A young woman who was forced to work at a Chinese-run scam center in Myanmar for two years is now in Thailand and expects to return to Laos soon.
Last week, Radio Free Asia reported that the woman, who withheld her name out of fear of reprisals, was one of several Laotians trafficked to work as scammers at a place called “Casino Kosai” in an isolated development near the town of Myawaddy in Kayin state.
Casino Kosai is in an area near the Thai border where ethnic Karen rebels have been engaged in intense fighting with military junta troops in recent months.
It was unclear exactly how the young woman, who just turned 19, had gained her release, but her mother said that scam center operators had agreed to let her go.
“It is the happiest moment in my life as soon as I heard from my daughter that the Chinese bosses would release her,” her mother said. “She was preparing to pack her belongings and the car would come to pick her up.”
The woman told Radio Free Asia that she faced beatings whenever she failed to scam potential victims.
“The Chinese bosses hit me and torture me every day,” she said in a text message. “Why isn’t anybody coming to help me?”
The woman’s mother said her daughter was initially promised a factory job in Thailand, but was later sold to the Chinese scam gang and brought to Myanmar.
She said her daughter told her about the abuse at the scam center and about working up to 19 hours a day.
“I have no idea what to do to bring my daughter back home,” said the mother. “The Chinese bosses use cattle prods to torture her if she doesn’t do her job well.”
The young woman told RFA Lao in a voice message that she arrived in Mae Sot on Wednesday, adding that she was unsure when she would continue on to Laos.
On Friday, the woman told RFA that she was staying at a police station in Thailand’s Mae Sot district.
RFA Lao spoke about the woman’s case with an official from the Lao Ministry of Public Security, who said that rescuing people from scam centers in areas in Myanmar that are not under junta control “is very difficult,” adding that there was little the Lao government could do about the situation.
RFA was unable to reach Thai police in Mae Sot to ask for more information.
Translated by Phouvong. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.