'Even worse than being in hell': About 4,000 fishermen, some enslaved, stranded on Indonesian islands: report

APTN/AP

Ngwe Thein, 42, who has been living on an island near Benjina, Indonesia for three years, after being forced to work on a fishing trawler with inadequate food and little or no pay, he said. In the wake of an AP report on fishermen who were enslaved, on Thursday, Thai lawmakers voted unanimously to create tougher penalties for violating the country's anti-human trafficking law, including the death penalty. 

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — An estimated 4,000 foreign fishermen are stranded on a number of remote islands in eastern Indonesia, including men revealed in an Associated Press investigation to have been enslaved, an aid group said.

Many of the migrant workers were abandoned by their boat captains following a government moratorium on foreign fishing that has docked vessels to crack down on illegal operators, said Steve Hamilton, deputy chief of mission at the International Organization for Migration in Indonesia.

"It is reasonable to expect many are victims of trafficking, if not outright slavery," he said, adding the group has been working for years with Indonesian authorities to repatriate trafficked fishermen.

About a quarter of the men are in Benjina, a town that straddles two islands in the Maluku chain, according to an Indonesian official who recently visited the area.

The AP reported Wednesday that men were locked in a cage at a fishing company in Benjina. Journalists interviewed more than 40 migrant workers from Myanmar who said they had been brought to Indonesia from Thailand and forced to work on trawlers with Thai captains. Some are runaway slaves who have lived in the islands for five, 10 or even 20 years.

Sakchai Lalit/AP

Pharak Yophasee, 50, right, and her unidentified daughter, embrace her son Wutthichai Yophasee, 30, center, upon his return from Ambon island, Indonesia, after arriving at Don Muang International airport in Bangkok, Thailand Friday. Wutthichai is among 21 men the Thai authorities have helped bring back to their home country after some of them were lured by human traffickers to work on fishing boats in the Indonesian waters.  

They described horrendous working conditions while at sea, saying they were forced to drink unclean water and work 20- to 22-hour shifts with no days off. Almost all said they were kicked, whipped with toxic stingray tails or otherwise beaten if they complained or tried to rest. They were paid little or nothing.

The yearlong AP investigation used satellites to track seafood caught by the slaves from a large refrigerated cargo ship in Benjina to Thailand, where reporters watched it being unloaded onto dozens of trucks over four nights. The lorries were then followed to a number of processing plants, cold storage operations and the country's largest fish market. From there, U.S. Customs records were used to link the fish to the supply chains of some of America's largest supermarkets and retailers.

AP

Slaves from Myanmar lean over the deck of their fishing trawler at the port in Benjina, Indonesia. 'I want to go home. We all do,' one man called out in Burmese, a cry repeated by others. 'Our parents haven't heard from us for a long time. I'm sure they think we are dead.'

The report prompted the U.S. government and major seafood industry leaders to renew their calls on the Thai government to crack down on slavery at sea and to punish those responsible. Thailand's biggest seafood company, Thai Union Frozen Products, announced that it immediately cut ties with a supplier after determining it might be involved with forced labor and other abuses.

Thai and Indonesian leaders have said they are investigating and will take action to end slavery.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/4-000-fishermen-enslaved-stranded-indonesia-article-1.2165371