៣០ កញ្ញា ២០២៥ / 30 September 2025
Cambodia named by US as state sponsor of human trafficking
'Job in Thailand' stories are used to dupe trafficking victims
David Whitehouse
Sep 30
Cambodia has been named for the first time by the US a state sponsor of human trafficking.
The designation is made in the new US Trafficking in Persons Report, with Cambodia joining 12 other state perpetrators. Myanmar (which the report calls Burma) is also on the list.
It’s as good a time as any to stress again that people who are trafficked to carry out forced online scams in either Cambodia or Myanmar will not be told that they will be working in these countries.
They will be told that they are going to work in Thailand. Numerous survivors of the scam centre compounds have reported travelling to Thailand and then being transferred across the border by their “employers” (who are in fact their captors) to Myanmar or Cambodia.
The sad reality is that accepting a job from employers in Thailand that you don’t really know - or a tour around Thailand with people you don’t really know - may be a one-way ticket to a forced labour compound in a neighbouring country where the government is getting a cut.
The people who end up in this predicament used to be mainly Chinese, but there has been a shift to young educated English speakers anywhere in the world. English-speaking captives allow the scam compounds to target the largest pools of wealthy financial victims worldwide.
The full list of the state perpetrators in the US TIP report:
Afghanistan
Belarus
Burma
Cambodia
China
Cuba
Eritrea
Iran
North Korea
Russia
South Sudan
Sudan
Syria (Assad regime)
Khmer
English
French
