Recession to Increase Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery

The State Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report, which was released yesterday, says the global economic crisis is boosting the demand for human trafficking because of a growing demand for cheap goods and services. It cites the International Labor Organization, which estimates that at least 12.3 million adults and children are victims of forced labor, bonded labor and sex slavery each year.

“A striking global demand for labor and a growing supply of workers willing to take ever greater risks for economic opportunities seem a recipe for increased forced labor cases of migrant workers and women in prostitution,” it says.

It predicts that the economic crisis will push more businesses underground to avoid taxes and unionized labor, which will increase the use of forced, cheap and child labor by cash-strapped multinational companies.

The report surveys the efforts of 175 countries in their fight against trafficking and slavery. The countries are then ranked, and negligent countries face sanctions by the United States. The United States, however, is not ranked among them. This year, however, the Justice Department did issue a report on efforts to combat trafficking efforts in the United States. According to the report, in 2008 the FBI opened 132 trafficking investigations, made 139 arrests and obtained 94 convictions.

Next year, the State Department’s Trafficking in Persons Report will rank the efforts of the United States to combat slavery and trafficking within its own borders.

Information from CNN. Read the article here.

Neighborhood Watch: Joining Forces with Canada

From The Toronto Star:

Obama’s inauguration was truly a turning of the page. Slavery is the deepest scar in American history. As an African American took the oath of office, that scar was finally healed. But as an old injustice was symbolically rectified, a new one was spreading around the globe.

Human trafficking of women, men and children for the purposes of forced labour and/or sexual exploitation occurs in most countries, including Canada. As the U.S. Action Group to End Human Trafficking and Modern-Day Slavery said in its transition report to Obama: “The illicit commercialization of humanity is one of the largest criminal industries in the world, and the selling of children is the fastest growing global crime.”

The Obama administration will make this scourge a foreign policy priority. In her Senate confirmation hearings to become secretary of state, Hillary Clinton pledged “to do all that we can to end this modern form of slavery. We have sex slavery; we have wage slavery. And it is primarily a slavery of girls and women.”

Clinton is not alone in her concern. The Council of Europe has a strong convention on human trafficking, and Brazil has a national action plan for the eradication of slave labour. There is a potential international coalition willing to be led. Obama and Clinton can be the leaders of that coalition, and Canada should be the first to urge them to do so.

The Harper government may be lukewarm on the environment compared with Obama’s enthusiasm, but there is no disagreement on the importance of human trafficking. In February 2007, Conservative MP Joy Smith introduced motion C-153, which was passed unanimously in the House of Commons, on Canada’s need for a national strategy to combat human trafficking.

Smith also recently introduced a private member’s bill to amend the Criminal Code to include a mandatory minimum prison term of five years for the trafficking of children. Citing a case in which a man made more than $350,000 off a 15-year-old by daily exploiting her sexually, Smith declared: “I believe there is clearly need for Parliament to provide additional guidance to the courts on the trafficking of minors.”

Canadians are also active internationally. Brian McConaghy, a former forensic scientist with the RCMP, was involved in the first investigation and conviction of a Canadian international pedophile in Cambodia. He now directs the Ratanak Foundation, which tries to protect Cambodian children from sexual exploitation. McConaghy recently spoke in Toronto and described how dangerous this was; brothel owners have guns and are quite prepared to use them. But despite the threats, Cambodian children are being rescued and helped in rebuilding their lives.

Human trafficking’s Terrible Toll

In an op-ed piece at The Washington Times, Mark P. Lagon, director of the State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, makes a powerful case for the US to continue fighting slavery within our borders:

Across the span of his presidency, at home and abroad, George W. Bush has led U. S. government efforts to eradicate modern-day slavery.

It is a fight that has received consistent support from the White House and bipartisan backing from Congress. It is a legacy of achievement that should make Americans proud. Taking aggressive action at home is essential if the United States is to be credible and urge other nations to do more.

… Since 2001, the Department of Justice and U.S. Attorneys’ offices prosecuted 156 trafficking in persons cases, securing 342 convictions and guilty pleas. More than three times as many human- trafficking cases were filed and more than three times as many defendants were convicted in 2007 compared to 2001.

Since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2003, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement investigations have led to over 300 convictions for human trafficking and related offenses. The Department of Health and Human Services has made over 1,370 foreign adult and minor trafficking victims in the United States eligible to receive federally funded services and benefits to the same extent as refugees.

As a leader in the global effort, the United States has committed over $528 million to fund international anti-trafficking programs since fiscal 2001, including a special $50 million presidential initiative.

… The United States is always striving to improve its efforts to vigorously identify, protect, and assist U.S. citizen victims of trafficking, improve collaboration across all spectrums of the U.S. government to aid victims, and increase efforts to combat labor trafficking on par with sex trafficking. The U.S. anti-trafficking strategy has included sustained, successful prosecutorial and humanitarian efforts-endeavoring to practice at home what we preach internationally.

With the international community watching, President Bush stood up before the U.N. General Assembly and said in 2003: “We must show new energy in fighting back an old evil. The trade in human beings for any purpose must not be allowed to thrive in our time.” These words have been taken to heart and turned into dignity reclaimed from Islip to India, and so many places in between. Future administrations will build on this strong foundation and continue putting victims first.

Gandhi: “Freedom Is Everyone’s Birthright”

Micheline Slattery, a native of Haiti, was orphaned at the age of five and taken in by relatives. Instead of being cared for, however, she was exploited and abused. She told her story to a roomful of students and faculty at USC Aiken, Mike Gellatly of The Aiken Standard reports.

“I speak out because I want people to know I am not unique,” she said. “In Haiti and across the U.S., there are thousands of stories like mine. You took the first step by coming here. You have a voice. Use it.”

Slattery is now an activist for the American Anti-Slavery Group (AASG). Read her incredible story of perseverance at The Aiken Standard.

U.S. Contracor In Iraq Sued For Human Trafficking

Dana Hedgpeth at The Washington Post reported today that Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld & Toll, a Washington law firm, has filed a lawsuit against KBR, one of the largest U.S. contractors in Iraq, for allegedly engaging in the human trafficking of Nepali workers with its Jordanian subcontractor.

It’s the same old story we’ve heard a million times: 13 Nepali men were recruited to work as kitchen staff in hotels and restaurants in Jordan but once they arrived, they had their passports confiscated by recruiters and shipped off to do some other thing.

In this case, that other thing was toil at a military facility in Iraq. This is where the usual narrative changes. Driven into the war-torn country in cars, the men were stopped by insurgents–12 of them were kidnapped and later executed, according to Agnieszka Fryszman, a partner at Cohen, Milstein, Hausfeld & Toll.

The thirteenth man survived and worked in a warehouse in Iraq for 15 months before returning to Nepal.

Read about the case at The Washington Post…