Oman Committed to Curbing Human Trafficking, Abuse of Children

From the Khaleej Times Online:

MUSCAT – Oman, which recently set up a Human Rights Commission, has reiterated its commitment to curbing trafficking in humans and sexual exploitation of children.

Social Development Minister Dr Sharifa bint Khalfan Al Yahya’eeya, extending her country’s wholehearted cooperation to the global drive against the menaces, also revealed that the government had formed working teams to survey the Sultanate’s regions and review the conditions of children and families with the aim of drawing up a ‘rapid intervention plan’. 

“The Omani society vehemently opposes all forms of sexual exploitation because it contradicts with the values and traditions of the Omani society as well as the teachings of Islam,” she said.

She was addressing delegates at the ‘World Congress Against Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents’ in Rio de Janeiro on Friday.

She said the Sultanate considered a strong family as the first line of defence against sexual exploitation of children, adding that the Basic Law of the State guaranteed the dignity of all citizens and residents and protected them against violence and exploitation, regardless of their age, ethnic background or religion. 

The laws in force in the Sultanate, Dr Sharifa said, prohibited all forms of sexual exploitation of children, slavery and trade, possession or promotion of pornographic materials.

“The first draft of the Child Law is currently under revision by the departments concerned as well as NGOs,” she added.

She said the ministry had constituted working teams to survey all the Sultanate’s regions and assess the conditions of children and families and prepare a rapid intervention action plan.

Dr Sharifa observed that the Internet is being used at a global level to destroy the lives of millions of children through the “propagation of the sex business which keeps luring children to the making and distribution of pornographic materials”.

She said the Rio de Janeiro congress must be considered as an important step in efforts to realise children’s rights.

Five major themes are being addressed by the congress — forms of commercial sexual exploitation and the emerging scenarios in this respect; international trafficking; child pornography on the Internet, sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in tourism; and sexual exploitation of children and adolescents in prostitution.

World Congress III Against the Sexual Exploitation of Children opens in Brazil

From UNICEF:

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil, 26 November 2008 – Some 3,000 participants from more than 125 countries gathered in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, for last night’s opening ceremony of World Congress III Against Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents.

The event, which runs from 25-28 November, is focusing on how to protect children from various types of sexual exploitation such as child marriage, the commercial sex industry, child pornography and the sexual exploitation of children on the internet. Among the opening night speakers were Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and UNICEF Executive Director Ann M. Veneman.

Veneman reminded those in attendance that sexual exploitation is a way to assert control over others, often by men against women and children. She also noted that men need to be a big part of the solution.

Earlier in the day, Veneman met with children from Brazil who are fighting sexual exploitation in their own country. Later, she met a group of children from all over the world, and listened to their stories of sexual exploitation in their home countries.

A global reality

The sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is gaining growing visibility as a global reality. Worldwide, children are suffering from the effects of trafficking, pornography, prostitution, rape and abuse.

The opening theme of the World Congress focused on a systemic approach to protecting children from sexual exploitation.

© UNICEF/0986/ Noorani

A young girl drapes her hand over the shoulder of a man she is soliciting outside a brothel in the city of Tangail, Bangladesh.

The importance of educating children about sexual exploitation "is as important an obligation as it is to give food every day to the children so they can survive," said Brazil's President Lula during his opening remarks.

Exploitation may be increasing

Many studies in the last decade, including the recent UN Study on Violence Against Children, indicate that the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents is increasing. There is also growing evidence of criminal activity related to the trafficking of children for sexual purposes and the proliferation of exploitative imagery and other internet-related crimes.

The sexual exploitation of children is fuelled by international demand, which threatens children and adolescents of all ages, in every corner of the world.

The driving force behind the third World Congress is to make the global response more emphatic and comprehensive as this problem continues to become more complex in its manifestations and scope.

© UNICEF/NYHQ2005-0944/Haviv

The rape of women and children is a recognized weapon of war. A 12-year-old girl, displaced by conflict in the Darfur Region of Sudan, was raped by government soldiers.

A worldwide response to sexual exploitation

As a key organizer of the Congress, UNICEF will join the international community to better protect children from sexual exploitation and reinforce the basic right to protection that must be guaranteed for all children.

The Brazilian Government, UNICEF and other partners involved in the Congress see it as being practical, solution-driven and innovative. It is an opportunity to broaden alliances, address new challenges and promote international cooperation for more effective prevention and response to sexual exploitation.

Setting goals to protect children

Additional organizing partners of the Congress are UNICEF, ECPAT, and the non-governmental organization 'Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child'.

Throughout the three-day event, there will be many workshops and discussions. Five panels will deal with identifying forms of commercial exploitation, developing a legal framework, adapting policies that address these issues and strengthening forms of international cooperation.

The event will result in setting important goals for how countries will fight the sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.

Human trafficking arrest in Nigeria

From The Punch:

Eighteen foreigners and a Malian suspected to be the kingpin of human trafficking in Nigeria, were on Friday, handed over to the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons and Other Related Offences by the Lagos State Command of the Nigerian Immigration Service.

The alleged kingpin, Mr. Mahmud Culibaley, was arrested after a tip-off by the NIS at a border town in Lagos, while trying to arrange for the distribution of the 18 foreigners to different parts of the country.

The 18 illegal immigrants were from Niger, Burkina Faso, Guinea Bissau, Guinea Conakry and Mali.

Culibaley was alleged to have facilitated the entry of hundreds of illegal immigrants into the country in the last few months.

According to the Comptroller, Lagos Command of the NIS, Mr. Ayo Oredipe, the upsurge in illegal immigrants is becoming a major threat to national security as the motives or intention of the immigrants cannot be immediately ascertained.

Worried by this development, the Comptroller-General of NIS, Mr. Chukwurah Udeh, had recently summoned the top hierarchy of the Immigration to discuss and find a solution on issues of human trafficking.

He said, “We have a serious issue that had been of concern to government. We discovered that so many able-bodied men are being brought into the country. We are not certain about where they are going, but we want to put a stop to it.

“It is true that there is poverty, but it has not got to the stage of bondage. What is going on is a threat to national security; this is a situation where the productive manpower from other countries is entering Nigeria illegally.

He added, “We were given a mandate to fish out Culibaley and here he is with 18 other foreigners waiting to be distributed to different parts of the country. We are going to hand him over to NAPTIP and we suggest that he should be prosecuted.

“He said he had been in this business in the last six months, but today, his business empire had collapsed.”

The Public Relations Officer, NIS, Lagos command, Mr. Sunday Abutu, said that investigation carried out could not link their movement with terrorism, stressing that it was more of human trafficking.

In an interaction with our correspondent, Culibaley, who said he was the leader of Malians in Nigeria, disclosed that the foreigners usually gathered at a point from where they were brought into Lagos by motor cycle operators.

While admitting that the illegal immigrants were brought in for labour, Culibaley, however, said that he knew that what he was doing was illegal.

Four People Arrested For Sex Trafficking Of Immigrant Women In South Florida

Image from a campaign by the Florida Coalition Against Human Trafficking

From The Miami Herald:
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, in coordinated South Florida raids, arrested four suspected sex traffickers and rescued nine trafficking victims who had been forced into prostitution in several brothels, federal authorities said late Friday.

Officials said actions occurred in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties.

In a statement, authorities identified the four suspects arrested Wednesday as Arturo Rojas-Gonzalez, Elodia Capilla-Diego, Fidel Gutierrez-Gonzalez and Rosalio Valdez-Nava.

According to criminal complaints, ICE conducted an investigation into more than a dozen brothels and stash houses where immigrant women were forced into prostitution.

On the same case, here is more information from Local10.com:

Detention hearings are scheduled for each of the defendants on Tuesday.

ICE conducted an intensive investigation into more than a dozen brothels and stash houses where immigrant women were being forced into prostitution. Through statements of former victims, corroborated by surveillance and evidence obtained through search warrants, ICE arrested the four alleged brothel operators as part of a larger criminal organization operating similar brothels across South Florida.

Officials also worked with non governmental organizations to identify, rescue and provide assistance to the victims.

ILO releases new handbook on Combating Forced Labor

From the ILO:

The International Labour Office (ILO) is to reinforce its efforts to help employers and the private sector contribute to the global fight against forced labour, which the ILO estimates afflicts more than 12 million persons worldwide.

The Special Action Programme to Combat Forced Labour (SAP-FL) of the ILO said it had prepared a new handbook that would fortify the capacity of employers and business leaders to assess the risk of forced labour and human trafficking in their operations and global supply chains.

“The role of employers and the private sector in the fight against forced labour is of paramount importance”, said Roger Plant, head of the ILO programme. “Business is increasingly asking for guidance in combating forced labour, and we intend to continue supporting them.”

The new publication entitled “Combating forced labour: A handbook for Employers and Business”, provides information on issues such forced labour, human trafficking, prison labour, debt bondage, abuses in labour contract systems, overtime and different forms of coercion in employment. It was developed in extensive consultation with experts from companies, as well as international and national employers’ organisations and civil society groups, all from different regions and economic sectors.

The handbook provides practical guidance for businesses of all kinds, including advice on what action they can take to prevent or rid forced labour in their supply chains.

The new handbook has been endorsed by the International Organization of Employers. IOE Secretary-General Antonio Peñalosa said it would provide with “much needed new tools to help employer organisations and their members understand the issue of forced labour, in taking the necessary measures to avoid being involved in those situations and in contributing to the total elimination of forced and compulsory labour”.

David Arkless, Senior Vice-President, Corporate Affairs of Manpower added that his organization “welcomed this recent initiative as an important and timely intervention, and one that will significantly help companies in all sectors address this challenging issue”.

“Employers’ organisations, in particular, are strategically well-placed to lead this work with the private sector, and business involvement is key to the success of the ILO’s campaign to rid the world of forced labour”, Mr. Plant said.

The webpage of the manual outlines reasons the private sector should play a role in combating labor trafficking and the set up of the document:

There are many reasons why business and employers’ organisations should play a central role in the global fight against forced labour and human trafficking:

-Legal compliance: Forced labour and trafficking in persons are punishable as crimes in most countries around the world, and companies found involved in such activities could face prosecution.
-Managing risk and reputation: To be successful, companies must manage risk in an environment where risk is not static and can emerge through the actions of the company itself, its suppliers and other actors. Allegations of forced labour and trafficking present legal risks as well as serious threats to brand and company reputation.
-Forced labour in global supply chains: Globalisation and the growing links across countries and firms have raised forced labour and trafficking in persons as significant issues within global supply chains.
-Codes of conduct and corporate social responsibility (CSR): The elimination of forced labour is a key element of codes of conduct and other CSR initiatives. Companies – particularly those that supply consumer markets and have significant brand value – face new and growing expectations that production will comply with social and human rights criteria.
-Forced labour and human trafficking are morally unacceptable.

From CNN:

Story Highlights

-UK government: Around 4,000 women trafficked in the UK for sexual exploitation
-Interior ministry introduces new proposals to clamp down on sex trade
-Minister: Measures will shift the focus onto sex buyers because they create demand
-Sex workers representative: Move is counterproductive, will force prostitution underground

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Paying for sex with trafficked or exploited women would become a crime under new laws proposed by the UK government Wednesday.

The act of purchasing sex is not currently a criminal offense in England and Wales -- although there are laws against paying for sex in a public place and persistently soliciting prostitutes.

Now UK Home Secretary (interior minister) Jacqui Smith says she is proposing the new measures to protect vulnerable women and tackle the demand for prostitution.

Britain's interior ministry, known as the Home Office, introduced the new measures Wednesday after a six-month review that looked at what else the government could do to protect women being exploited for sexual gain.

"I want to do everything we can to protect the thousands of vulnerable women coerced, exploited or trafficked into prostitution in our country, and to bring those who take advantage of them to justice," Smith said in a statement.

Smith said the new measures will shift the focus onto sex buyers because they create demand for prostitution and demand for the trafficking of women for sex.

"There will be no more excuses for those who pay for sex," she added.

As part of the review, the government looked at the experience of other countries including Sweden -- which has criminalized paying for sex -- and the Netherlands, where brothels are licensed.

The government estimates around 80,000 people are involved in prostitution in Britain, with about 4,000 women having been trafficked for sexual exploitation. It says the prostitution market nationwide is worth up to £1 billion ($1.52 billion).

Trafficking is the movement of women from one place to another for the purposes of sex. British Authorities have said trafficking usually involves the trafficker promising to bring a woman to Britain for a better life and then forcing her into prostitution.

The measures -- which must be approved by Parliament -- would mean that those committing the new offense would be given a criminal record and fined £1,000 ($1,520) -- even if it was a person's first offense and the offender did not know the prostitute was being controlled by a pimp or had been trafficked.

Police would also be given powers to close and seal premises suspected of being used for sexual exploitation, such as brothels, which the government said will prevent further exploitation and abuse from taking place.

Current law prohibits curb crawling, which involves soliciting prostitutes from a motor vehicle persistently or in a manner that causes annoyance to the neighborhood. It also prohibits "persistent soliciting," which is essentially curb crawling without a car.

But representatives of sex workers attacked the plans Wednesday, saying they will force prostitution further underground and make women more vulnerable to violence.

"It's going to really make it more difficult for men to use the sex industry, and it's going to mean that women are going to have to take more risks in order to earn the same money," said Cari Mitchell, a spokeswoman for the English Collective of Prostitutes. "It's also going to drive it underground. It's going to increase the stigma."

Mitchell said the government's figures are inflated, and that most immigrant women working as prostitutes have not been trafficked and are working independently.

The new measures, she said, confuse prostitution with trafficking and take the focus off those women who may be vulnerable.

"Of women who may be trafficked and forced, what they need is to be able to come forward and report to the police without any fear of being deported," Mitchell told CNN.

The new restrictions on curb crawling won't end the practice, Mitchell said, but simply give prostitutes less time to weigh up any potential dangers before getting in the client's car.

CNN provides a topics page with video and the most recent stories on human trafficking.

Post on Dipnote from Mark Lagon

This is a post from Dipnote, the official blog of the U.S. State Department:

About the Author: Ambassador Mark P. Lagon is Senior Advisor to the Secretary of State and Director of the U.S. Department of State’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons.

I have recently visited two major powers in the Middle East -- Egypt and Saudi Arabia -- quite different from one another in the context of trafficking in persons (TIP). I came away with striking impressions from my visits and dialogue.

There are some promising efforts in Egypt. Amendments to the child protection law last June define for the first time crimes of trafficking of children. This includes the most serious TIP vulnerability in Egypt: children (especially street children) exploited as domestic servants or in prostitution.

Since ratification of the UN TIP Protocol four years ago, discussion of crafting a comprehensive anti-human trafficking law has seemingly accelerated. The Egyptian anti-TIP interagency group (like the one I chair in the United States) is consulting with UN agencies on the law's content, and we hope it will cover internal, as well as transnational (e.g. through Egypt to Israel), TIP.

Notably, a rising generation of key government officials has a clear interest in fighting the gross exploitation which constitutes TIP. 

Nonetheless, it was clear from our visit to Cairo that Egypt needs a system for identifying victims and for referring them to social services. Although drop-in centers for vulnerable street children exist, we hope the Government of Egypt and civil society will band together to make these centers safe havens for all children exposed to forced begging, sexual exploitation, and other harm on the streets.

Sexual exploitation of young people is taking some troubling forms in Egypt. We learned of Sudanese refugee girls and young women lured into prostitution by gangs. This is a sorry fate for those fleeing Sudan. Moreover, sex tourists are increasingly going to places like Luxor and Alexandria to abuse Egypt's young. I stressed how the United States has enacted and enforced laws to punish child sex tourists who commit crimes abroad, and is urging European nations to follow suit. One particular horror is Saudi and other Gulf visitors acquiring (and I use that word purposefully) youth brides in so-called "temporary marriages." 

It was, in fact, the Gulf and Saudi Arabia which we flew to next. I had very direct dialogue with the Ministries of Interior, Labor, and Social Affairs, sharing our steady, though not perfect, experiences in confronting TIP at home.

The sponsorship system in Saudi Arabia -- tying migrant workers to a single employer -- is rife with vulnerability to human trafficking. This system, which is seen throughout the Gulf, is compounded in Saudi Arabia by the disproportionate power given to employers of housemaids, construction workers, and agricultural laborers in the form of exit permits. A migrant worker cannot leave the country without the okay of their "sponsor." This gives unscrupulous employers devastating leverage should they subject workers to abusive conditions or withhold their pay. We heard countless testimonials of this kind of abuse.

One potentially positive initiative is discussion of reforming this sponsorship system. We were told by senior officials of serious discussions to create large labor companies in the Saudi Kingdom to more flexibly manage the placement of workers. If adopted this could do much to reduce the vulnerability of migrant workers, and indeed offer momentum to similar changes throughout the smaller states of the Gulf.

We visited two shelters -- one run by the Ministry of Social Affairs and one by the Embassy of the Philippines. The contrast between the two was marked. The Government shelter is limited to serving female domestic workers who are not met by employers at the airport, as well as short-term guests near resolution of contract disputes in court. But there is no systematic or broad referral of victims to this shelter. 

By contrast, the Philippines is as active on behalf of the welfare of its migrant workers in the Kingdom as it is worldwide. We met with housemaids compelled to flee employers. One woman was in two leg casts after leaping to escape from a window. We heard of employers' repeated violence, and the squeezing of every hour of the day and ounce of energy from these survivors. One such survivor described the brutality of the employer who kicked, pushed, and punched her for the slightest mistake. Facing years of court battles if they brought their cases to the court, many of these women opted dejectedly to simply return to the safety of their home countries.

The stories of these victims drove home the violence and desperation women and migrant workers face in Saudi Arabia and many other countries, at the hands of people who treat them as less than human. States must step up to the responsibility of protecting the helpless on their soil. The United States devotes diplomacy to this cause every day.