THE government of Norway has pledged US$1 million in assistance to help fight human trafficking in the Mekong sub-region, an area that includes Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam, as well as China’s Yunnan Province.

The pledge was made at the annual Project Steering Committee meeting of the United Nations Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking in the Greater Mekong Sub-region (UNIAP), which was held in Bangkok in early January.

Dr Daw Ei Kalya Moore, the national project coordinator of UNIAP in Myanmar, said the assistance would be used to support the activities of the UN’s Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative Against Trafficking.

She said Canada has also informally pledged to provide about $500,000 to help support projects drafted under the sub-regional plan of action.

The plan, which was approved last year by the six countries in Mekong sub-region, outlines anti-trafficking activities in the areas of law enforcement and criminal justice, prevention and protection, as well as the repatriation and reintegration of victims.

It includes provisions for international cooperation in the investigation and prosecution of traffickers, and for developing support systems for the repatriation and rehabilitation of trafficking victims.

The assistance would also be used to help countries in the Mekong sub-region draft anti-trafficking laws.

Myanmar and Laos have already enacted such laws, while Thailand and Cambodia are revising their existing laws to meet international and regional standards, said Dr Daw Ei Kalya Moore.

The assistance would also be used to help draw up national action plans and help strengthen the criminal justice systems of the member countries. Of the six countries, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam have already developed national action plans, she said.

A memorandum of understanding to cooperate in the fight against human trafficking was signed by the ministers of the six Mekong countries in Yangon in October 2004.