Woman arrested for luring two Thai victims into prostitution in Brunei

BANGKOK, October 22 (TNA) - Police on Monday arrested a Thai woman alleged to have lured two Thai female victims into prostitution in neighbouring Brunei. The police reported that the arrested woman, identified as Rungthiva Phetlam, from Thailand's northeastern Chaiyaphum province, was accused of luring the two 20-year-old female victims, her neighbours, to work as staff of a clothes store in Brunei to earn about 30,000-40,000 baht monthly, but when arriving in Brunei on March 6, 2012, the two victims were, instead, forced to be prostitutes serving foreign workers by a human trafficking ring comprising Thai, Brunei and Bangladesh members. The police acknowledged that the two young female Thai victims eventually managed to escape and to have returned to Thailand; while the accused has denied all the charges, saying that the two victims approached her, asking for being sent to Brunei. (TNA)