• Society

Cambodia and Malaysia to Keep on Cooperating to Deal with Job Scams across Borders

• By Meng Seavmey
• September 11, 2022 10:53 AM

PHNOM PENH – Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn and Malaysian Foreign Minister Dato’ Sri Saifuddih Abdullah on Sept. 9 discussed job scams that have led to Malaysians coming to Cambodia and the need for more measures to stop human trafficking and job fraud crimes.

During a phone conversation, the two ministers spoke of the need for the two countries to work together in order to combat the scams and crimes as a joint effort to stop human trafficking and job rackets, Cambodia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Relations wrote in a communique at its website.  

“As we spoke on the phone, [Saifuddin] expressed his thanks to the Cambodian Government and the concerned authorities for lending great assistance and for doing a great job to help rescuing the victims,” Sokhonn wrote on his Facebook page on Sept. 9.  Saifuddin also pointed out that many Malaysians come to Cambodia to do business, making a success of it, and that only a small number of Malaysians have come to the country through those job scams and fallen victims of them, he wrote. 

Sokhonn told Saifuddin, he wrote, that “these crimes occur in every country, big or small, and we all have to do our part to combat them.” Cambodia and Malaysia will continue to work together to prevent and combat such crimes across borders with the assistance of the Malaysian Embassy in Phnom Penh, he added.  

In a letter on Sept. 9, Cambodian Foreign Affairs Ministry’s spokesperson Chum Sounry said that human trafficking conditions in Cambodia are not as serious or terrible as reported by various news outlets.

Sounry mentioned the article posted on Sept. 4 “Malaysian envoy reveals bizarre cases of job scam victims in Cambodia” by Fatimah Zainal of Malaysia’s news website TheStar in which Malaysian Ambassador to Cambodia Eldeen Husaini Mohd Hashim is quoted as saying that “the operations to rescue the Malaysians were only made possible because of the cooperation by the Cambodian authorities.”

Quoting Malaysian Foreign Minister Dato’ Sri Saifuddih Abdullah, TheStar also reported on Sept. 9 that the 24 Malaysians who fell victim to job scams in Cambodia were successfully taken back home to Malaysia. “Saifuddin said out of 148 reported cases, 118 Malaysians who fell victim to job offer fraud in Cambodia have been rescued so far,” the article read.

Heng Sour, spokesperson for Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training, could not be reached for comments.