People smuggling syndicates do not hesitate to commit abduction, police warn

Dicky Christanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Sat, 01/24/2009

Police have issued a warning about brazen abductions being committed by human trafficking organizations following reports of a schoolgirl being abducted and forced in prostitution in Malaysia.

National Police spokesman Insp. Gen. Abubakar Nataprawira said Friday police were upgrading alerts after reports from Lampung of a schoolgirl, identified only as SS, being lured and abducted.

"Human trafficking syndicates have always duped their victims, but in this particular case they have not hesitated to commit outright abduction. Perhaps with growing crackdowns, they are becoming more impatient," Abubakar said.

The Lampung student told police she was abducted by five masked men before falling unconscious from an unspecified cause.

"She was abducted while waiting for a public minivan en route to school around the middle of 2008," Abubakar said.

The men took the teenager to Jakarta along with three other girls from West Java, where they were transferred to Singkawang in West Kalimantan.

"From there, a Malaysian national named Kam Seng escorted the abducted victims to Tebedu in Malaysia via Entikong," Abubakar said.

The traffickers took the girls to Kuching, the capital of the Malaysian state of Sabah, where they were forced to work as prostitutes in poor conditions.

The case began to unfold when SS managed to escape from the Cong Ling Pa night club where she was held against her will. She made it to the Indonesian Consulate in Kuching and reported her ordeal.

Following her testimony, the police formed a specialist team to track down the syndicate.

The police have named four people as suspects so far but have only managed to arrest Nurdin, alias Boros, and Kam Seng. The two are currently in custody.

The other suspects, identified as Indonesian nationals Ika and Helen, remain at large.

"The suspects face multiple charges of violating the Human trafficking Law and the Child Protection Law, and could face more than 20 years in prison and fines of up to Rp 15 billion," Abubakar said.

Anis Hidayah from Migrant Care, an NGO focusing on human trafficking, said there was nothing new in the use of abduction in people smuggling.

"Abduction has been part of human trafficking syndicate's for many years," she told The Jakarta Post on Friday.

"I have been reporting similar cases since 2003 but the police have not responded to them properly."

She said the police lacked the will to fight human trafficking and only made an effort when a case captured public attention.

"Police need to act as if they rarely care about the issue, not just when their public image is at stake," she said.

Human trafficking is a growing problem in Indonesia, with 12 cases reported last year and hundreds of others allegedly going unnoticed. Poverty is often blamed as the root cause of the practise.