phnom penh trip

[The Great Him]

[This article is sourced from the Independent, UK]

WHILE I WAS AT SVAY PAK: LIVES OF CHILD PROSTITUTES IN CAMBODIA

The young girls working in brothels like those in Svay Pak are , in effect, sex slaves; they receive no money, only food, and armed guards stop them running away.

Chantala, possibly 14, recounts that her a woman approached her aunt and promised to give her a job as a live-in cleaner at a shop in Phnom Penh. The shop turned out to be a brothel in Svay Pak. Her first customer she recounts was a Chinese man who beat her till she was unconscious because she refused to have sex with him. He then tore her clothes and raped her. She worked everyday from 9 a.m. to 3 a.m. and still owed a huge sum to the brothel owner.

She was one day taken to a village outside Phnom Penh. When she arrived she found 10 men waiting to have sex with her. She had to have sex with all of them. She went to the same place many times after that.

Avy, 8-years-old, was sold into the sex trade after being raped by her stepfather and nine other men. She was hit across the face and given electric shocks when she refused to have sex with clients. When she grew sleepy after working long hours, the pimp thrust chillies in her eyes.
Chantala and Avy are two among the thousands of young children who are being ruthlessly violated every day of their precious lives. Being treated worse than slaves for the luxuries of influential politicians, the children in Cambodia's brothels hope that the international humanitarian community will come to their rescue.

Note: Both Chantala and Avy are in the care of AFESIP.

Pierre Legros, the director of AFESIP expressed concern that though the activity at Svay Pak has decreased after the police raid by 90 percent, the trade has shifted temporarily to other regions within Cambodia. It is has not yet been driven out of the country. He feels that there is a dire need for a national strategy to combat child prostitution in Cambodia or else each raid will only result in a shift of trade from one place to another.