In Kachin State, northern Burma, not only are Kachin women trafficked, but ethnic women like Shan, Palaung, Chinese and Burmese women are being sold to Chinese men as wives and in the sex industry on the Sino-Burma border while they look for work, according to a report by a Kachin group which was released today.

Because of the deteriorating political, economic and social situation in Burma, more people in Kachin State, mainly young men and women, are leaving their homeland in search of work in foreign countries especially in China, said Eastward Bound launched today by Kachin Women's Association of Thailand (KWAT).

 "Not only women from Kachin State are being sold but also women from other ethnic States and proper Burma were trafficked," said Gum Khong, a member of KWAT. "We provide assistance to all ethnic women and girls who escape and come to us without discriminating who they are, even though our main focus is women in Kachin State."

The new report describes that the junta authorities issued temporary ID cards to ethnic people to vote in the May 10 referendum but they were withdrawn by the immigration officers after the referendum was held.

Shirley Seng, spokesperson of KWAT said, "There will be more human trafficking if the citizen does not have ID cards."

Citizens without ID cards are denied their rights to travel and migrate legally. Thus they become vulnerable to trafficking, said the report.

In September 2005, the Burmese regime's new anti-trafficking law was passed in order to curb trafficking and to protect the rights of trafficked women. However, victims who had appealed to the Burmese Embassy in Beijing were denied assistance and denied entry back to Burma, and falsely accused of trafficking themselves.

"Anti-trafficking laws are meaningless under a regime that systematically violates people's rights, and whose policies are driving citizens to migrate," said Gum Khong, a researcher for the report.

"International agencies must look holistically at the trafficking problem, and not be complicit in any efforts by the regime to further abuse people's right under the guise of preventing trafficking," said Shirley Seng.

KWAT first exposed the trafficking of Kachin women on the China-Burma border in their 2005 report "Driven Away."

KWAT was founded in Chiangmai on September 1999 and it is a founding member of the umbrella organization, the Women's League of Burma, comprising 12 women's groups from Burma.