By Matt Blomberg
PHNOM PENH, Feb 20 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – A rising number of Cambodian women are being sold as brides in China but complaints and convictions are on the decline with many victims refusing to speak out because their families are colluding with trafficking rings, a regional police chief said.
Thousands of Cambodian women have gone to China in recent years on the pretence that they would be able to marry, work and send money home to their families, only to find themselves sold into forced – and often abusive – marriages, campaigners say.
But survivors who return to Cambodia often decide against filing police complaints because they fear implicating their relatives in criminality, according to Thol Meng, deputy chief of the anti-trafficking bureau in Kompong Cham province.
“When a victim gets in trouble in China, the family seeks our help to rescue them, but once they get home, the families do not want to cooperate,” said Meng, whose province is a major hub in Cambodia for traffickers seeking to send people to China.
“Maybe they (relatives of victims) are concerned that we will find that they received money from the traffickers,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
