LTO Cambodia: Brothel Bust

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Brothel Bust

Police lead girls wearing masks to van

This afternoon I witnessed a brothel bust here in Phnom Penh. Just happened across it as I walked up the street on my afternoon constitutional. The police raided a house amongst the strip of karaoke joints on Street 63, an area known for its brothel-like activities. Places that cater primarily to Cambodians and Vietnamese.

It was a peaceful bust from what I could see standing across the street. The police spent at least an hour in the place, presumably taking photos and gathering evidence. At one point the MPs showed up escorting some high ranking police or official, but they eventually moved on. At the end the gates of the house slid open wide and people began to emerge. The police led a half dozen working girls, all wearing

Gawkers like me

surgical masks, to a waiting van. Two children wandered out of the house nonchalantly and tried to disappear on the back of a motodup, but the police collected them and put them in the van too. They also arrested what appeared to be the mama and papason, putting them in a separate vehicle with the officer in charge. The police locked the front gates, tagged it and left.

These days this sort of thing is neither new nor uncommon. The Cambodian police have been using the anti-pimping laws for several years now, and to some significant effect. There are still plenty of prostitutes working the bars and clubs in Phnom

Police spot escaping children

Penh, and even on the streets in some areas, but regardless of what some NGOs may tout, the days of red light districts and the open brothel has long passed in the city, save a few comparatively small protected exceptions, like this little string of mostly Vietnamese places along 63. And today the civilian police raided one of those places, presumably because it was operating as a brothel or involved in trafficking.

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Cambodia

Cambodia is Srok Khmer, the 'Land of the Khmer,' the primary ethnic group in the area since at least the Neolithic and an Indian influenced civilization with origins near 2000 years old. Centered on the lower Mekong and tributaries the Khmer people have dominated the region for millennia. From 2nd century AD Khmer kingdoms rose and fell, culminating in unification and the 500 year reign of the Angkorian Empire, the builders of the temples of Angkor near Siem Reap. The Empire stretched from Burma to the ocean. But by the 1400s Cambodia fell to centuries of change and decline squeezed between the expanding Siam and Vietnam. Colonized and by the French in the 1860s, independence 90 years later in 1954, a brief post-colonial 'golden period' under Sihanouk, coup in 70, civil war, fall to the communist Khmer Rouge in 75, 3 years 8 months 20 days of madness, Vietnamese rescue in 1979, occupation, low level war and international sanctions in the 80s, the UN, ostensive democracy and an adventure party destination in the 90s and now mainstreaming, tourism, rapid development, rapacious capitalism and NGOs, missionaries and other international busybodies aplenty.

Southeast Asia

As the term implies, Southeast Asia encompasses the southeastern corner of the Asian continent, loosely speaking, the area between India, China and Australia. It is made up of two distinct regions: the mainland zone, a bulbous peninsula jutting into the Pacific Ocean, bounded by China to the north and India to the west; and the insular (island) zone in the Pacific Ocean. The name 'Southeast Asia' is a comparatively recent invention, first coming into use into the 20th century and still a bit indefinite in definition. Mainland Southeast Asia is generally considered to include Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, Burma (Myanmar) and peninsular Malaysia. The mainland is sometimes referred to as Indo-China though Indochina (Indochine) also designates the 19th/20th century French colonial conglomerate of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. Sitting south of the Tropic of Cancer, most of mainland Southeast Asia lies in the hot, humid tropics and sub-tropics with a climate dominated by a monsoon cycle which divides the year into two distinct seasons: a dry season and an extremely wet monsoon season. Much of the mainland is mountainous and thickly jungled, with large river systems and wide, low-lying, flood-prone plains, much of which is, in modern times, deforested and blanketed with geometrical rice paddies. Several major river valleys including the Mekong River, the Red, Ma and Ka rivers and the group of rivers draining to the Chao Praya Delta played host to the rise of early civilization in the area. The Mekong River is one of the world's greatest rivers, the seventh largest on the planet, and since pre-history has been closely associated with the land of the Khmer.