Weighing into the dark web of protecting the children of Cambodia.
Nikki Capp, CEO – February 2024
We’re in the back of our local partners tuk tuk heading for the riverside area at 8pm. The head of their investigation team accompanies us, and we’re meeting their other team members on the strip.
The outreach team has already run play sessions during the day and early evening in nearby villages and areas where children gather around Phnom Penh, as they also do in Siam Reap. The team not only takes toys and games to entertain and engage with the children along with a football to kick, they are armed with first aid kits, snacks and are well trained in play-based therapy and listening techniques. This is not just about entertaining kids who are not in school, or who are sent out to beg and scrounge for the day – and often the nights too. This team is gathering information to identify where children may be suffering abuse and neglect, and to discover through conversation and stories, where they are being groomed by paedophiles.
An innocent conversation with some children who are sharing about the pool they had a swim in during the week, has a darker side. Many of these kids are vulnerable and naïve that the man who regularly comes to sit where they hang out by the river, or near their parents’ food and souvenir stall, is not offering them gifts and money because he is a nice guy. To the equally naïve parents, struggling to survive, the offer of payment from a man wanting to take their child on a trip to the beach or generously help with rental payments, is too good to pass up.
The week we are in Phnom Penh, the investigations team, who work closely with local police, other NGO’s in Cambodia, and in recent years, with the FBI, have received a request to track a known paedophile. He was recently released from a US prison and has been spotted in Phnom Penh. The task for our partner team is to locate the man and ascertain where he is staying.
We walk the riverside strip with the investigation team. They know the locals, many of the children, the regular foreign tourists. The team don’t manage to spot the man they are looking for that night, but they are out every night, and their success rate is good. In 2023 this team helped police and the FBI prosecute 4 perpetrators. The team is a critical part in the chain because they collect vital photographic evidence on the movements of the paedophiles and the children they interact with. They are connected with the local children, always on the lookout for the most vulnerable, and skilled at helping kids share what has been happening to them. Therefore, our partner not only helps authorities apprehend perpetrators, they also journey with the children and their families who must testify in order to successfully prosecute them.
This is a slow, painstaking process that can take years, and the journey with the children and their families from victim to survivor is complex – the court process often compounds the trauma. Removing kids from situations of abuse and exploitation does not solve the vulnerabilities caused by poverty. That’s why our partner is well connected in the NGO community in Phnom Penh and refers children and families to other services and supports as they continue to journey with them to secure justice. Their work on the streets and in the slums and villages is also about education and awareness raising. If people talk about and understand the risks posed to the children of Cambodia by sex tourists and paedophiles, they can better recognise the grooming process and intervene.
Successful prosecution of these predatory paedophiles won’t change the trauma and abuse the children have suffered, but it is part of a long journey to wholeness and hope. Our partners venture daily into dark, hard places where families have little hope and children’s lives and futures are being stolen. They have developed effective play therapy approaches both to gain information and help children tell their stories. Through the generosity of our supporters, the training and equipping of the teams is enabled, and they are resourced to be on the streets, investigating perpetrators, and building trusting relationships with vulnerable children and families. This is why we do what we do in connecting the hearts and funds of supporters with our amazing partners. We are so grateful for these brave partners who are on the front lines in the battle against the exploitation of children.
Every child is precious, and we will not stop.
