A 19-year-old Lao girl who was forced to work at a Chinese-run online scam center in Myanmar for two years is safe at a rehabilitation facility for human trafficking victims in Thailand, two Thai officials told Radio Free Asia.
The young woman had sent two messages to RFA earlier this month saying she had been released from the scam center and had made her way across the border to a police station in Thailand’s Mae Sot district.
However, a Thai police officer said last week that there was no evidence that a 19-year-old Lao woman had recently sought safety at a police station in Mae Sot.
On Wednesday, an official at a rehabilitation center in Thailand’s Phitsanulok province confirmed to RFA that the woman was sent to the facility on Dec. 13 after Thai authorities identified her as a human trafficking victim.
Under an agreement with Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar and Vietnam, Thailand must provide physical and mental treatment for trafficking victims before sending them back to their home country, the rehabilitation official said.
“After she arrived here, we had to process her case,” he said. “Firstly, she will go through all steps for physical and mental treatment.”
The young woman spoke with RFA on Wednesday.
“I am in Pissanulok province now, at the rehabilitation center,” she said. “As soon as I left, I informed my mom on Dec. 3. I left Burma near the end of November.”
Another official at the rehabilitation center told RFA that they are interviewing her for a report that will be sent to the Thai and Lao governments.
After that, Lao officials will visit her family to make sure that she will be safe when she returns, the official said.
Translated by Phouvong. Edited by Matt Reed and Malcolm Foster.