KUALA LUMPUR: A child rights advocate who appeared in a recent documentary on underage sex trafficking in Malaysia has denied attacking the police, but said she had assisted the police in the past by providing them with information.

Dr Hartini Zainuddin was responding to a statement by Bukit Aman’s secret societies, gambling and vice division principal assistant director SAC Datuk Roslee Chik, who criticised her for not furnishing evidence of her claims of underage sex trafficking.

Hartini, who was interviewed in a video titled Trapped — The underage sex industry in Malaysia, said some of the girls involved in prostitution had forged documents to hide their real age.

“To say I’ve never stepped forward to provide information to the authorities is not true. I always have and always will,” the activist told The Malaysian Insider, adding that she has a good relationship with Bukit Aman’s D11 (Sexual and Child Investigation Division).

“Maybe he [Roslee] wants to meet with us more often so we can assist them with gaps and provide more information. No one is attacking police — we’re saying there are huge gaps collaboration and system.”

The 22-minute video documents the underage sex trade in Kuala Lumpur and features interviews with the police, child activists, psychologists and three underage sex workers seasoned in their trade.

The video, the result of two years of research by journalists Mahi Ramakrishnan and Rian Maelzer, has so far received more than 155,000 views on YouTube.

In its response, Bukit Aman downplayed the video, and said it is wrong to use the word “industry” to describe the problem.

“Sex is not an industry in Malaysia, the term ‘sex activities’ is more accurate,” Roslee was reported as saying, adding that “industry” implies that the profits derived from prostitution in Malaysia are as big as in Thailand, where prostitution is legal.

Damansara Utama assemblyman Yeo Bee Yin took the police to task for attempting to whitewash the issue, saying she was greatly disturbed by Bukit Aman’s response to the video.

“How is a RM3 billion prostitution market not an ‘industry’ but an ‘activity’ to Bukit Aman? Bukit Aman should not take the problem of the illegal sex trade lightly,” she said in a statement. — Full report at www.themalaysianinsider.com


This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on September 24, 2014.