Its four days before Christmas and many of us are still madly scrambling to finish our shopping, baking and gift-wrapping. But for Richmonds Brian McConaghy, Christmas came early this year.
Last Sunday, two little girls we had been searching for for months were found and we are able to help them, said McConaghy. So, Christmas has arrived for me.
McConaghy is the founder of Ratanak International, a nonprofit organization focused on helping poor and victimized children in Cambodia more specifically girls, as young as five, from mafia-run brothels.
To understand how McConaghy came to this calling, you need to know his story.
In 1989, McConaghy was a 26-year-old RCMP forensic scientist and firearms specialist.
He was used to dealing with murder victims, but nothing prepared the cop for what he witnessed in Cambodian refugee camps in Thailand.
What I saw appalled me, said the 48-year-old devout Christian. I was so moved that I felt compelled to do something about it. That trip changed me completely.
Several months later, McConaghy traveled to Cambodia, only to find the camps there were far worse. It was a time when the civil war was raging on and the Khmer Rouge was executing and torturing dissidents.
Doctors had been murdered and hospitals and clinics destroyed, he said. I also saw children dying because of a lack of medicine.
I wanted to prevent such absolutely absurd deaths.
That same year, McConaghy founded Ratanak International in memory of a little girl he saw dying in a documentary about Cambodias refugee camps.
When I first founded Ratanak, I was focused on bringing medical supplies in and building hospitals and clinics, he said.
In 2008, McConaghy retired from the RCMP to devote his life full-time to his foundation.
Fast track to 2011 and although Ratanak still maintains health care programs, its focus has shifted more to the sex trade.
Because of my background in police work and sex exploitation investigations, helping young girls escape from the brothels became our centerpiece, he said.
Other charities can help provide health care, but its too daunting for them to get into the issue of human trafficking in Cambodia.
Over the years, Ratanak International has successfully saved 300 young girls from the sex trade and got them into rehabilitation, and has trained more than 2,600 people to help street proof the girls.
Weve had sex traffickers transform their lives and help the girls, he said. We show compassion to anyone who wants to change most Cambodians have never experienced compassion and caring.
The nonprofit organization has also raised millions of dollars, built hospitals, clinics, orphanages and a rehabilitation centre and housing facility for young girls theyve rescued from mafia-run brothels.
There are 14 ongoing projects in Cambodia at this moment.
Girls are simply products to mobsters, said McConaghy.
Ratanak also funds a shelter outside of Phnom Penh for 60 victims, as well as provide trafficking education and connecting survivors with foster families.
We work in mafia-controlled areas of Cambodia, he said.
This is slavery in the 21st century if a child escapes from a brothel and she is found, either she will be beaten or electrocuted or even killed.
When asked whether he ever gets discouraged, McConaghy said, I am rejuvenated every time we save a young girl from the brothel.
He concedes its extremely difficult to change the lives of girls forced into sexual slavery at a young age.
It can take years to undo the damage done to them, he said. When we rescue girls, we provide schooling and intensive counseling.
Today, McConaghy travels to Cambodia known all over the world as the Killing Fields at least three times a year.
The violence and brutality still exists not only from the pimps but from the North American pedophiles who frequently visit the brothels, he said.
When I was there three weeks ago, I saw four American men looking over the young girls, choosing which one they wanted for the night.
As much as Id like to grab the girls away from this nightmare, the police and many in government are as corrupt as the criminals in fact, many police officers own brothels themselves.
You have to follow the proper channels to be able to save these young girls.
McConaghy went on to say, We need to work to rescue those helpless children sold into this dark underworld, but we also need to be very active working to prevent kids being trafficked in the first place.
To that end, Ratanak International has funded a wonderful child trafficking prevention program at the community level in many rural villages from where the kids are sold.
McConaghy, along with his wife Louise McConaghy, have dedicated their lives to the people of Cambodia.
We absolutely fell in love with the country, he said.
In fact, the couples two adopted sons, Ian, 14, and nine-year-old Andrew (adopted at birth), are Cambodian-born.
In the end, McConaghy said, Even someone like myself, who had no skills to start a foundation, can affect huge change. Anyone who is moved to do something can do it.
His foundation survives on corporate and private donations.
For more information or to learn how you can help Ratanak International, log onto www.ratanak.org.
