Current Human Trafficking Crisis
Problem and Solutions to the Criminal Trafficking In Persons
Millions of people every year are the victems of human trafficking. Slavery, which is often thought to have ended with the civil war, is alive and well in the world of today. As a crime that is not being significantly impactected by the measures taken to prevent it, the governing international bodies are currenly working to improve conviction of the criminals involved with this crime and also in the aid of the victimes of the crime.
As defined by the United Nations Protocol to Protect, Punish and Suppress Trafficking in Persons, human trafficking is “…the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuses of power or of a position of vulnerability” (Article 3, par 1). This tedious definition can be shortened to two words: force and fraud. All human trafficking involves someone being forced through violence or the threat of violence or coerced through fraudulent representation.
Because of the stealthy nature of the crime it often slips underneath national radars. In Eastern Europe many young woman are presented with an “Amazing modeling opportunity” in the West, only to find themselves trapped in the illicit sex trade once they arrive. Worldwide there is a high demand for women and children to work as sex slaves, sweatshop labor, and domestic servants. The inefficiency of laws and law enforcement have allowed the trafficking in human beings to be the world’s third largest market falling behind drugs and weapons.
Though the largest number of victims comes from South and Southeast Asia, cases of human trafficking exist in nearly all the developed nations of the West. The State Departments conservative estimate calculates that 2-4 million people are trafficked annually, but some estimates range as high as 27 million. 800,000 people are trafficked across international boarders each year; 80% woman and 50% children. According to Condoleezza Rice, as many as 17,500 people are trafficked to the United States each year. The UN's Protocol to Protect puts the number of people the victims of human trafficking at any given time at 12.3 million.
As with any crime, the causes of human trafficking are varied and complicated. But looked at simply it is a case in which an illegal market exists, and wherever money can be earned, organized crime is willing to destroy lives to earn it. While an adequate response to combating the crime has been historically slow, governments and NGO’s are beginning to rise to the call to combat the crime. Even the developing countries of the world are moving forward.
Even Guatemala, considered as Tier 2 by the State Department because it does not have enforcement that is significant and has victim assistance that is considered “inadequate,” is hosting its first ever nationwide congress on the issue under the direction of the NGO Nuestros Ahijados and its sister organization ITEMP.org. In October 2008, the same organization is hosting a similar congress to combat the crime across all of Central America. The key to ending the plague of human trafficking is bringing organizations working against it together to better coordinate the convictions of the criminals and the care of the victims. With awareness finally created, steps large and small are being made to combat the crisis.
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