(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) Thailand remains at the lowest level in a U.S. State department report on the fight against human trafficking released Monday, the country again lambasted for its inability to clamp down on slavery and people smuggling within its borders.
The branding comes after a year in which businessmen were condemned for their involvement in slavery in the seafood industry, while significant efforts were made by the military junta to clamp down on the trafficking of Rohingya Muslims in its south.
"Thailand is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women and children subjected to forced labour and sex trafficking," said the yearly Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP), presented by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry in Washington.
"The government of Thailand does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, and is not making significant efforts to do so," the report added.
Thailand has thus been classified again as a Tier 3 country, along with Venezuela and Yemen.
Official economic sanctions are not automatic for a country classified as Tier 3 for the second consecutive year, but experts estimated that there will be some economic impact, with private companies possibly considering ceasing the imports of some products originating in Thailand.
Prior to the report's release, Junta Chief-cum-Prime Minister General Prayuth Chan-ocha had underlined the "substantial efforts" made by his government in the last few months in the fight against human smugglers.
"We have done our best to meet the U.S. concerns," he told local media.
He added that he would accept the U.S. decision "whatever it is."
Panitan Wattanayakorn, an adviser to Deputy-Prime Minister-cum-Defence Minister General Prawit Wongsuwan - who is in charge of the fight against human trafficking - also said that the government had made progress in line with the US recommendations, such as intensifying law enforcement and increasing the number of arrests of human traffickers and their accomplices.
Wattanayakorn, however, hinted that there could be hidden motives behind a possible Tier 3 classification for the second year in a row.
"The report will be closely scrutinized as to whether it will be used as a tool to put pressure on us over political developments or our close ties with particular countries," he told the Bangkok Post.
Chan-ocha seized power in a coup in May last year, which led to limited sanctions by the U.S. government, mostly in the field of military cooperation.
The warming of ties between Thailand and China since the coup, however, is also said to have worried Washington, according to some analysts.
Sriprapha Petcharamesree, an independent academic specializing in human rights, emphasized in an interview with the Post that the TIP report focuses on government efforts in the year from March 2014, prior to an extensive campaign by the authorities against human trafficking.
On May 1, 26 bodies of migrants were found in graves in an abandoned human trafficking camp in a Thai forest bordering Malaysia. The discovery triggered an official campaign to wipe out human smuggling networks from Thai territory.
"The report won't just criticize, but also provide recommendations for change. We have to accept that we do have human trafficking problems, tackle them, and prevent them from re-occurring," Petcharamesree said.
Malaysia, however was upgraded - despite a year in which its own officials have been accused of trafficking - which provoked an angry reaction from Human Rights Watch on Monday.
"Malaysia's record on stopping trafficking in persons is far from sufficient to justify this upgrade from Washington," Phil Robertson, HRW's Asia Division deputy director, said in a statement
"Migrants are being trafficked and abused with impunity, Rohingya victims' bodies are being pulled from shallow graves at the border and convictions are down this year compared to last year € so how can the State Department call this 'progress'?"
Robertson claimed that the upgrade was a diplomatic reward for Malaysia's role alongside the U.S. in multinational trade agreement the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
"This upgrade is more about the TPP and U.S. trade politics than anything Malaysia did to combat human trafficking over the past year, but sadly this action also does significant damage to the credibility of a report that is a critical part of global efforts to combat slavery," he added.
The TIP report recommended, among others, that Thailand to "prosecute officials allegedly complicit in trafficking and convict and punish those found guilty" and "increase proactive efforts to identify victims of trafficking among vulnerable populations".
The report hinted at the cause of the problem through its numerous uses of the word "corruption" - stating that it was the main reason for the existence of trafficking and for the difficulties in combatting it.
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