Video Transcript

The scourge of trafficking is affecting them and has for many years in ways that I think they realize have been holding them back a bit in terms of their economy and how they are perceived by the outside world and how they can strengthen their society to deal with all of these problems.

So there is now in Thailand this new focus on the issue, new energy, new interest in addressing it. I think the Thai government realizes that the magnitude of the problem is massive, that they’ve got a big job on their hands and they’ve begun to apply themselves in, I think, very important and useful ways.

This whole focus on trafficking, on child sexual exploitation, on child endangerment, it’s begun now to penetrate and officialdom has begun to grasp this problem, begun to deal with it.

The Thais are increasingly sensitized to it. They’re getting better and better at it in collaboration with us, the Europeans and others and more and more often we are able to roll up these bad guys and very often get them sent back to the states to face the music.

I think people make a big mistake if they think they can come out here and operate freely when it comes to these types of heinous crimes. I think that era is ending and it’s ending fast and it’s ending here and it’s ending to a great extent because of the efforts of the Bureau and of Homeland Security, the State Department, and others who have concentrated a lot of effort on the Thais given their willingness to work with us.