14 rescued, 4 arrested over ‘human trafficking’ in Palawan

A total of 14 people have been rescued from alleged human trafficking and illegal recruitment in Rizal, Palawan, the Women and Children Protection Center of the Philippine National Police said Monday.

WCPC public information office’s Police Major Shari Vanneza Deseo said 4 suspects were also nabbed in the operation on September 10, as police responded to a report from the Department of MIgrant Workers and  Presidential Anti-Organized Crime Commission.

“Last September 10, the WCPC was able to arrest four suspects of trafficking in persons and illegal recruitment large-scale, and rescued 14 victims,” she said.

According to Deseo, one of the suspects initially pretended to be one of the victims but authorities were able to uncover that the concerned individual was actually a “facilitator” in the scheme.

The suspects lured the victims through Facebook posts offering them supposed customer service representative jobs abroad. 

But in reality, they will force the victims to work as cryptocurrency scammers in Cambodia, Myanmar, as well as Thailand, and they will be transported through the “backdoor,” the police said.

Charges for illegal large-scale syndicated recruitment and trafficking in persons have been filed against the suspects before the Prosecutor’s Office in Palawan.

Meanwhile, the victims were turned over to the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) office in the province for psychosocial intervention. —AOL, GMA Integrated News