Cambodian girls rescued from border brothel
Monday, September 13th, 2010Aranyaprathet is a fairly non-descript border crossing point from Thailand into the town of Poi Pet on the Cambodian side. It is the busiest crossing point into Cambodia and a key transit point for human traffickers.
On the evening of 13 September 2010 in Aranyaprathet, a joint operation between The Grey Man and the Royal Thai Police resulted in the rescue of four Cambodian girls on the Thai side of the border. The girls were 14-15 years old and had been trafficked into Thailand for prostitution.
A three person Grey Man team had set up a sting operation the previous day but it fell through when the go-between became frightened and did not bring the girls he had promised. It had been a frustrating month for the team with a number of leads ending in dead ends.
The team then changed to another target. They had acquired video and audio surveillance of a brothel that had under-aged girls in it and called in a specialist Thai police unit. In this brothel the girls’ rooms were padlocked and the windows covered in bars.
After a thorough briefing between the two groups, the Grey Man operatives then re-entered the brothel with Police nearby ready to conduct a raid.
The operatives continued their undercover roles, and once they ensured that the girls were still there, triggered a raid by the Police. Twenty Anti-trafficking Police and three Grey Man personnel were involved in the operation.





We liked their style and their philosophy. They made financial support for a family conditional on the children attending school. If the children were removed from school to be trafficked or for any other reason the money stopped coming. This works very well and all of the children supported this way remain in school. Grey Man started our prevention programme by supporting 28 families in one of the Lahu hill-tribe villages. We continue this but have since expanded into providing transport for 100 children spread across three villages. Without this transport many of these children would never receive an education. 

