VZCZCXRO2847
PP RUEHDT RUEHPB
DE RUEHHM #0196 0610834
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 020834Z MAR 07
FM AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH CITY
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 2173
INFO RUEHHI/AMEMBASSY HANOI PRIORITY 1556
RUCNARF/ASEAN REGIONAL FORUM COLLECTIVE
RUEHHM/AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH CITY 2346

UNCLAS HO CHI MINH CITY 000196 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PHUM PREL CVIS KWMN TIP ELAB SMIG SOCI TW VM
SUBJECT: HCMC POLICE CONTACT ON TIP CONCERNS 
 
REF: HCMC 90; B) 06 HCMC 437; C) 05 HCMC 1299 
 
¶1. (SBU) On February 23, PolOff met with Colonel Hoang Tan 
Viet, Deputy Director of Criminal Police of the HCMC 
Ministry of Public Security (MPS) to follow up the status 
of the investigation into an international trafficking-in- 
persons ring that reportedly involved over 100 Vietnamese 
women from the Mekong Delta and Tay Ninh province(ref B). 
According to Colonel Viet, 13 traffickers associated have 
been prosecuted in the case.  The MPS has identified 73 
additional individuals who are alleged to have participated 
in the TIP ring as recruiters, transporters, and document 
procurers.  Of these 73 individuals, 13 reside outside of 
Vietnam.  As the investigation still is underway, he would 
provide no further details at this point. 
 
¶2. (SBU) Talking more generally about TIP trends, Colonel 
Viet said the MPS is becoming increasingly concerned that 
traffickers are exploiting marriages of Vietnamese women to 
foreigners to conceal TIP.  He said that the MPS now 
believes that up to ten percent of the approximately 40,000 
marriages in southern Vietnam between local women and 
Taiwanese men since 1995 resulted in the women being sold 
either into sexual slavery, forced into other marriages, or 
otherwise exploited.  In 2006, he said that MPS 
investigated three cases in which Taiwanese men paid the 
families of Vietnamese women USD 4,000 to marry the women. 
Once the couples arrived in Taiwan, the men sold their 
wives to brothels for USD 5,000.  MPS learned about these 
incidents from the women involved, who were able to escape 
and file complaints with Vietnamese authorities.  MPS is 
working with Interpol to try and prosecute these men, but 
have so far received no cooperation from Taiwanese 
authorities, the Colonel noted.  (Comment:  Per ref C, 
Taiwanese officials in HCMC acknowledged that, prior to 
2005, they were lax in vetting marriages of Vietnamese 
women to Taiwanese men.  Since instituting much tougher 
interview procedures, they asserted that the number of 
fraudulent marriages has dropped sharply.  End Comment.) 
 
¶3. (SBU) Colonel Viet said that the MPS is compiling a 
national composite list of women who have gone absent from 
their legal residences for extended periods of time 
"without proper reason."  The list is based on inputs 
submitted through the MPS chain of command from the local 
provincial level.  Another MPS contact estimated that 
approximately 11,000 names are on the nationwide composite 
list thus far. 
 
¶4. (SBU) Viet said that international traffickers rely on 
domestic counterparts to procure women in Vietnam.  These 
local counterparts usually are persons with criminal 
records and traffic not only persons, but drugs and other 
contraband.  These domestic traffickers use recruiters, who 
work in the local communities, transporters, who bring TIP 
victims to HCMC and smuggle them out of Vietnam, and 
document procurers, who obtain actual or fake travel 
documents for TIP victims.  Once out of Vietnam, the 
international trafficker steps in to shepherd TIP victims 
to their final destination.  Viet confessed that, at this 
point, MPS is limited to going after domestic traffickers 
and their "satellites" because ringleaders flee, or reside 
outside of, Vietnam. 
 
¶5. (SBU) Viet stressed that GVN relies on bilateral 
agreements for investigatory and judicial cooperation to 
tracking down, arrest, and prosecute international 
traffickers.  Nevertheless, extradition and repatriation 
remain difficult.  For example, cooperation with Malaysia, 
Colonel Viet complained, is slow in coming.  In the Ref B 
case involving roughly 100 women trafficked to Malaysia, 
the GVN has sent several diplomatic notes to the GOM 
seeking the repatriation of TIP victims, but thus far has 
received no response. 
 
WINNICK