On July 27, 2015, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry released the 2015 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report in Washington, DC.  As required by the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, the TIP Report assesses governments around the world on their efforts to combat modern slavery.  The 15th annual TIP Report includes narratives of 188 countries and territories, including the United States.  At the launch event, Secretary Kerry also honored the 2015 TIP Report Heroes, men and women whose personal efforts have made an extraordinary difference in the global fight against modern slavery.

Cambodia is placed on the Tier 2 Watch List in the 2015 Trafficking in Persons Report.  While the government continued to prosecute and convict traffickers, including one case involving the forced labor of Cambodian men on commercial fishing vessels, it failed to increase overall efforts to combat all forms of human trafficking from the previous year.  The report also welcomes the government’s efforts to combat child sex trafficking in commercial establishments in recent years.  Cambodia received a waiver from an automatic downgrade to Tier 3 because it has a national action plan to combat trafficking and is contributing significant resources toward implementation of the plan.

The entire 2015 TIP Report on Cambodia can be found here.  The Khmer translation of the report will be available in the coming days.