The Importance Of Human Trafficking In Thailand

Research Topic: The investigation towards Thailand’s immigration policy and the efficacy of the enforcement by Thai official on human exploitation and trafficking cases

The discovery of over 30 dead bodies in the abandoned area of Songkha province, nearby Thai-Malaysian border in May last year stirred up public attention nationwide. The investigation team led by the senior policeman, Major General Paween Pongsirin was appointed to track down the evidence. He and his investigation team ended up issuing 153 warrants to the suspects, which 91 of them were put on trial, including some senior Thai government officials, soldiers and police officer. It was revealed later that those bodies belonged to the victims of trafficking or to be more specifically,

There are significant numbers of illegal migrants from neighboring countries especially the countries within Greater Mekong subregion, i.e., China, Laos, Vietnam and Burma who have been encountering severe risk of human exploitation and are trafficked into fishing industry, prostitution and other forms of slavery. Most of time, the victims are mistakenly identified as typical illegal migrants and it lowers the chance of getting rescued even more. Besides, the worst nightmare for the trafficked victims is the systemic corruption among government officials who are beneficial from bribery, some even act as the trafficker themselves. Even though Thailand is one of worst places in the world as a source, transit point and destination for human trafficking; however, only minimum effort is taken to resolve such issue.

Research objectives

The study aims to investigate Thai immigration policy and the strategies used upon trafficking and illegal immigration cases.The objectives of this study are:

1) to examine the action taken by Thai government to handle trafficking problem; how they identify trafficking victim from irregular immigrant and what action the government official takes after the identification process,

2) to explore the weakness of current immigration policy and determine the factors which hinder the efficiency of such enforcement,

If I had been selected to study in APU, I will devote myself to conduct a research that would helps develop immigration policy in Thailand by addressing undistorted facts and possible solutions with an ambition to decrease the amount of trafficked victims and make significant progress to the country in an effort to be upgraded from the lowest rank—Tier 3 into the higher rank in the near