CHAPTER 4 - REPORT OF THE ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS WORKING GROUP (ii) International cooperation Trafficking in persons is a complex issue and no country can tackle this menace in isolation. Bilateral and multilateral cooperation are required to ensure that demand and supply are eradicated. ASEAN provides an example of how such cooperation can be forged. Some diplomatic personnel said they are routinely informed only about arrests and detention of their nationals. As this does not include victims of human trafficking, they are unable to conduct joint investigations with Malaysia. This contradicts the Vienna Convention which states, among others, that the receiving country is to inform the sending country without delay of the person of the sending state who is arrested/detained/put in custody by the receiving country. This would assist either country to track down traffickers. At the same time, the need was expressed for missions to initiate regular meetings and establish rapport with the Malaysian Government. The Indonesian Embassy recounted its experience of being denied access to victims’ shelters, which left it unable to verify whether the victims were Indonesians. The Council then outlined the procedures that missions should follow, explaining that this was necessary to ensure the safety of victims. The Council said it faced difficulty in obtaining assistance from diplomatic missions, in particular for interpretation services. This had delayed resolution of some cases due to the language barrier. In view of such issues, the Commission suggested that the Council should come up with a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) so that the diplomatic missions were duly informed of cases involving their nationals. In the interim, meetings should be organised between the two parties to identify practical solutions. (iii) Cooperation between the Council and NGOs NGOs like TENAGANITA and MTUC have extensive knowledge and experience in handling trafficking issues that can be shared with the Council, while other NGOs could be trained to deal with such matters. (iv) Cooperation from victims In some cases, rescued victims are unwilling to cooperate with the authorities because of the language barrier and trauma they have experienced. The representative of the AG’s Chambers said this could also be due to embarrassment because the police had made fun of – or refused to assist – victims who reached out for help. 64