Appeal Court upheld Former parliamentarian’s trafficking conviction

 

Buth Reaksmey Kongkea 

Phnom Penh Appeal Court on December 28, 2021 upheld  former Parliamentarian Ahmad Yahya and his nephew’s 15-year-sentence, who were convicted of trafficking women to Saudi Arabia in 2004. 

Presiding Judge Plong Samnang identified the accused as Ahmad Yahya, 69 , former director of the Accent Group and former parliamentarian;  and  his nephew Ismael Pin Osman, 48, formerly an official at the Ministry of Public Works.  

Judge Samnang said that they were sentenced by Phnom Penh Municipal Court in August 2019 to 15 years in prison each. 

The court also ordered them to jointly pay $50,000 each to the two victims. 

He added that they were charged with “unlawful removal for cross-border transfer” under article 11 of the Cambodia Law on Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation.  

Osman was arreste in 2018, while Yahya was picked up in 2019. They were arrested after recruiting nearly 300 girls and women to work as maids. The pair received fees of up to $20,000 for each of the maids. 

During their appeal hearing on December 10, Ahmad Yahya and Ismael Pin Osman denied the allegations. 

Ahmad Yahya told the court that in this case, he accepted that his company had recruited many women to work overseas. He claimed that he did not know that some of the women were exploited, and even bought and sold between Saudi families. 

The case was lodged when a woman who had worked without pay for nearly a decade, escaped from her household and raised the alarm. Upon her repatriation to Cambodia, she registered her complaint. 

 “I did not traffic or sell them to work as maids in Saudi Arabia as accused. I also did not know that they were forced by the owners of houses to work harder without payment and did not eat enough during their works and stays in Saudi Arabia,” said Ahmad Yahya. 

“I did not commit any thing as the lower court has allegedly accused and sentenced me. I would like to ask Appeal Court to find the truth and justice for me, and please release me from the prison,” he said. 

Ismael Pin said that he did also not know the two victims or bring them to work in Saudi Arabia in 2004. 

Ismael Pin added that on that time [ 2004], he was the official working with Ministry of Public Works and Transports and was very busy with his government works. He did not have any free time to bring them for a travel to  Saudi Arabia as accused.  

“In this case, I was innocent and I have known nothing. Please the court to drop the charge and release me from the prison,” he said. 

But the victim Heng Pov said that in 2004, she was introduced by Ismael Pin, the nephew of Ahmad Yahya about the overseas employment offered by Ahmad Yahya’s company in Phnom Penh.  

Pov testified that after the introducing from Mr. Ismael Pin and because she trusted on Mr. Ismael Pin , especially Mr. Amad Yahya, who was  the owners of the company and who was then Working as Parliamentarian in the National Assembly, she then accepted the work as a maid with $ 120 salary per month offered by Amad Yahya.  

Pov  said that after she has accepted the work, a week later she was brought by her mother from her home in Kampong Cham province to directly meet with Mr. Ahmnad Yahya at his resident in Phnom Penh’s Russei Keo district.   

Pov said that she stayed at Ahmad Yahya’s house for a month in Phnom Penh before she was later sent to Saudi Arabia for the housemaid work. 

Pov said that during staying at Ahmad Yahya’s house, she learned Arabian language and other housemaids skills.  

Pov said to prepare for oversea trip, Ismael Pin brought her along other women to make passport at the Ministry of Interior’s Passport Department.  And Ahmad Yahya paid for her passport, visa as well as other travel fees. 

Pov noted that on the day of her departure to Saudi Arabia in 2004 [ she did not remember the exact date],  Ismael Pin brought her along with a group of about other 18 women by a bus to Saudi Arabia via traveling by  Poipet International Border Checkpoint, in Banteay Meanchey province, in Cambodia-Thai-border. 

“At first, after I have arrived in Saudi Arabia, I was sold to work as a housemaid with a rich Saudi Arabian family.  They paid me $ 120 salary but they used me and forced me to work very hard ---almost 24 hours as a slave every day,” Pov said.

 “After working with that family for seven months, the house owners later sold me with the price $ 20,000 to work with another family there. And during staying and working with this second family, I have never received any salary besides eating and working very hard as slave,” she stated. 

“I worked with this second family as slave for more than ten years without payments in Saudi Arabia,” she added. 

Pov said that finally because she could not support with her hard works with the second Arabian family, in January 2018 r, she fled from the house when the house owner were sleepy and ran to seek for interventions from Arabian police and the Embassy of Cambodia based in Saudi Arabia. 

She said that she was later rescued and repatriated from Saudi Arabia to her home in Kampong Cham province in February 2018. 

She added that after arriving home, she later lodged the complaint against Mr. Ismael Pin and Mr. Ahmad Yahya to Ministry of Interior for justice and interventions.

 

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