CORRESPONDENCE - 85A COMBINED REPORTS OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN VIETNAM 2012

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North Vietnam with China. Next was Cambodia; while in recent years, this traffic has spread to Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong, South Korea, Russia, etc... With the assistance of international agencies such as ActionAid Vietnam (AAV), Alliance Anti - Traffic (ATT), International Organization for Migration (IOM), United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), and International Labor Organization (ILO), many seminars and recommendations have been offered in 2011 on the engagement of women and children in sexual businesses. However, nothing concrete has yet resulted, mainly because the government has failed to give its serious concern and carry out effective prevention as well as punishment. After six years of enforcement from 2004 to 2010, the national anti -human trafficking program has worked only in 12 out of 63 provinces involved . 24 2. Selling of Vietnamese "Brides" to Foreigners This is the same problem in scope as that of tricking women and children into becoming sex slaves abroad. The main cause was, here again, poverty created by the government's policies resulting in great differences of income and therefore injustice. This has been a widespread issue among the provinces in the South for many years before it openly spread North in recent years. Most of the victimized young girls came from the countryside and were lured by mediators into agreeing to "marry" certain men from Taiwan, South Korea, China, and then follow them overseas, without love or even knowledge of their own background. The 24 flai A Chau Tex Do (Radio Free Asia), Th6ng chbng bu6n ngLxai tai VN (phan 2)," http: / /rfavietnam.wordpress.com /2010/11/ 29 /phong- ch %E1 %BB %91 ng -buon- ng %C6 %BO %E1 %BB %9Di -t %E1 %BA %A1 i -vn- ph%E1 %BA %A7n -2/ (accessed 26 Dec 2011). Vietnam Human Rights Network * Annual Report 2011 sights of these victims standing naked in front of the "foreign candidates" for them to make their pick at many locations, especially in the South, have been harshly condemned by public opinion which considers such treatment to be more savage than the ancient slave markets in the West. Statistically, from 1998 to the end of 2010, the Vietnam Ministry of Justice has accepted applications and issued permits for 294,280 Vietnamese women to marry citizens of over 50 nations and territories. The majority of these hasty marriages was arranged by profit - making intermediary organizations. Based on a survey by the Institute of Labor and Social Sciences, only 7% of these foreign marriages were initiated by love.25 These unfortunate girls readily accepted to trade their life for a chance to get rid of their own and their family's destitution, even to become sex slaves and hard laborers away from their home country. Not a few Vietnamese brides in Taiwanese and South Korean families have been subjected to brutality or asked to provide forced sexual pleasure for more than one person in their husbands' family; worse, they may even be sold to brothels. A number have even been killed by their "husbands" or the husband's family members, others have had to commit suicide in desperation. So far, the Vietnamese government has had no firm and effective policy to deal with illegal marriage intermediaries. Criminally, these lawless activities and "abuses of marriage registration for profit, sexual violation, and labor exploitation" are currently punishable by law (based on Decision No. 60 /2009/ND -CP) but they can be fined merely from ten to twenty million 25 Phap Luat, (Law online) "Chi 7% cuoc h6n nhan v&i ngLxai nLr&c ngoai vi yeu ", http: / /www.baomoi.com /Home/TinhYeu /www.phaplu atvn .vn /C h i -7- cuoc -hon- nhan- voi -ng uoi -n uoc -ngoa i- vi- yeu /6124406.epi (accessed 29 Dec 2011). 29