Jakarta. The Philippines’ law enforcement authorities, in collaboration with the diplomatic missions in Manila, have recently rescued thousands of human trafficking victims, many of whom are from ASEAN countries.

The anti-trafficking operations saved 1,048 people from 10 different countries, including Indonesia. According to the Foreign Affairs Ministry, 143 of the trafficked victims are Indonesians. The victims saved during the raid are mostly Vietnamese, amounting to 389 people. There were also some Filipinos, Thais, and Malaysians who fell prey to this human trafficking scheme.

“The operations in Manila show the magnitude of human trafficking with ASEAN citizens as victims,” Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi told reporters in Jakarta on Friday.

The Indonesian Embassy in Manila is now collecting information on the victims. The embassy will also facilitate their repatriation to Indonesia.

“We still do not know when the Indonesian victims will get repatriated. But all of them are safe now, although we are still waiting for the internal process on the Philippines’ side,” Judha Nugraha, the director for citizen protection at the Foreign Affairs Ministry, told the same press conference.

The news of human trafficking in the Philippines emerged amidst Indonesia’s efforts to repatriate 20 Indonesian job seekers —who are forced to work as cyber scammers on crypto websites or apps— from Myawaddy, Myanmar. 

Earlier this week, family members of the 20 victims reported two fake recruiters —“P” and “A”— to the police. The scammers had promised the victims a high-paying job in Thailand. The Foreign Affairs Ministry is still unable to confirm if the said recruiters are involved in the Philippines case.

"To find out, there needs to be an investigation on this. But we will have to wait for the police to finish investigating [the report on ‘P’ and ‘A’]. And we need to collaborate with the Filipino police. We will check if [the human trafficking case in the Philippines] involves the same company or recruiter," Judha said.

And amidst many Southeast Asians falling prey to online scams, ASEAN chair Indonesia plans on bringing up the issue of human trafficking at the upcoming summit in Labuan Bajo.

Filipino online media Rappler wrote on Friday that some of the victims admitted they had to work 18 hours with a daily quota of 20 clients. This means that they had to get 20 people to invest in cryptocurrencies. The rescue took place on Thursday night local time at the Clark Sun Valley Hub Corporation.

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