Philippine authorities have detained more than 2,700 people during a raid on several buildings in Manila where alleged human trafficking victims were paid to recruit players for online games, police said Tuesday.
A state-run wire service said those apprehended were found working for an illegal Philippine offshore gaming operator (POGO) in Las Piñas City. Chinese, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Singaporean, Malaysian, Pakistani, Cameroonian, Sudanese, Myanmar and Philippine nationals were among the people found inside a compound in the capital on Monday night.
Authorities were interviewing 2,724 detainees to identify who was a victim or suspect, said police Capt. Michelle Sabino, spokeswoman for the anti-cybercrime unit.
More than 1,500 were Filipinos.
International concern has been growing over internet scams in the Asia-Pacific region, often staffed by trafficking victims tricked or coerced into promoting bogus crypto investments.
Sabino said the alleged trafficking victims had accepted jobs posted on Facebook to work in the Philippines “to find players” for online games.
Many of them were forced to work 12-hour shifts every day for as little as P24,000 pesos a month, and were prevented from leaving the compound, she said.
Sabino described it as the “biggest ever” anti-trafficking raid in the Philippines.
AFP journalists at the scene on Tuesday saw two police buses and two police trucks parked outside the compound. They were not allowed to enter the buildings.
Sabino said “everything will be investigated”, including whether the workers were involved in online rackets.
In May, authorities rescued more than a thousand people from several Asian nations who had been trafficked into the Philippines, held captive and forced to run online scams.
The International Organization for Migration (IOM) said victims were often ensnared by traffickers with the prospect of “better jobs with high salaries and enticing perks”.
“One very noticeable aspect in these online scams, which is different to other forms of trafficking, is that education offers no immunity as we have seen even well-educated professionals become victims,” Itayi Viriri, IOM senior regional spokesman for Asia-Pacific, told AFP.
Viriri said victims were typically “trapped in a world of exploitation where they endure abuse, confiscation of travel documents, and isolation from their peers”.
“We therefore commend the actions taken by the Philippines authorities to intervene as it is clear that victims are basically hostages to their traffickers and as such rely on external intervention to break free from their captors,” Viriri said.
Sen. Risa Hontiveros recently warned that “scam call centers” were operating in the Philippines and employing foreigners trafficked into the country.
In its 2023 human trafficking report, the US State Department said the Philippines “did not vigorously investigate or prosecute labor trafficking crimes that occurred within” the country.
“Corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained significant concerns,” it said.
The National Capital Region Police Office (NCRPO) reported that the apprehensions consisted of 1,528 Filipinos, 600 Chinese, 183 Vietnamese, 137 Indonesians, 134 Malaysians, 81 Thais, and 21 Taiwanese,
while the rest were from Nigeria, Singapore, Myanmar, Yemen, Pakistan, South Africa, India, Somalia, Sudan, Cameroon, and Iran.
They were rounded up during the raid by joint operatives from the NCRPO and the Philippine National Police-Anti Cybercrime Group (PNP-ACG) at the POGO establishment Alabang-Zapote Road in Barangay Almanza Uno.
The operation was conducted on the strength of warrants issued by a local court of Las Piñas against the owners and maintainers of the POGO hub, identified through their aliases Quiha Lu, Liangfei Chen, Jimmy Lin, and Abbey Ng for violating the Expanded Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2012.
The foreigners were documented for booking and possible deportation.
Earlier, PNP chief Gen. Benjamin Acorda Jr. said they will continue to work closely with other agencies to ensure that those engage in such heinous crimes are held accountable.
“We must all unite in this fight against human trafficking and help put an end to this inhumane practice,” Acorda had said.
“The PNP remains steadfast in its commitment to eliminating human trafficking in the Philippines and pledges to transform the country into a secure place where Filipinos and foreign nationals alike can thrive, explore and conduct business without fear,” he added.