SEANF Paper on Migrant Workers trafficking in persons from the perpetrators, and identify the countries of origin and nationalities of such victims and thereafter ensure that such victims are treated humanely and provided with such essential medical and other forms of assistance deemed appropriate by the respective receiving or recipient country, including prompt repatriation to their respective countries of origin.” The Declaration also requires the ASEAN member states to “take measures to strengthen regional and international cooperation to prevent and combat trafficking in persons.” 20. The SEANF recommends that the ASEAN Governments should immediately establish distinct national focal points for the purposes of establishing and maintaining case by case cooperation on human trafficking, in line with the intent of the ASEAN Declaration against Trafficking in Persons Particularly Women and Children that called for establishment of a “regional focal network.” Once the network is established, the ACMW should develop an action plan for collaboration with the network in order to build more effective regional cooperation against cross-border human trafficking. 21. The SEANF recognizes the close link between human trafficking and transnational crime, but notes that trafficking for labour and other purposes frequently occurs in the context of migration. Yet unfortunately, ASEAN has separated migration and trafficking into separate pillars 15, thereby creating challenges to effective coordination of migrant protection and anti-trafficking work. The SEANF therefore urges the ACMW to press ASEAN to find ways to recognize the connection of trafficking to migration in its structure and coordination efforts. 22. The SEANF recognizes that fully half of the members of ASEAN are already signatories 16 of the Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative against Trafficking (COMMIT) MOU which has established a comprehensive and sustained framework for cross-border cooperation between states to combat human trafficking. The SEANF recommends that the ASEAN Instrument call for the extension of the original COMMIT MOU to the rest of ASEAN. The SEANF urges 15 ASEAN places human trafficking in the Political-Security Community, while migration is included in the Socio-Cultural Community. 16 The five ASEAN members who signed COMMIT are Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. China also signed COMMIT but it is not an ASEAN member. 20

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