafficking" set forth in the TVPA are classified as Tier 1. Countries assessed as not fully complying with the minimum standards, but making significant efforts to meet those minimum standards are classified as Tier 2. Countries assessed as neither complying with the minimum standards nor making significant efforts to do so are classified as Tier 3. -- The TVPA also requires the Secretary of State to provide a "Special Watch List" to Congress later in the year. Anti-trafficking efforts of the countries on this list are to be evaluated again in an Interim Assessment that the Secretary of State must provide to Congress by February 1 of each year. Countries are included on the "Special Watch List" if they move up in "tier" rankings in the annual TIP Report -- from 3 to 2 or from 2 to 1 ) or if they have been placed on the Tier 2 Watch List. -- Tier 2 Watch List consists of Tier 2 countries determined: (1) not to have made "increasing efforts" to combat human trafficking over the past year; (2) to be making significant efforts based on commitments of anti-trafficking reforms over the next year, or (3) to have a very significant number of trafficking victims or a significantly increasing victim population. As indicated in reftel B, the TVPRA of 2008 contains a provision requiring that a country that has been included on Tier 2 Watch List for two consecutive years after the date of enactment of the TVPRA of 2008 be ranked as Tier ¶3. Thus, any automatic downgrade to Tier 3 pursuant to this provision would take place, at the earliest, in the 2011 TIP Report (i.e., a country would have to be ranked Tier 2 Watch List in the 2009 and 2010 Reports before being subject to Tier 3 in the 2011 Report). The new law allows for a waiver of this provision for up to two additional years upon a determination by the President that the country has developed and devoted sufficient resources to a written plan to make significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with the minimum standards. -- Countries classified as Tier 3 may be subject to statutory restrictions for the subsequent fiscal year on non-humanitarian and non-trade-related foreign assistance and, in some circumstances, withholding of funding for participation by government officials or employees in educational and cultural exchange programs. In addition, the President could instruct the U.S. executive directors to international financial institutions to oppose loans or other utilization of funds (other than for humanitarian, trade-related or certain types of development assistance) with respect to countries on Tier 3. Countries classified as Tier 3 that take strong action within 90 days of the Report's release to show significant efforts against trafficking in persons, and thereby warrant a reassessment of their Tier classification, would avoid such sanctions. Guidelines for STATE 00060449 005 OF 006 such actions are in the DOS-crafted action plans to be shared by Posts with host governments. -- The 2009 TIP Report, issuing as it does in the midst of the global financial crisis, highlights high levels of trafficking for forced labor in many parts of the world and systemic contributing factors to this phenomenon: fraudulent recruitment practices and excessive recruiting fees in workers, home countries; the lack of adequate labor protections in both sending and receiving countries; and the flawed design of some destination countries, "sponsorship systems" that do not give foreign workers adequate legal recourse when faced with conditions of forced labor. As the May 2009 ILO Global Report on Forced Labor concluded, forced labor victims suffer approximately $20 billion in losses, and traffickers, profits are estimated at $31 billion. The current global financial crisis threatens to increase the number of victims of forced labor and increase the associated "cost of coercion." -- The text of the TVPA and amendments can be found on website www.state.gov/g/tip. -- On June 16, 2009, the Secretary of State will release the ninth annual TIP Report in a public event at the State Department. We are providing you an advance copy of your country's narrative in that report. Please keep this information embargoed until 10:00 am Washington DC time June ¶16. The State Department will also hold a general briefing for officials of foreign embassies in Washington DC on June 17 at 3:30 pm EDT. (end non-paper) ¶10. Posts should make sure that the relevant country narrative is readily available on or though the Mission's web page in English and appropriate local language(s) as soon as possible after the TIP Report is released. Funding for translation costs will be handled as it was for the Human Rights Report. Posts needing financial assistance for translation costs should contact their regional bureau,s EX office. ¶11. The following is press guidance provided for Post to use with local media. Q1: Why was Thailand again given a ranking of Tier 2? A: The Royal Thai Government does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so. The government began implementing a new, comprehensive anti-human trafficking law that came into force in June 2008 and trained the law enforcement community on the new legislation. In recent years, the number of annual convictions for sex trafficking has declined. Three sex traffickers were convicted, and the government initiated prosecutions of 54 individuals for trafficking offenses, including forced child labor, during the reporting period. The government did not, however, achieve a conviction for a labor trafficking offense during the year. Q2: What progress has Thailand made in the past year? A: The government initiated prosecutions against at least 54 individuals for trafficking offenses, eight of whom are being prosecuted for forced child labor. During the reporting period, there were at least three convictions for sex trafficking offenses. In 2008, the government,s shelters provided protection and social services for at least 102 repatriated Thai victims and 520 foreigners trafficked to Thailand. The Department of Consular Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs reported that 443 Thai nationals classified as trafficking victims were repatriated from a number of overseas locations. The Thai government continued to support prevention and public awareness activities on trafficking during the year, including through &public dialogues8 on trafficking and television advertisements. Q3: What efforts could Thailand make to improve its fight against trafficking in persons? A: The Royal Thai Government could: increase efforts to investigate labor trafficking and prosecute labor traffickers; improve efforts to identify victims of trafficking among vulnerable groups, such as undocumented migrants; ensure that adult foreign trafficking victims who are willing to work with local law enforcement are not confined to shelters involuntarily; develop and implement mechanisms to allow adult foreign trafficking victims to seek and find employment outside shelters; educate migrant workers on their rights, their employers' obligations to them, legal STATE 00060449 006 OF 006 recourse available to victims of trafficking, and how to seek remedies against traffickers. ¶12. The Department appreciates posts, assistance with the preceding action requests. CLINTON