Hong Kong airport ‘ground zero’ for human smuggling, says UN report
UN report points to gangs transiting Chinese and Middle Eastern migrants through the airport; Security Bureau denies claims
Hong Kong's airport has been pinpointed by the UN as a crucial transit point for worldwide human smuggling rackets.
Chek Lap Kok is an "important embarkation point" for many mainland Chinese migrants going to the West, as well as people from the Middle East transiting to Malaysia and Indonesia, from where they are smuggled to Australia by boat.
The findings come in a report released yesterday by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, which highlights the threats posed to Asia by transnational human trafficking and smuggling gangs.
"People that make use of smugglers face increased risks to their health and safety," said Jeremy Douglas, regional representative of the UN anti-crime office.
Chinese migrants often face harsh working conditions and debt bondage with repayment stretching over years, said the report, entitled Migrant Smuggling in Asia.
Both Hong Kong and Macau were labelled as transit points for migrants smuggled from mainland China, who are increasingly using fraudulent travel and identity documents to cross international borders.
The migrants typically leave the mainland using genuine documents, but switch to fraudulent papers in a transit jurisdiction.