Prostitutes get the heave-ho before Apec

MANOP THIP-OSOD
More than 1,000 prostitutes hanging around Sanam Luang and Khlong Lot have been rounded up in the past few months under a measure to clean the city ahead of October's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.
But police say prostitutes return almost as soon as they are fined, and the measure is not working.
Prostitutes, mostly women aged 20-50, continue to ply their trade at night, just as they have done there for decades.
Prostitutes are fined only 100 baht for every arrest. Some are fined and arrested several times a night. Police say it is also hard to tell some prostitutes from pedestrians.
Samran Rat and Phra Ratchawang police started the crackdown along Khlong Lot, near the Interior Ministry, in June.
Chana Songkhram police are rounding up prostitutes around Sanam Luang.
The crackdown also includes areas around public parks such as Lumphini park and in front of love motels.
Pol Maj-Gen Phadet Thalawong, chief of the Metropolitan Police Bureau's division 6, said Samran Rat police arrested 291 prostitutes in June and 418 in July, while Phra Ratchawang police nabbed 230 prostitutes in June and 357 in July.
"I asked police stations such as Pathum Wan, Bang Rak, Samran Rat and Phra Ratchawang to send special teams to check hotels in troubled areas to pressure prostitutes to stop selling their bodies," he said.
The prostitutes have sex with customers in small hotels. They pay 100-150 baht for hotel rooms besides sex charges which are as low as 50-150 baht for old prostitutes.
However, the hotels have devised a way to escape legal action by claiming that they only open rooms for guests and are not sex-service providers.
Police can only warn hotel owners not to allow prostitutes in their rooms. If they do they can have their licence revoked.
A member of a police suppression team who requested anonymity said more than 10 women prostitutes were arrested, fined and blacklisted every day, but they always returned.
Officers felt uncomfortable since they had other work to do and also sympathised with prostitutes who had no other way to earn a living.
"There are not only women hanging around near Sanam Luang, Khlong Lot and many public places selling their bodies but also teenage boys looking for homosexual customers, both Thais and foreigners.
"More have turned to serve women, too," a police officer said.
Pol Maj Ekkachai Chaicharoen, Chana Songkhram police station's inspector for suppression, said it was hard for police to differentiate prostitutes from pedestrians and police could be sued for human rights violations if they accused someone falsely.
Police teams worked two shifts a night _ the first shift for rounding up old faces around midnight, and the second shift for arresting women waiting alone in the area about 3am.
"We arrested more than 500 prostitutes in July.
"More than 20 people have been nabbed every day this month.
"They are freed after being fined, but they return. Some people are arrested twice in one night. They run away when they see police," Pol Maj Ekkachai said.
The officers felt uncertain whether their crackdown on prostitutes ahead of the Apec meetings would succeed.
Every night, at least 30 prostitutes aged between 20-40 wait for customers around Sanam Luang.
They look better than the ones around Khlong Lot.
They serve customers and charge them about 500 baht excluding hotel fees. Sometimes men and elderly women also go there looking for customers.
Many prostitutes around Sanam Luang are not full-time professionals but people moonlighting as prostitutes when they need money.
Prostitutes around Khlong Lot tend to serve tuk-tuk drivers and construction workers.
Pol Maj Ekkachai said police still hoped to solve the problem though prostitutes had plied their trade there for years.
"We asked the prosecution and the courts about detaining prostitutes before fining them, in the hope of giving them a scare.
"We can't put them in jail pending the fining process, so police have to fine them during questioning and then release them," he said.
A police proposal to ban prostitutes from the area at night was once rejected by a judge, who thought the move breached their human rights.
Making Sanam Luang a protected zone at night would not work either, as putting up barricades would spoil the landscape.
Kai (not real name), 30, who has been arrested on prostitution charges, said she sold her body to help her family pay education expenses and look after her ill father.
Sanam Luang was a good place because she was too old to work in a brothel and had no money to pay pimps. She said her customers paid hotel room fees.
Her main worry was the police.
Several other women prostitutes in the area also gave a lack of money as their reason for doing this kind of work.

source: Bangkok Post