Kampot provincial police continued to question nine Chinese nationals on Tuesday after their arrests the previous night for running a brothel from a guesthouse.

Provincial police chief Mao Chanmathurith said that four men and five women had been detained.

He said he had received a tip-off that a brothel was being run from the Rising Star guesthouse in Kampot town’s Kampong Kandal commune.

Having received the information, he requested legal coordination with the provincial court prosecutor to lead a night raid on the location.

The nine Chinese nationals were arrested in the operation and several used and unused Chinese-brand condoms were found.

The suspects had rented the guesthouse to offer sexual services, Chanmathurith said.

The five women admitted under questioning to be sex workers and so were not victims of trafficking.

All of them will have to face Cambodian law, he said.

Chanmathurith said he had requested the General Department of Immigration at the Ministry of Interior to deport the suspects, but this did not mean they would escape Cambodian justice as they will have to be prosecuted in the Kingdom if the court ruled they had broken the law, he stressed.

“After being arrested in Cambodia, if they are found guilty by the court, then they will be deported to their home country immediately after serving their sentences,” Chanmathurith said.

He said he could not say exactly when the Chinese nationals would be sent to court as so many had been arrested and needed to be processed.

“I have yet to send them to the court, but it will not exceed the timeframe of being within 48 hours of their arrest as per the law,” he said.