The call follows the US House of Representatives’ decision on Tuesday to pass legislation making it easier to penalise operators of websites that facilitate online sex trafficking.
Speaking to FMT, JK Associates principal consultant Khen Han Ming said the legislation, although passed more than 15,000km away, would go far in helping save Malaysians who had – or could – become victims of sex trafficking.
“It is quite possible, but we don’t know how many Malaysian victims there could be. What I know is that Malaysian porn has become a genre of its own now, just like Japanese porn,” he said.
Recently, Tenaganita director Glorene Das told FMT that local students from colleges and universities were being trafficked to other countries, adding that Malaysia was not only a destination for traffickers, but also a source country.
Khen, however, said it was not enough for individual governments to have the right laws if there was to be any hope of winning the fight against sex trafficking.
“For example, we already have more than enough laws to address this concern but what happens if the websites are based overseas where our Malaysian laws have no jurisdiction?”
The US bill’s passage marks one of the most concrete actions in recent years from the US Congress to tighten regulation of internet firms, which have drawn heavy scrutiny from lawmakers over the past year due to an array of concerns regarding the size and influence of their platforms.
The Asean Convention Against Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children (ACTIP) was signed on Nov 21, 2015, in Kuala Lumpur and entered into force on May 9, 2017. Malaysia ratified the convention in September 2017.
Klang MP Charles Santiago, who is also Asean Parliamentarians for Human Rights (APHR) chairman, told FMT that while there was a convention, the problem was in enforcement.
“The only question is how to enforce it. That’s not clear. Different countries and different agencies are involved which makes things very complicated in terms of enforcement across the board.
“For example, in the case of militancy in Malaysia, the Malaysian police are involved. In the case of the Philippines, it is the army that is involved.”
Santiago said whatever the case, the matter needed to be addressed quickly especially in the face of the monsoon season this month.
“There’s been a lot of talk that there’s going to be a lot of human trafficking taking place in the face of the monsoon season, especially around the Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh as people try to run away from there due to the heavy rains.”
Cox’s Bazar, a town on the southeast coast of Bangladesh, is where the country has placed Rohingya immigrants who have run away from an alleged genocide in Myanmar.
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