Human Trafficking Around the World

HUMAN TRAFFICKING AROUND THE WORLD

Human Trafficking Around the World

STEPHANIE HEPBURN and RITA J. SIMON

Columbia University Press

New York   Chichester, West Sussex

cup.columbia.edu

Copyright © 2013 Columbia University Press

All rights reserved

E-ISBN 978-0-231-53331-7

Hepburn, Stephanie, 1977–

   Human trafficking around the world : hidden in plain sight / Stephanie Hepburn and Rita J. Simon.

      pages cm.

   Includes bibliographical references and index.

   ISBN 978-0-231-16144-2 (cloth : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-231-16145-9 (paperback : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-231-53331-7 (e-book)

   1. Human trafficking. I. Simon, Rita J. (Rita James), 1931– II. Title.

     K5297.H47 2013

     364.15—dc23

2013000561

A Columbia University Press E-book.

CUP would be pleased to hear about your reading experience with this e-book at [email protected].

COVER IMAGE: © Getty Images

COVER DESIGN: Julia Kushninsky

References to Internet Web sites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing.

Neither the author nor Columbia University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared.

To our families and friends for the steadfast support they have shown us, and most importantly to the victims of human trafficking who have existed in darkness for far too long.

They would not call it slavery, but some other name. Slavery has been fruitful in giving itself names. It has been called “the peculiar institution,” “the social system,” and the “impediment,” as it was called by the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church. It has been called by a great many names, and it will call itself by yet another name; and you and I and all of us had better wait and see what new form this old monster will assume, in what new skin this old snake will come forth.

—FREDERICK DOUGLASS, SPEECH TO THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY, MAY 1865

Contents

Introduction

PART I    WORK VISA LOOPHOLES FOR TRAFFICKERS

1     United States

2     Japan

3     United Arab Emirates

PART II    STATELESS PERSONS

4     Thailand

5     Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories

PART III    UNREST, DISPLACEMENT, AND WHO IS IN CHARGE

6     Colombia

7     Iraq

8     Syria

PART IV    CONFLATION

9     Canada

PART V    CONFLICTING AGENDAS

10     Italy

11     France

PART VI    GENDER APARTHEID

12     Iran

PART VII    SOCIAL HIERARCHY

13     India

14     Niger

15     China

PART VIII    MUTI MURDER

16     South Africa

PART IX    HARD-TO-PROVE CRITERION AND A SLAP ON THE WRIST

17     Australia

18     United Kingdom

19     Chile

20     Germany

PART X    TRANSPARENT BORDERS

21     Poland

PART XI    FEAR FACTOR

22     Mexico

PART XII    POVERTY AND ECONOMIC BOOM

23     Russia

24     Brazil

Conclusion

Notes

References

Index

Introduction

We have all seen films that portray the dark and lurid world of human trafficking, depictions that seem sensationalized and exaggerated for cinematic effect. The victims are usually young women forced into an underground sex-trafficking ring, kept on a permanent drug high, and forced to prostitute. Although the plot is horrifying, it is just a story to us—or perhaps it is something that happens in some other part of the world but surely would never occur where we live. Yet the reality is that wherever we may live, regardless of city or nation, some form of human trafficking exists. As of 2005 this global phenomenon reaped an annual worldwide profit of $44.3 billion and affected more than 12.3 million persons. The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimated that 43 percent of victims were trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation, 32 percent were trafficked for forced labor, and the remaining 25 percent were trafficked for a mixture of both or for undetermined reasons (Belser, 2005, p. 4; ILO, 2006). We believed the percentage of forced labor to be higher, and recent ILO global estimates concur. The International Labour Organization now estimates that 20.9 million are victims of forced labor. Within that number it is estimated that 14.2 million people (68 percent) are victims of forced labor exploitation and 4.5 million (22 percent) are victims of forced sexual exploitation. The remainder of victims—2.2 million (10 percent)—are in state-imposed forms of forced labor such as that imposed by rebel armed forces, state militaries, and prisons with conditions that conflict with ILO standards (ILO, 2012, p. 13).

The term
human trafficking
triggers preconceived notions. Sex trafficking has received more coverage in the media than forced labor, so people generally think of it. But it is the element of movement that seems to confuse most, even legislators. The verb
traffic
, according to Merriam-Webster, means to trade or barter. Yet trade in humans does not necessarily involve movement, and international definitions of human trafficking are evolving to include this fact. The crux of human trafficking is its exploitative purpose. Persons of all ages and genders are vulnerable. Women and girls make up 56 percent of persons trafficked for forced labor, while men and boys make up 44 percent. Of those trafficked for forced commercial sexual exploitation, women and girls make up 98 percent; men and boys make up 2 percent. Children constitute 40 to 50 percent of the overall forced labor population (Belser, 2005). While trafficking for forced labor is more prevalent than sex trafficking, many nations are just beginning to include forced labor in their anti-trafficking legislation and statistics. Although we perceive all forms of indentured servitude to be forced labor, a division is often created in legal definitions and anti-trafficking legislation. As a result, throughout the book trafficking for forced labor and for commercial sexual exploitation are presented as two different categories. Other forms of trafficking will also be discussed, such as organ trafficking and Muti murders, which involve killing a person and removing the body parts and organs that are allegedly used for traditional healing purposes. Child sexual tourism, adoption, and marriage for the purpose of sexual exploitation are also examined.

Human trafficking varies not only by type but also by current, that is, by the flow of victims. These currents are categorized in terms of source nation, transit nation, and destination nation. Many nations qualify for all these groupings, but one category is often more prevalent than the others. Another current of trafficking, one that is often ignored, is purely internal or domestic, involving indentured servitude within a nation. Because the anti-trafficking focus has been chiefly on victims of international trafficking, internal trafficking is often absent from the calculus, both in legislation and in practice.

There are common methods used by traffickers, regardless of the type of trafficking, such as false job offers that lure potential victims and exorbitant fees charged for recruitment, visas, travel, housing, food, and the use of tools. These practices keep victims in an endless cycle of debt. Along these same lines, traffickers often charge victims fines for alleged poor behavior or not meeting certain work quotas. As debts rise exponentially, victims often go unpaid or are underpaid. In order to control and limit the movement of victims, traffickers frequently withhold victims’ visas and other identifying documentation, isolate the victims, threaten deportation, threaten to harm the victims or their families, and physically harm the victims. At the beginning of the process, exorbitant recruiting fees, sometimes as high as $40,000, can place victims in a position of debt bondage. In order to pay these fees workers sell their land or that of family members and take out loans with astronomical interest rates. Earning low wages or none and paying high fees for housing, food, and even the use of work tools, the workers can never catch up to their debt, putting them in a position of debt bondage. In cases where the employer paid the costs, the worker is told that before they can receive their wages they have to work off the fees.

There are many definitions of human trafficking, but the Palermo Protocol, otherwise known as the United Nations Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, is the worldwide standard for anti-trafficking law and the template on which many nations model their domestic laws. The protocol, which supplements the 2000 United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, contains three elements that define trafficking of persons. The first element is the act of trafficking, which is the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring, or receipt of persons. The second, the means of trafficking, is the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, abduction, fraud, deception, abuse of power or vulnerability, or giving payments or benefits to a person in control of the victim. The third, the purpose of trafficking, is exploitation. This includes, at a minimum, sexual exploitation, including the exploitation of the prostitution of others, forced labor or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude, or the removal of organs (UNODC, 2004, p. 42). Of the 24 nations we examined, 21 have ratified the protocol, in whole or in part: Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, France, Germany, India, Iraq, Israel, Italy, Mexico, Niger, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Iran, Japan, and Thailand have not yet ratified the protocol (UNTC, 2011). Ratification of the protocol alone is not a sufficient anti-trafficking measure for a nation. The Palermo Protocol, according to Joy Ngozi Ezeilo, United Nations special rapporteur on trafficking in persons, is not a self-executing provision (OHCHR, 2009); that is, by itself the protocol is not sufficient to bridge the gap between domestic and international law. Those nations that ratify the protocol must also adopt domestic anti-trafficking law, or an additional act of legislation, to harmonize internal legislation to that of the protocol and ensure that the protocol is entirely implemented. Consequently, gauging a nation’s anti-trafficking efforts solely on whether they have ratified the protocol is not adequate.

The most prevalent tool used globally to help determine the anti-trafficking status of a nation is the annual U.S. State Department
Trafficking in Persons Report
. The report ranks nations’ compliance with the minimum standards of the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA). The report gives a breakdown, per country, on the severe forms of human trafficking prevalent in that nation. These forms of human trafficking involve the use of force, fraud, or coercion for the purpose of sex trafficking, involuntary servitude, peonage, debt bondage, or slavery, or, in terms of sex trafficking, the act involves a person less than 18 years of age. The minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking apply to governments of nations of origin, transit, or destination with a significant number of severe-form-of-trafficking victims. Under the TVPA minimum standards, such governments should prohibit severe forms of human trafficking and punish offenders with sentences that are sufficiently stringent and reflect the severity of the crime. Those offenders involved in severe forms of sex trafficking should be prescribed a punishment akin to other grave crimes such as forcible sexual assault. Also, under the standards, the government should make real and continual efforts to eliminate severe forms of human trafficking. Where a nation stands in the report is not without consequence as those nations rated Tier 3, the worst tier, face possible U.S. sanctions. The report has been extremely significant to the global anti-trafficking movement. Not only can nations face U.S. sanctions, but the stigma associated with poor anti-trafficking efforts can create pressure on a nation to improve measures. For instance, according to James Farrer, former director of the Institute of Comparative Culture (ICC) at Sophia University in Tokyo, the U.S. State Department
Trafficking in Persons Report
had a critical impact on the Japanese Ministry of Justice that propelled the nation to adopt the National Action Plan of Measures to Combat Trafficking in Persons in 2004.
¹
Despite the importance and significance of the U.S.
Trafficking in Persons Report
, it is impossible to escape that the report is prepared by an agency within the U.S. government. Quite obviously, the data the U.S. government is able to collect can be scarce in nations where it is not on the best of terms with the governments. This indicates that the report alone is not a sufficient guide to determine an accurate picture of the trafficking scenario in nations.