Return to Sender

Nicholas Kristof's piece on human trafficking in today's New York Times describes a particularly unsettling example of a growing problem, but Kristof's simplistic suggestions are hardly helpful. Kristof writes of trafficked women who must be "rescued" from Cambodian brothels, but he downplays the fact that many of these women actually prefer to be in brothels rather than be returned to their source countries. Significant numbers of women who are forcibly removed from sex work and repatriated by NGOs just return as soon as the aid workers are out of sight. NGOs seek to reunite women with their families, but often they're returning women to poverty and isolation. There is a reason these women leave their villages in the first place.

The Cambodia Daily, discussing the same well-meaning NGO as Kristof, reports that some women are more intent on escaping from the NGO's hostel than the brothel:

And many women do "escape," said Pierre Legros, Afesip's director. The organisation does not have the legal right or manpower to detain the trafficking victims who pass through the center, he explained . . .

Huyen Trang was one of 27 women brought to Afesip in March, the result of a joint investigation and raid on Svay Pak conducted by Cambodian police and the faith-based NGO International Justice Mission. Within two weeks, six of those women had climbed the compound's wall and disappeared. Legros said it is likely they returned to the brothels from which they were rescued.

None of this is to suggest that human trafficking isn't a disturbing reality; these women should have better options. But giving them options requires treating them as individuals capable of making their own choices.