Underage girls graduate from border towns to Bangkok, but are often interrupted as police go to great lengths to gather evidence.
Strolling around downtown Udon Thani, visitors quickly gain the impression it is not much different from other major cities in Thailand. The locals are genuinely friendly and the streetscape consists of the usual food stalls, mega shopping malls and night market, adding a big-city vibe to the culturally rich northeastern hub. They are all young and beautiful girls from Laos.
In a narrow soi between a major hospital and upmarket hotel, hostess bars, massage parlours and karaoke bars with dim red lights replace the safe feeling of the daytime.
It's not as in-your-face as Pattaya or Bangkok's Soi Nana, but it's obvious more than just alcohol is available. Some owners go to great pains to make out that their business is above board. She can sit and have a drink with you but nothing more," says the pushy manager of a hostess bar. But an elderly German tourist who visits Thailand every year is far blunter about the sex trade in the Northeast when he speaks to Spectrum in an Irish bar.
Apart from the Lao sex workers, he says Udon Thani and the surrounding areas of northern Isan are now a major hub for sex tourists from Europe. Disturbingly, he says it is known among many older men for the availability of girls and boys. Once they get there, they can pick anyone they like and take them out. Cross-border human trafficking for prostitution is not something new to Thailand. Underage girls and women from Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia see Thailand as an easy place to earn cash from selling themselves.
