Myanmar generates 30,000 jobs abroad for country people in past few years

The Myanmar government has worked to generate 30,000 jobs abroad for its country people in most recent years, an official newspaper reported Thursday.

Through 70 local overseas employment agencies making contacts with 14 nations, the 30,000 overseas jobs opportunities were created, said the New Light of Myanmar.

Noting that the government has been issuing temporary passports for Myanmar workers to work in neighboring Thailand since November last year, the report said efforts are being made to enable new more workers to work in the neighbor under bilateral cooperation between the two governments.

According to the report, of about 300,000 Myanmar migrant workers in Thailand, only 80,000 hold official labor cards issued by the Thai Labor Ministry, while about 120,000 have only stay visas and the rest or 100,000 are living in that country without having any legal documents.

The report warned that some illegal Myanmar workers in Thailand are facing labor exploitation by human traffickers who gave false promise of finding lucrative jobs in other countries.

The report urged Myanmar migrant workers to go through formal procedures to get jobs in Thailand to prevent from being deceived by such traffickers.

Meanwhile, the authorities, in cooperation with some major social organizations, are launching anti-human trafficking programs including educating women and children regarding trafficking in persons and meting out severe punishment for human trafficking.

As disclosed by earlier official reports, during the three months' period between last December and February this year, 33 local human traffickers among the 51 arrested by the Myanmar police force were sentenced to life imprisonment for trafficking 49 Myanmar young women to an unidentified neighboring country.

Besides, in September last year, Myanmar authorities also nabbed a 30-member human trafficking gang on the Myanmar-China border in cooperation with the Chinese police force for trafficking 180 Myanmar young women to Ruili by means of forced marriage and fake marriage, according to the Home Ministry.

To step up the momentum in cracking down on human trafficking, the Myanmar authorities have formed nine special units to combat such crimes in nine township areas bordering China.

In August last year, two Myanmar human traffickers, a woman and a man, were sentenced to long-year imprisonment for respectively persuading a girl residing in Kutkai to marry a Chinese man and enticing two other girls with false promise for better work in Ruili and selling them there.

Meanwhile, Myanmar formed the Central Committee for Anti- Trafficking in Persons in March last year to step up crackdown on such crime.

According to the ministry, Myanmar had exposed 748 human trafficking cases since July 2002 up to September last year, arresting 1,484 such traffickers including 669 women and rescuing 3,694 victims including 1,790 women.

Source: Xinhua