12 June 2007
The 2007 Trafficking in Persons Report
(Letter from Rice, excerpts from introduction, U.S. anti-trafficking efforts)
(begin excerpt)
Letter from Secretary Condoleezza Rice
Dear Reader:
Two hundred years ago, the British Parliament outlawed the trans-Atlantic slave trade, culminating a decades-long struggle led by William Wilberforce.
Trafficking in persons is a modern-day form of slavery, a new type of global slave trade. Perpetrators prey on the most weak among us, primarily women and children, for profit and gain. They lure victims into involuntary servitude and sexual slavery. Today we are again called by conscience to end the debasement of our fellow men and women. As in the 19th century, committed abolitionists around the world have come together in a global movement to confront this repulsive crime. President George W. Bush has committed the United States Government to lead in combating this serious 21st century challenge, and all nations that are resolved to end human trafficking have a strong partner in the United States.
The seventh annual Trafficking in Persons Report documents efforts by foreign governments to prevent human trafficking, prosecute criminals, and protect their victims. The report probes even the darkest places, calling to account any country, friend or foe, that is not doing enough to combat human trafficking.
The power of shame has stirred many to action and sparked unprecedented reforms; and the growing awareness has prompted important progress in combating this crime and assisting its victims wherever they are found.
Defeating human trafficking is a great moral calling of our day. Together with our allies and friends, we will continue our efforts to bring this cruel practice to an end. Thank you for joining the new abolitionist movement. Together we can make a difference, and together we can build a safer, freer, and more prosperous world for all.
Sincerely,
Condoleezza Rice
THE 2007 TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS (TIP) REPORT
Purpose
The Department of State is required by law to submit a Report each year to the U.S. Congress on foreign governments’ efforts to eliminate severe forms of trafficking in persons. This Report is the seventh annual TIP Report. It is intended to raise global awareness, to highlight efforts of the international community, and to encourage foreign governments to take effective actions to counter all forms of trafficking in persons.
The U.S. law that guides anti-human trafficking efforts, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of
2000, as amended (TVPA), states that the purpose of combating human trafficking is to punish traffickers, to protect victims, and to prevent trafficking from occurring. Freeing those trapped in slave-like conditions is the ultimate goal of this Report—and of the U.S. government’s anti-human trafficking policy.
Human trafficking is a multi-dimensional threat. It deprives people of their human rights and freedoms, it increases global health risks, and it fuels the growth of organized crime.
Human trafficking has a devastating impact on individual victims, who often suffer physical and emotional abuse, rape, threats against self and family, document theft, and even death. But the impact of human trafficking goes beyond individual victims; it undermines the health, safety and security of all nations.
There is an ever-growing community of nations making significant efforts to eliminate this atrocious crime. A country that fails to make significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking in persons, as outlined in the TVPA, receives a “Tier 3” assessment in this Report. Such an assessment could trigger the withholding by the United States of non-humanitarian, non-trade-related foreign assistance. In assessing foreign governments’ efforts, the TIP Report highlights the “three P’s”—prosecution, protection, and prevention. But a victim-centered approach to trafficking requires us also to address the “three R’s”—rescue, rehabilitation, and reintegration—and to encourage learning and sharing of best practices in these areas.
This year is the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade. The movement led by British parliamentarian William Wilberforce took decades to succeed. It required a nation to deepen and expand its definition of human dignity. It required a nation to declare that moral values outweigh commercial interests. Nothing less is required today of every nation taking up the contemporary challenge to eliminate human trafficking, a form of modern-day slavery.
Human Trafficking Defined
The TVPA defines “severe forms of trafficking,” as:
a. Sex trafficking in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion, or in which the person induced to perform such an act has not attained 18 years of age; or
b. The recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for labor or services, through the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of subjection to involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery.
A victim need not be physically transported from one location to another in order for the crime to fall within these definitions.
The Scope and Nature of Modern-Day Slavery
The common denominator of trafficking scenarios is the use of force, fraud, or coercion to exploit a person for profit. A victim can be subjected to labor exploitation, sexual exploitation, or both. Labor exploitation includes slavery, forced labor, and debt bondage. Sexual exploitation typically includes abuse within the commercial sex industry. In other cases, victims are exploited in private homes by individuals who often demand sex as well as work. The use of force or coercion can be direct and violent or psychological.
A wide range of estimates exists on the scope and magnitude of modern-day slavery. The International Labor Organization (ILO )—the United Nations agency charged with addressing labor standards, employment, and social protection issues—estimates there are 12.3 million people in forced labor, bonded labor, forced child labor, and sexual servitude at any given time; other estimates range from 4 million to 27 million.
Annually, according to U.S. Government-sponsored research completed in 2006, approximately 800,000 people are trafficked across national borders, which does not include millions trafficked within their own countries. Approximately 80 percent of transnational victims are women and girls and up to 50 percent are minors. The majority of transnational victims are females trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation. These numbers do not include millions of female and male victims around the world who are trafficked within their own national borders—the majority for forced or bonded labor.
Human traffickers prey on the vulnerable. Their targets are often children and young women, and their ploys are creative and ruthless, designed to trick, coerce, and win the confidence of potential victims. Very often these ruses involve promises of a better life through marriage, employment, or educational opportunities.
The nationalities of trafficked people are as diverse as the world’s cultures. Some leave developing countries, seeking to improve their lives through low-skilled jobs in more prosperous countries. Others fall victim to forced or bonded labor in their own countries. Women eager for a better future are susceptible to promises of jobs abroad as babysitters, housekeepers, waitresses, or models—jobs that traffickers turn into the nightmare of prostitution without exit. Some families give children to adults, often relatives, who promise education and opportunity—but sell the children into exploitative situations instead.
Focus of the 2007 TIP Report
The TIP Report is the most comprehensive worldwide report on the efforts of governments to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons. This Report covers the period April 2006 through March 2007. It includes those countries that have been determined to be countries of origin, transit, or destination for a significant number of victims of severe forms of trafficking. The 2007 TIP Report represents an updated, global look at the nature and scope of modern-day slavery and the broad range of actions being taken by governments around the world to confront and eliminate it.
Because trafficking likely extends to every country in the world, the omission of a country from the Report may only indicate a lack of adequate information. The country narratives describe the scope and nature of the trafficking problem, the reasons for including the country, and the government’s efforts to combat trafficking. Each narrative also contains an assessment of the government’s compliance with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking as laid out in the TVPA, and includes suggestions for additional actions to combat trafficking. The remainder of the country narrative describes each government’s efforts to enforce laws against trafficking, protect victims, and prevent trafficking. Each narrative explains the basis for rating a country as Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 2 Watch List, or Tier 3. If a country has been placed on Tier 2 Watch List, the narrative will contain a statement of explanation, using the criteria found in the TVPA.
The TVPA lists three factors to be considered in determining whether a country should be in Tier 2 (or Tier 2 Watch List) or in Tier 3: 1) The extent to which the country is a country of origin, transit or destination for severe forms of trafficking; 2) The extent to which the government of the country does not comply with the TVPA’s minimum standards including, in particular, the extent of the government’s trafficking-related corruption; and 3) The resources and capabilities of the government to address and eliminate severe forms of trafficking in persons.
Some countries have held conferences and established task forces or national action plans to create goals for anti-trafficking efforts. However, conferences, plans, and task forces alone are not weighed heavily in assessing country efforts. Rather, the Report focuses on concrete actions governments have taken to fight trafficking, especially prosecutions, convictions, and prison sentences for traffickers, victim protection measures, and prevention efforts. The Report does not give great weight to laws in draft form or laws that have not yet been enacted. Finally, the Report does not focus on government efforts that contribute indirectly to reducing trafficking, such as education programs, support for economic development, or programs aimed at enhancing gender equality, although these are worthwhile endeavors.
Methodology
The Department of State prepared this Report using information from U.S. embassies, foreign government officials, NGOs and international organizations, published reports, research trips to every region, and information submitted to tipreport@state.gov. This email address was established for NGOs and individuals to share information on government progress in addressing trafficking. U.S. diplomatic posts reported on the trafficking situation and governmental action based on thorough research, including meetings with a wide variety of government officials, local and international NGO representatives, officials of international organizations, journalists, academics, and survivors.
To compile this year’s Report, the Department took a fresh look at information sources on every country to make its assessments. Assessing each government’s anti-trafficking efforts involves a two-step process:
Step One: Finding Significant Numbers of Victims
First, the Department determines whether a country is “a country of origin, transit, or destination for a significant number of victims of severe forms of trafficking,” generally on the order of 100 or more victims, the same threshold applied in previous reports. Some countries, for which such information was not available, are not given tier ratings, but are included in the Special Case section because they exhibited indications of trafficking.
Step Two: Tier Placement
The Department places each country included on the 2007 TIP Report into one of the three lists, described here as tiers, mandated by the TVPA. This placement is based more on the extent of government action to combat trafficking, rather than the size of the problem, important though that is. The Department first evaluates whether the government fully complies with the TVPA’s minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking (detailed on pp. 228-229). Governments that do fully comply are placed in Tier 1. For other governments, the Department considers whether they are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance. Governments that are making significant efforts to meet the minimum standards are placed in Tier 2. Governments that do not fully comply with the minimum standards and are not making significant efforts to do so are placed in Tier 3. Finally, the Special Watch List criteria are considered and, when applicable, Tier 2 countries are placed on the Tier 2 Watch List.
The Special Watch List—Tier 2 Watch List
The TVPA created a “Special Watch List” of countries on the TIP Report that should receive special scrutiny. The list is composed of: 1) Countries listed as Tier 1 in the current Report that were listed as
Tier 2 in the 2006 Report; 2) Countries listed as Tier 2 in the current Report that were listed as Tier 3 in the 2006 Report; and, 3) Countries listed as Tier 2 in the current Report, where:
a) The absolute number of victims of severe forms of trafficking is very significant or is significantly increasing;
b) There is a failure to provide evidence of increasing efforts to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons from the previous year, including increased investigations, prosecutions, and convictions of trafficking crimes, increased assistance to victims, and decreasing evidence of complicity in severe forms of trafficking by government officials; or
c) The determination that a country is making significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with the minimum standards was based on commitments by the country to take additional future steps over the next year.
This third category (including a, b, and c) has been termed by the Department of State “Tier 2 Watch List.” There were 32 countries placed on Tier 2 Watch List in the June 2006 Report. Along with two countries that were reassessed as Tier 2 Watch List countries in September 2006 and five countries that met the first two categories above (moving up a tier from the 2005 to the 2006 TIP Report), these 39 countries were included in an “Interim Assessment” released by the Department of State on February 1, 2007.
Of the 34 countries on Tier 2 Watch List at the time of the Interim Assessment, 10 moved up to Tier 2 on this Report, while 7 fell to Tier 3 and 17 remain on Tier 2 Watch List. Countries placed on the Special Watch List in this Report will be reexamined in an interim assessment to be submitted to the U.S. Congress by February 1, 2008.
Potential Penalties for Tier 3 Countries
Governments of countries in Tier 3 may be subject to certain sanctions. The U.S. Government may withhold non-humanitarian, non-trade-related foreign assistance. Countries that receive no such assistance would be subject to withholding of funding for participation by officials and employees of such governments in educational and cultural exchange programs. Consistent with the TVPA, governments subject to sanctions would also face U.S. opposition to assistance (except for humanitarian, trade-related, and certain development-related assistance) from international financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Sanctions, if imposed, will take effect October 1, 2007.
All or part of the TVPA’s sanctions can be waived upon a determination by the President that the provision of such assistance to the government would promote the purposes of the statute or is otherwise in the national interest of the United States. The TVPA also provides that sanctions can be waived if necessary to avoid significant adverse effects on vulnerable populations, including women and children. Sanctions would not apply if the President finds that, after this Report is issued but before sanctions determinations are made, a government has come into compliance with the minimum standards or is making significant efforts to bring itself into compliance.
Regardless of tier placement, every country can do more, including the United States. No country placement is permanent. All countries must maintain and increase efforts to combat trafficking.
How the Report Is Used
This Report is a diplomatic tool for the U.S. government to use as an instrument for continued dialogue and encouragement and as a guide to help focus resources on prosecution, protection, and prevention programs and policies. The State Department will continue to engage governments about the content of the Report in order to strengthen cooperative efforts to eradicate trafficking. In the coming year, and particularly in the months before a determination is made regarding sanctions for Tier 3 countries, the Department will use the information gathered here to more effectively target assistance programs and to work with countries that need help in combating trafficking. The Department hopes the Report will be a catalyst for government and non-government efforts to combat trafficking in persons around the world.
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Definition of Terms
Sex trafficking means the recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act.
Commercial sex act means any sex act on account of which anything of value is given to or received by any person.
Coercion means (a) threats of serious harm to or physical restraint against any person; (b) any scheme, plan or pattern intended to cause a person to believe that failure to perform an act would result in serious harm to or physical restraint against any person; or, (c) the abuse or threatened abuse of the legal process.
Involuntary servitude includes a condition of servitude induced by means of (a) any scheme, plan, or pattern intended to cause a person to believe that, if that person did not enter into or continue in such condition, that person or another person would suffer serious harm or physical restraint; or (b) the abuse or threatened abuse of the legal process.
THE FORMS AND IMPACT OF HUMAN TRAFFICKING
Labor Trafficking
Most instances of forced labor occur as unscrupulous employers take advantage of gaps in law enforcement to exploit vulnerable workers. These workers are made more vulnerable to forced labor practices because of unemployment, poverty, crime, discrimination, corruption, political conflict, and cultural acceptance of the practice. Immigrants are particularly vulnerable, but individuals are also forced into labor in their own countries. Female victims of forced or bonded labor, especially women and girls in domestic servitude, are often sexually abused.
Forced labor is a form of human trafficking that can be harder to identify and estimate than sex trafficking. It may not involve the same criminal networks profiting from transnational trafficking for sexual exploitation. More often, individuals are guilty of subjecting one domestic servant or hundreds of unpaid workers at a factory to involuntary servitude.
Bonded Labor
One form of force or coercion is the use of a bond, or debt, to keep a person under subjugation. This is referred to in law and policy as “bonded labor” or “debt bondage.” It is criminalized under U.S. law and included as a form of exploitation related to trafficking in the United Nations Protocol To Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children (UN TIP Protocol). Many workers around the world fall victim to debt bondage when traffickers or recruiters unlawfully exploit an initial debt the worker assumed as part of the terms of employment or when workers inherit debt in more traditional systems of bonded labor. Traditional bonded labor in South Asia enslaves huge numbers of people from generation to generation.
Involuntary Servitude
People become trapped in involuntary servitude when they believe an attempted escape from their situation would result in serious physical harm to them or others, or when they are kept in a condition of servitude through the abuse or threatened abuse of the legal processes. Victims are often economic migrants and low-skilled laborers who are trafficked from less developed communities to more prosperous and developed places. Many victims are physically and verbally abused, experience breach of an employment contract, and/or are held captive (or perceive themselves as held captive).
Debt Bondage and Involuntary Servitude Among Guest Workers
The vulnerability of migrant laborers to trafficking schemes is especially disturbing because this population is so sizeable in some regions. Three potential contributors can be discerned: 1) Abuse of contracts; 2) Inadequate local laws governing the recruitment and employment of migrant laborers; and 3) The intentional imposition of exploitative and often illegal costs and debts on these laborers in the source country or state, often with the complicity and/or support of labor agencies and employers in the destination country or state.
Some abuses of contracts and difficult conditions of employment do not in themselves constitute involuntary servitude, though use or threat of physical force or restraint to compel a worker to enter into or continue labor or service may convert a situation into one of forced labor. Costs imposed on laborers for the “privilege” of working abroad can place laborers in a situation highly vulnerable to debt bondage. However, these costs alone do not constitute debt bondage or involuntary servitude. When combined with exploitation by unscrupulous labor agents or employers in the destination country, these costs or debts, when excessive, can become a form of debt bondage.
Involuntary Domestic Servitude
Domestic workers may be trapped in servitude through the use of force or coercion, such as physical (including sexual) or emotional abuse. Children are particularly vulnerable. Domestic servitude is particularly difficult to detect because it occurs in private homes, which are often unregulated by public authorities. For example, there is great demand in some wealthier countries of Asia and the Middle East for domestic servants who sometimes fall victim to conditions of involuntary servitude.
Forced Child Labor
Most international organizations and national laws indicate that children may legally engage in light work. In contrast, the worst forms of child labor are being targeted for eradication by nations across the globe. The sale and trafficking of children and their entrapment in bonded and forced labor are clearly the worst forms of child labor. Any child who is subject to involuntary servitude, debt bondage, peonage or slavery through the use of force, fraud or coercion is a victim of trafficking in persons regardless of the location of that exploitation.
Child Soldiers
Child soldiering is a unique and severe manifestation of trafficking in persons that involves the unlawful recruitment of children through force, fraud, or coercion to be exploited for their labor or to be abused as sex slaves in conflict areas. Such unlawful practices may be perpetrated by government forces, paramilitary organizations, and rebel groups. UNICEF estimates that more than 300,000 children under 18 are currently being exploited in more than 30 armed conflicts worldwide. While the majority of child soldiers are between the ages of 15 and 18, some are as young as 7 or 8 years of age.
Many children are abducted to be used as combatants. Others are made unlawfully to serve as porters, cooks, guards, servants, messengers, or spies. Many young girls are forced to marry or have sex with male combatants and are at high risk of pregnancy. Male and female child soldiers are often sexually abused and are at high risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases.
Some children have been forced to commit atrocities against their families and communities. Child soldiers are often killed or wounded, with survivors often suffering multiple traumas and psychological scarring. Their personal development is often irreparably damaged. Returning child soldiers are often rejected by their home communities.
Child soldiers are a global phenomenon. The problem is most critical in Africa and Asia, but armed groups in the Americas and the Middle East also unlawfully use children in conflict areas. All nations must work together with international organizations and NGOs to take urgent action to disarm, demobilize, and reintegrate child soldiers.
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Sex Trafficking and Prostitution
Sex trafficking is considered the largest specific subcategory of transnational modern-day slavery.
Sex trafficking would not exist without the demand for commercial sex flourishing around the world. The U.S. Government adopted a strong position against prostitution in a December 2002 policy decision, which states that prostitution is inherently harmful and dehumanizing and fuels trafficking in persons.
Prostitution and related activities—including pimping and patronizing or maintaining brothels—encourage the growth of modern-day slavery by providing a façade behind which traffickers for sexual exploitation operate. Where prostitution is tolerated, there is a greater demand for human trafficking victims and nearly always an increase in the number of women and children trafficked into commercial sex slavery. Few women seek out or choose to be in prostitution, and most are desperate to leave it. A 2003 scientific study in the Journal of Trauma Practice found that 89 percent of women in prostitution want to escape prostitution but had no other options for survival.
Children Exploited for Commercial Sex
Each year, more than two million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade. Children are also trapped in prostitution despite the fact that a number of international covenants and protocols impose upon parties an obligation to criminalize the commercial sexual exploitation of children. The use of children in the commercial sex trade is prohibited under both U.S. law and the UN TIP Protocol. There can be no exceptions, no cultural or socio-economic rationalizations that prevent the rescue of children from sexual servitude. Terms such as “child sex worker” are unacceptable because they sanitize the brutality of this exploitation.
Child Sex Tourism
Child sex tourism (CST) involves people who travel from their own country to another and engage in commercial sex acts with children. CST is a shameful assault on the dignity of children and a form of violent child abuse. The commercial sexual exploitation of children has devastating consequences for minors, which may include long-lasting physical and psychological trauma, disease (including HIV/AIDS), drug addiction, unwanted pregnancy, malnutrition, social ostracism, and possibly death.
Tourists engaging in CST often travel to developing countries looking for anonymity and the availability of children in prostitution. The crime is typically fueled by weak law enforcement, corruption, the Internet, ease of travel, and poverty. Sexual offenders come from all socioeconomic backgrounds and may hold positions of trust. Cases of child sex tourism involving U.S. citizens have included a pediatrician, a retired Army sergeant, a dentist, and a university professor. Child pornography is frequently involved in these cases, and drugs may also be used to solicit or control the minors.
POLICY APPROACHES TO TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS
Focusing on Forced Labor and Sex Trafficking
Every year we add to our knowledge of the trafficking phenomenon. The 2007 Report sheds new light on the alarming trafficking of people for purposes of forced labor, often in their own countries. Conventional approaches to dealing with forced or bonded labor usually focus on compliance, in line with international conventions (i.e., ILO Conventions 29, 39, 105 and 182). These approaches seek to have exploitative industries comply with the law simply by releasing victims or offering financial compensation.
Approaches to combating forced labor that rely solely on compliance with labor standards can be weak because these approaches fail to punish those responsible for trafficking. While administrative sanctions are effective for deterring some labor violations, forced labor must be punished as a crime, through vigorous prosecutions. While most countries in the world have criminalized forced labor, they do little to prosecute offenders, in part due to the lack of awareness of forced labor issues among law enforcement officials.
The Department of State, as directed by Congress through the TVPA, continues to increase its attention on forced labor and bonded labor, while maintaining its campaign against sex trafficking. As with the last two Reports, this Report places several countries on Tier 3 primarily as a result of their failure to address trafficking for forced labor among foreign migrant workers.
The Policy of Victim Rescue
While some victims of human trafficking are able to escape from involuntary servitude, many more are not able to break free on their own. They need help.
Help often comes in the form of a raid by law enforcement on the place where victims are held against their will. Victims of involuntary servitude in a labor situation are rescued, for example, through raids on sweatshops or searches of homes exploiting domestic servants. Victims of sex trafficking are rescued through raids on brothels and other places where commercial sexual exploitation occurs, such as massage parlors, Karaoke bars, and strip clubs.
The U.S. Government views rescues as an integral part of the law enforcement response to trafficking in persons. Rescues identify, gain access to, and protect victims while uncovering evidence for the prosecution of traffickers and their accomplices.
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Health Impacts of Trafficking in Persons
Trafficking in persons has serious public health implications in addition to being a human rights and national security issue. By definition, human trafficking entails “force, fraud, or coercion” which typically includes confinement and, often, physical and psychological abuse.
Research demonstrates that violence and abuse are at the core of trafficking for prostitution. A 2006 study of women trafficked for prostitution into the European Union found that 95 percent of victims had been violently assaulted or coerced into a sexual act, and over 60 percent of victims reported fatigue, neurological symptoms, gastrointestinal problems, back pain, and/or gynecological infections. Additional psychological consequences common among prostituted women include dissociative and personality disorders, anxiety, and depression. A 2001 study revealed that 86 percent of women trafficked within their countries and 85 percent of women trafficked across international borders suffer from depression.
As with sex trafficking, those who are trafficked for labor suffer physical and mental health problems, such as post-traumatic stress disorder due to physical assaults and beatings, and depression that elevates the risk of suicide. Victims of forced labor have limited ability to determine the conditions in which they work or to leave the workplace, which may increase their risk of physical and mental health damage.
HIV/AIDS and Trafficking in Persons
Approximately 42 million people worldwide are living with HIV/AIDS and sex trafficking plays a major role in spreading the epidemic. The 2005 UNAIDS report states that “across Asia, the [HIV] epidemics are propelled by combinations of injecting drug use and commercial sex.” Thus, both prostitution and sex trafficking contribute to the spread of HIV/AIDS.
Globally, women in prostitution and those who have been trafficked for prostitution have a high incidence of HIV. For example, HIV prevalence among women prostituted in Nepal is 20 percent. In South Africa, the number reaches 70.4 percent. Furthermore, according to the World Congress Against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children, between “50 and 90 percent of children rescued from brothels in Southeast Asia are infected with HIV.”
The U.S. Government has strong policies to combat HIV/AIDS and human trafficking. In 2006, the President’s Interagency Task Force To Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons reaffirmed the Administration’s commitment to fighting both. The U.S. Government promotes the rescue and care of victims and seeks to ameliorate the harm suffered by men, women, and children used in prostitution.
U.S. law encourages appropriate treatment and care for those trafficked into prostitution as well as those who escape servitude. The U.S. Government is the largest funder in the world of vital HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment.
The Many Causes of Trafficking: Supply and Demand
The causes of human trafficking are complex and often reinforce each other.
The supply of victims is encouraged by many factors, including poverty, the attraction of perceived higher standards of living elsewhere, lack of employment opportunities, public and private corruption, organized crime, violence against women and children, discrimination against women, political instability, and armed conflict. In some societies a tradition of fostering allows a younger child to be sent to live and work in an urban center with a member of the extended family, in exchange for a promise of education and instruction in a trade. Taking advantage of this tradition, traffickers often position themselves as employment agents, inducing parents to part with a child, but then traffic the child into prostitution, domestic servitude, or a commercial enterprise. In the end, the family receives few if any wage remittances, the child remains unschooled and untrained and separated from his or her family, and the hoped-for educational and economic opportunities never materialize.
Demand for cheap labor and for prostituted women, girls, and boys is the primary “pull” factor. Customers for the products of forced labor are often completely ignorant of their involvement with slavery. Sex buyers are far more complicit in the victimization of sex trafficking victims, and thus are logical targets for education on the link between prostitution and human trafficking. Sex tourism and child pornography have become worldwide industries, facilitated by technologies such as the Internet, which vastly expand the choices available to pedophiles and permit instant and nearly undetectable transactions. [See Box on p. 23] Trafficking is also driven by the global demand for cheap, vulnerable, and illegal labor. For example, there is great demand in some prosperous countries of Asia and the Middle East for domestic servants who sometimes fall victim to exploitation or involuntary servitude.
The Greatest Challenge: Victim Protection
The TVPA gives us a victim-centered approach to address trafficking, combining anti-crime and human rights objectives. Without adequate protection for victims, efforts to address trafficking crimes are unlikely to be effective. The TVPA’s criteria for evaluating a government’s efforts to combat trafficking in persons include an explicit criterion on victim protection: “Whether the government of the country protects victims of severe forms of trafficking in persons and encourages their assistance in the investigation and prosecution of such trafficking, including provisions for legal alternatives to their removal to countries in which they would face retribution or hardship, and ensures that victims are not inappropriately incarcerated, fined, or otherwise penalized solely for unlawful acts as a direct result of being trafficked.”
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The Victim-Centered Approach
Two main objectives govern the approach the international community takes toward trafficking in persons: the need for the state to punish this serious crime and the need for society to care for the victims of a serious human rights abuse that strikes at their most basic freedoms. The UN TIP Protocol, which supplements the UN Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, clearly supports both.
At the core of the U.S. Government’s anti-trafficking efforts is the human rights principle that victims of trafficking and slave-like practices must be protected from further trauma. A government should provide efficient access to justice for these victims, if they so chose, and access to shelter, medical care, legal aid, psycho-social counseling, and assistance in integrating back into their original community or into a new community so that they can rebuild their lives. Such an approach strikes a careful balance between the security needs of the state and society’s need for the restoration of human rights to the victim.
By placing the needs of victims front and center, victims of this heinous crime are assured of the protection they so desperately need. Once given those assurances, many victims step forward voluntarily and without pressure to become powerful and confident witnesses, telling their stories in court and achieving justice not only for the state that wants to eradicate these slave-like practices, but on a personal level as well.
Cooperation of victims cannot be bought or forced, but through the consistent provision of assistance that is not tied to performance in court, victims assured of their rights regain the confidence to speak out for themselves. When this balance is struck effectively, everyone wins—the state, the victim, and society—as a victim finds his or her voice and an exploiter is rendered speechless as justice is handed down.
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United States Government Domestic Anti-Trafficking in Persons Efforts
The United States is a source and destination country for thousands of men, women, and children trafficked for the purposes of sexual and labor exploitation. Women and girls, largely from East Asia, Eastern Europe, Mexico and Central America are trafficked to the United States into prostitution. Some men and women, responding to fraudulent offers of employment in the United States, migrate willingly—legally and illegally—but are subsequently subjected to conditions of involuntary servitude at work sites or in the commercial sex trade. An unknown number of American citizens and legal residents are trafficked within the country primarily for sexual servitude and, to a lesser extent, forced labor.
The United States Government (USG) in 2006 continued to advance the goal of eradicating human trafficking in the United States. This coordinated effort includes several federal agencies and approximately $28.5 million in Fiscal Year (FY) 2006 for domestic programs to boost anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts, identify and protect victims of trafficking, and raise awareness of trafficking as a means of preventing new incidents.
While significant progress has been made, the U.S. Government continues to seek improvement in its efforts to address trafficking within the borders of the United States. For example, the U.S. Government, its state and local partners, and NGOs strive to improve coordination of services to victims. This includes efforts to find victims, track the support they receive from the U.S. Government and U.S. Government grantees, and coordinate efforts to effectively provide services. For a complete assessment of USG efforts to combat trafficking in persons, please visit the Department of Justice Web site: http://www.usdoj.gov/whatwedo/whatwedo_ctip.html.
Prosecution: The United States Government continued its efforts to improve anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts over the reporting period. The United States prohibits all forms of trafficking in persons through criminal statutes created or strengthened by the 2000 Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), which prescribes penalties of up to 20 years’ imprisonment—penalties that are sufficiently stringent and commensurate with those for other grave crimes. In FY 2006, the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Civil Rights Division and U.S. Attorneys’ Offices initiated 168 investigations, charged 111 individuals, and obtained 98 convictions (including in cases initiated in previous fiscal years). Under the TVPA, traffickers can be sentenced to up to 20 years’ imprisonment. The average sentence imposed for trafficking crimes in FY 2005 was 8.5 years (including defendants convicted in other fiscal years). The Federal Bureau of Investigation and DOJ Criminal Division continued to combat the exploitation of children in prostitution in the United States through the Innocence Lost National Initiative; in FY 2006, this Initiative resulted in 103 open investigations, 157 arrests, 76 indictments, and 43 convictions.
State and local governments also made significant law enforcement efforts against trafficking in persons. By the end of 2006, 27 states had passed criminal anti-trafficking legislation. DOJ and Health and Human Services (HHS) continue to increase the number of anti-trafficking task forces, coalitions, and outreach efforts across the United States. DOJ funded 42 task forces at the end of FY 2006, up from 32 in FY 2005. These task forces bring together state, local, and federal law enforcement with partners from NGOs.
In 2006, the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) began developing resources to help investigators identify potential trafficking issues and began introducing trafficking issues into its investigator training curriculum. During the past year, WHD staff participated in over 30 local, multi-agency task forces on trafficking.
Protection: The U.S. Government continued to provide strong victim protection services over the year. As of March 2007, HHS had certified 1,175 victims of human trafficking from 77 countries since the TVPA was signed into law in October 2000. In FY 2006, HHS certified 234 foreign victims of human trafficking from a remarkably diverse array of countries. Primary sources in FY 2006 of victims were El Salvador (62), Mexico (47), Republic of Korea (20), and Honduras (17). Certification allows human trafficking survivors to access services and benefits, comparable to assistance provided by the U.S. to refugees. HHS established in April 2006 a Per-Capita Services Contract to provide “anytime, anywhere” services to human trafficking victims. As of March 2007, the contract had enlisted 93 social service agencies to provide care to victims across the country.
In FY 2006, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued 192 T-visas to foreign survivors of human trafficking identified in the United States and 106 T-visas to their immediate family members. T-visas are a special visa category resulting from the TVPA. Cumulatively through FY 2006, DHS has issued a total of 729 visas to human trafficking survivors, and another 645 T-visas to members of their family.
As part of the assistance provided under the TVPA, the Department of State’s Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration funds the Return, Reintegration, and Family Reunification Program for Victims of Trafficking. Since its launch in 2005, and through April 2007, the program assisted a total of 67 persons from 22 countries. Of the cases assisted, 5 victims of trafficking elected to return to their country of origin, and 62 family members were reunited with trafficking survivors in the United States.
Prevention: Prevention efforts were sustained over the year, as HHS continued to fund the Rescue & Restore public awareness campaign and the National Human Trafficking Resource Center with an information hotline that has received more than 4,000 calls since it started in February 2004. The Department of Defense (DOD) Inspector General in November 2006 completed and released publicly a department-wide evaluation of DOD efforts to prevent trafficking in persons. The overall assessment concluded that DOD has made significant progress in implementing a comprehensive program.
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(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
