Syria: Iraqi Refugees Turn to Sex Trade

Ben Stechshulte for The New York Times

At Al Rawabi, an expensive nightclub in Al Hami, customers can drink imported Scotch, smoke water pipes and watch a show featuring young Iraqi woman gyrating to a 10-piece band on a garishly lighted stage.

MARABA, SYRIA— Back home in Iraq, Umm Hiba’s daughter was a devout schoolgirl, modest in her dress and serious about her studies. Hiba, who is now 16, wore the hijab, or Islamic head scarf, and rose early each day to say the dawn prayer before classes.

But that was before militias began threatening their Baghdad neighborhood and Umm Hiba and her daughter fled to Syria last spring. There were no jobs, and Umm Hiba’s elderly father developed complications related to his diabetes.

Desperate, Umm Hiba followed the advice of an Iraqi acquaintance and took her daughter to work at a nightclub along a highway known for prostitution. “We Iraqis used to be a proud people,” she said over the frantic blare of the club’s speakers. She pointed out her daughter, dancing among about two dozen other girls on the stage, wearing a pink silk dress with spaghetti straps, her frail shoulders bathed in colored light.

As Umm Hiba watched, a middle-aged man climbed onto the platform and began to dance jerkily, arms flailing, among the girls.

“During the war we lost everything,” she said. “We even lost our honor.” She insisted on being identified by only part of her name — Umm Hiba means mother of Hiba.

For anyone living in Damascus these days, the fact that some Iraqi refugees are selling sex or working in sex clubs is difficult to ignore.

Even in central Damascus, men freely talk of being approached by pimps trawling for customers outside juice shops and shawarma sandwich stalls, and of women walking up to passing men, an act unthinkable in Arab culture, and asking in Iraqi-accented Arabic if the men would like to “have a cup of tea.”

By day the road that leads from Damascus to the historic convent at Saidnaya is often choked with Christian and Muslim pilgrims hoping for one of the miracles attributed to a portrait of the Virgin Mary at the convent. But as any Damascene taxi driver can tell you, the Maraba section of this fabled pilgrim road is fast becoming better known for its brisk trade in Iraqi prostitutes...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT NYTimes.com

Special: Janice Raymond, Risking Her Life to Fight Sex Trafficking

GLASGOW, SCOTLAND -- Janice Raymond is about to receive a major award for her outstanding contribution to the war against people trafficking - but she is not a popular woman. Hate mail and death threats are part of her everyday life, and such is the uprising of sheer malevolence towards her from all parts of the world that she cannot give out her address or telephone number for fear it will appear on the internet. Even having her photograph taken is a risk.

Nevertheless, this extraordinary woman is a shining light and an outstanding inspiration to thousands. Fighting to protect women and children from sexual exploitation is her life's work, and she is not about to stop now. Dr Raymond is co-executive director of the Coalition Against the Trafficking of Women (CATW) and professor emeritus of Women's Studies and Medical Ethics at the University of Massachusetts, and she is in Glasgow for the first time to receive, at Glasgow City Chambers tomorrow evening, the Zero Tolerance International Woman Award, one of a series of awards launched last year by the Scottish charity to recognise those women working to prevent violence against women.

Raymond, who is half Irish, was pivotal in bringing about a new UN definition of trafficking that embraces the often ambiguous concept of consent in order to protect all victims of trafficking - including children, who are, she says, "becoming much more of a market"...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT TheHerald.co.uk

Scotland: Educating Boys on Prostitution

GLASGOW, SCOTLAND -- Young men in Scotland must be targeted in the fight against prostitution, according to a leading American feminist.

Janice Raymond (left), an executive director of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, wants schoolboys to be educated about prostitution in an attempt to shape male attitudes towards pornography and sexual exploitation from an early age.

She said: "Young men are more aware of the issues, including prostitution and exploitation, and we need them to engage with our work.

"Men are part of the problem, not prostitution on its own."

Ms Raymond was speaking in Glasgow on Saturday night at the awards ceremony for Zero Tolerance, the anti-domestic violence charity, where she collected the International Woman Award...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT TheHerald.co.uk

US Gov: Trafficking + Int'l Military Organizations

Fact Sheet
Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons
Washington, DC
February 22, 2007

Trafficking in Persons (TIP) is modern-day slavery, a crime that is brutal, dehumanizing and a multi-dimensional threat to international security. Human trafficking is linked to organized crime, undermines peacekeeping efforts, and is incompatible with military core values. Any nation serious about ending human trafficking must begin by ensuring that its own uniformed employees lead by example by helping combat modern-day slavery at home and abroad.

Historically, profiteers of both labor and sex trafficking have targeted international military organizations. Labor traffickers sometimes try to exploit military contract opportunities. Sex traffickers often prey on individual peacekeepers and servicemen with solicitations of commercial sex. While the vast majority of military personnel conduct themselves honorably, a number of recent trafficking in persons cases have occurred in connection with international military organizations.

Typically, commercial sex sellers conduct activities, such as pimping or maintaining brothels, in districts frequented by service members. These activities also provide cover for sex trafficking - the recruitment or use of, especially women and girls, for commercial sexual exploitation.

Where prostitution is legal or tolerated, there is a greater demand for human trafficking victims and, typically, an increase in the number of women and children trafficked into commercial sex slavery. Of the estimated 800,000 people trafficked across international borders annually, 80 percent of victims are female, and up to 50 percent are minors. Hundreds of thousands of these women and children are abused in prostitution each year, including many who are used in prostitution near military bases.

Peacekeepers and service members who engage in commercial sexual exploitation put themselves at risk of sexually transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS, which jeopardizes the readiness of their unit.

DOWNLOAD THE FULL FACT SHEET AS A PDF HERE

India: Tackling Sex Trafficking Through "Maid Ban"

NEW DELHI, INDIA -- India will ban women under 30 from emigrating to work as domestic help in the Gulf and parts of Africa and Southeast Asia in a bid to curb sex trafficking, a report said Tuesday.

The move came after Renuka Chowdhury, the minister for women and children, said that overseas domestic workers had complained of being pushed into prostitution after their employers had seized their passports.

A ban will be "imposed on granting emigration clearance to women below 30 if they are seeking employment as housemaids," Chowdhury, who recently returned from Kuwait, was quoted by the Times of India as telling parliament.

An exception will be made for women who return to India on leave from their jobs and who wish to return to their employers, the ministry for Indians working abroad said.

Some 17 countries will be covered by the ban, which was aimed at halting the trafficking of women for prostitution, the newspaper reported...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT The Middle East Times

India: 35% of Prostitutes Enter Trade Before Age 18

NEW DEHLI, INDIA -- Of 2.8 million prostitutes in the country, 35.47% entered the trade before the age of 18 years, Minister of state for Women and Child Development Renuka Chowdhury informed the Rajya Sabha today.

“The study on girls/women in prostitution in India, conducted between 2002-04, reports that there is a growing trend in the number of prostitution in the country. The study estimates that there are 2.8 million prostitutes in the country of which 35.47% entered the trade before the age of 18 years”, she said in a written reply.

The Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act 1956 (ITPA) supplemented by the Indian Penal Code prohibits trafficking in human beings including children for purpose of prostitution and lays down severe penalties for traffickers, she said.

The ITPA is being further amended providing for more stringent punishment for trafficking in persons including children, Chowdhury said adding her ministry conducts advocacy, awareness generation, sensitization programme for prevention of child trafficking...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT LiveMint.com (A Wall Street Journal Publication)

Special: Should Prostitution be Legal? New Website Explores Pro's + Con's

USA -- Should Prostitution Be Legal? ProCon.org Investigates the Selling of Sex With New Website

The D.C. Madam, 5 murdered women in Ipswich, and Hawaii House Bill 982 have aroused interest in the question of whether prostitution should be legalized.

ProCon.org launched its 10th website today, Prostitution ProCon.org, to bring much-needed clarity and balance to the debate over prostitution.

The world's oldest profession is treated as just another job in countries like New Zealand, where it is legal. Other countries, such as Iran, consider it a crime punishable by death. Prostitution is illegal in the United States, except in one state, Nevada, which permits individual counties to decide for themselves whether to legalize prostitution. So far, 11 counties have opted for legalization.

To help unravel the pros and cons of legalizing prostitution, ProCon.org examines all the surrounding issues, including: human trafficking, AIDS, brothels, red light districts, rape, violence, slavery, economics, religion, morality, and more.

Prostitution ProCon.org features over 200 expert sources from Presidential hopefuls Rudy Giuliani and Hillary Clinton to Ann Landers, Heidi Fleiss, Susan B. Anthony, and the ACLU.

The Managing Editor, Kamy Akhavan, remarked on the project:

"The issue of legalizing prostitution comes up in debates year after year. When we tried to learn more about the issue, we found inaccurate data, biased presentations, hard-to-follow academic reports, and a general lack of reliable information on which to base an informed opinion. We were frustrated by the lack of info, and we thought that most people probably felt the same way. After 6 months of full-time research, we completed our Prostitution ProCon.org website. It is free, fair, and easy to use. Finally."

Some featured content areas include: -- Top 10 Pros and Cons on Prostitution -- Federal, State, and Nevada County Laws on Prostitution -- Comparison of Prostitution Laws in 26 Countries Strange but true facts that appear on our website include: -- In Japan, prostitution is illegal, but selling oral sex is legal. -- In Sweden, selling sex is legal, but paying for sex is illegal. -- Medieval lawyer Johannes Teutonicus defined a prostitute as a woman who has had sex with more than 23,000 men...

READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE AT Sys-Con.com

India: Nearly 3 Million Prostitutes

NEW DELHI, INDIA -- India's minister for women and child development said Tuesday the country has an estimated 2.8 million prostitutes and the number is rising.

Renuka Chowdhury presented a study on "Girls-Women in prostitution in India" to the lower house of Parliament. She said more than one-third of Indian prostitutes entered the profession before age 18, the Press Trust of India reported.

She told lawmakers her ministry runs homes to provide shelter, food, clothing, counseling, rehabilitation and other facilities to victims of commercial sexual exploitation. She said another project is being implemented to combat trafficking in women and children for sexual exploitation.

READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE AT United Press International

The IOM Handbook on Direct Assistance for Victims of Trafficking

The IOM Handbook on Direct Assistance for Victims of Trafficking

DOWNLOAD HANDBOOK HERE IN PDF FORMAT (Adobe Reader Req.)

Description: International Organization for Migration (IOM) has had some 13 years of experience in implementing counter-trafficking activities and has provided assistance to over 14,000 victims of trafficking in all regions of the world. With a growing number of organizations, especially local NGOs, now providing or intending to provide assistance to victims of trafficking, IOM would like to share its experience and lessons learned. This Handbook summarizes and systematizes this experience. IOM recognizes that each victim is unique and requires and desires different assistance. As well, the nature of trafficking is different around the world and is ever evolving, requiring changing responses. Therefore this Handbook is not meant to provide a single methodology for the provision of assistance to victims of trafficking, but to offer suggestions and guidance, based on IOM’s many years of experience. IOM hopes that it will be helpful to all organizations providing such assistance to victims, but especially for organizations who are just beginning to develop victim assistance programmes and can benefit from IOM’s experiences. This Handbook provides guidance and advice necessary to effectively deliver a full range of assistance to victims of trafficking from the point of initial contact and screening up to the effective social reintegration of the individuals concerned.

Table of Contents : Preface* Security and Personal Safety* Screening of Victims of Trafficking* Referral and Reintegration Assistance* Shelter Guidelines* Health and Trafficking* Cooperation with Law Enforcement Agencies* Appendices

Number of Pages : 356
Language : English
Format : Softcover
Year : 2007
ISBN / ISSN: 978 92 9068 371 1

DOWNLOAD HANDBOOK HERE IN PDF FORMAT (Adobe Reader Req.)

Ecuador: Two Men Prosecuted for Trafficking

Ecuador - Two young Ecuadorian men have received stiff jail sentences for human trafficking in the capital, Quito, with the case representing only the second successful prosecution of traffickers in the country.

The judge handed down a 12-year sentence to a 19 year-old male and a six-year term for his 18-year-old accomplice.

The judicial authorities have confirmed that they are currently trying to get convictions on 160 cases of human trafficking.

Working with the Public Prosecutor's Office, the Child Welfare Police and the International Labour Organization (ILO), IOM provided protection and assistance to the victims and their families through its Global Emergency Fund. The assistance included transportation, lodging, medical, legal and psychological support for the victims and their relatives during the trial in Quito.

The victims, both girls, were 13 and 15 years old when they left their homes in a small town in Pichincha Province with their boyfriends who put them to work in the sex industry.

They said they were in love and left home hoping to marry and have children. During their ordeal, the girls were sexually, physically and verbally abused. They were given food and shelter, but this was deducted from their earnings.

The victims testified against the accused but are still struggling to accept that they were abused and exploited by the men they loved and trusted...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT International Organization for Migration

Legalizing Prostitution: A Solution? N. Kristof Opines

NICHOLAS KRISTOF for The New York Times - A number of you have commented on my blog that the way to address prostitution is to legalize it and encourage unions of sex workers, thus empowering prostitutes and enabling sensible regulation and health outreach programs.

In the context of countries like India and Cambodia where I've written about sex trafficking, that would be a bad mistake. Let me explain why.

There may be a sound argument for legalization and sex worker unions in Brazil and South Africa, perhaps even China. My sense is that in those countries many women genuinely choose to be prostitutes because of economic pressures or opportunities. But in India, I have yet to find a single woman who made that choice - every single one of them first entered after being forced by a trafficker, her parents, or her husband. Later, after they had been prostituted, some continued to sell their bodies voluntarily. But the initial entry into prostitution was invariably coercive.

That means that if you validate the red light districts, then the new entrants will continue to be trafficked into it. And in India we have had something of an experiment, in which the legalization model has failed.

In the effort to combat AIDS, a union was established of prostitutes in Shonagachi, a red light district in Calcutta (one of the places in my video reporting of a year ago). The union, DMSC, purports to represent prostitutes and to dignify sex work, and it argues that it's important to empower the women by offering them respect and acknowledging their choice of occupations.

A DMSC brochure, for example, states: "Like other entertainment workers of the world we use our brain, ideas, emotion and sex organs, in short, our entire body and our mind to make people happy. As entertainment workers, we seek governmental recognition and fulfillment of our just professional demands."

Among liberals in the U.S. and India alike, that model has been treated respectfully. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and CARE have both shown support for that approach as a way to fight AIDS. I have lots of respect for both the Gates Foundation and for Care, and they do fantastic work around the globe--but in this case I think they've made a mistake.

The argument in favor is "harm reduction" - a sex worker union makes it easier to hand out condoms and educate women about AIDS. That's true to some extent, but the latest data we have actually show a rising degree of HIV among young prostitutes in Shonagachi. The data aren't good, but they don't demonstrate to me that the model works. In contrast, there is a health outreach model in Cambodia that really does reduce HIV and STD, through regular check-ups, without legitimizing the brothels and protecting them from raids. That's the direction to go in.

More broadly, many of the prostitutes from Shonagachi have told me that DMSC is just a front for the brothel-owners, a way of protecting them from raids and harassment. Likewise, the trafficking of young girls and forced prostitution seems as flagrant as ever in Shonagachi. That's also the judgment of two people whose anti-traffickng work I admire: Ruchira Gupta and Urmi Basu. Both live in Calcutta and see Shonagachi up close, and both oppose the legalization model. So even if DMSC achieved a mild reduction in HIV infection levels -
which it apparently hasn't - it comes at the expense of legitimating trafficking and modern slavery.

I'm particularly swayed by an argument of Ruchira's, based on the contrast with Bombay. Traditionally, the red light districts of Bombay and Calcutta have both been enormous, and Calcutta has DMSC while Bombay has in recent years seen more raids and harassment of brothels. The upshot is that Shonagachi is as big as ever and seems to have as much trafficking and more HIV than ever, while Bombay's red light district has shrunk dramatically. There still are some brothels in Bombay's red light district, but only a fraction of the number
there used to be.

Some skeptics say that the raids have only pushed prostitution out of Bombay's red light district and hidden it among neighborhoods throughout the city, making it more difficult to control trafficking and AIDS. There may be some of that. But if NGO's have trouble finding the brothels than customers do as well. And most estimates are that total prostitution in Bombay has come down a great deal because of the harassment.

In contrast, DMSC seems to legitimate a red-light district that is completely enmeshed with criminal gangs, trafficking and forced prostitution. The validation from DMSC probably makes it easier for police to take bribes from brothels to look the other way, and harder to order up raids and aggressive police coverage. So, quite apart from morality, it seems to me that Bombay's record comes out better than Calcutta's. Maybe legalization and sex worker unions can reduce HIV in Africa and Brazil where forced prostitution is less of a problem, but it doesn't work in India.

The model in the West that seems to have worked best is Sweden's, which involves decriminalization for prostitutes themselves, but seeks to crack down on pimping and on the demand side. By arresting customers, the Swedish model undermines the economics of prostitution, and it seems to have reduced the trafficking that one sees in the Netherlands and Germany.

Fundamentally, I think these kinds of disputes about legalization are a distraction in countries like India. Both left and right in the States do good work on trafficking, but the two sides can't even agree on what to call the issue. The left tends to refer to sex work and sex workers, to avoid stigmatizing people they want to work with. The right tends to use terms like
prostitution and prostitutes, to avoid euphemisms that validate such work.

One reason more hasn't been accomplished in the campaign against human trafficking is that the issue has become so polarized in the U.S. There's immense distrust and much less cooperation than one might expect. But the one thing everybody should be able to agree on is that whether or not prostitution should be legal for 18-year-olds who are on their own, it is appalling for 13-year-olds to be imprisoned in brothels and forced to sleep with customers.
And that is what is going on in countries like India.

SEE THE WHOLE ARTICLE AT NY Times Select

UN: Resolution Approved To Criminalize Child Exploitation

UNITED NATIONS, WASHINGTON - Resolution recognizes international response needed to a global problem.

A resolution introduced by the United States and Ecuador that urges U.N. member states criminalize all aspects of child sexual exploitation was approved at the 2007 meeting of the U.N. Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice.

The resolution was approved at the conclusion of the 16th session of the U.N. Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice, which met in Vienna, Austria, April 23-27.

The Resolution on Effective Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice Responses to Combat Sexual Exploitation of Children recognizes that child sexual exploitation is a growing international problem demanding an international response.

The resolution defines child exploitation to include sexually explicit images of children (child pornography), the victimization of children through prostitution and child-sex tourism. The resolution maintains that sexually explicit images of children severely harm children and are linked to other sexual exploitation offenses against children.

International cooperation is absolutely essential to combat these crimes, say U.S. authorities. Sexually explicit images of children are easily distributed across international boundaries through the Internet. Similarly, child-sex trafficking -- including the victimization of children through prostitution and sex tourism -- often involves international travel, with offenders having different nationalities from those of the victims, so international teamwork is considered crucial.

According to a 2006 study by the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children, 95 countries have no legislation specifically addressing child pornography.

The U.S. government hopes the resolution will encourage countries lacking such legislation to consider it....

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT USinfo.state.gov

UN: Anti-Trafficking Drive Hits Culture Barriers

Antonio Maria Costa, director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)

VIENNA -- Global efforts to crack down on human trafficking are handicapped by lack of information from countries whose cultures have not deemed some forms of slavery to be a crime, U.N. officials said on Monday.

The United Nations is trying to raise awareness that two centuries after the transatlantic slave trade was abolished, millions of adults and children are sold into prostitution or made to work in degrading conditions for little or no pay.

"We operate in an information fog. We don't know the scope of threats we face and can't gauge global trends. We just see the tips of icebergs," said Antonio Maria Costa, director of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

"It's time to move from statements of intent and legislative mandates into realisation of goals and delivery of results," he told a meeting of the U.N. Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice in Vienna.

Costa told a news briefing during a break in the meeting: "When families (in Asian villages) sell their daughter, it's not out of poverty necessarily, it may be cultural."

He said only a fifth of member states had so far responded to a UNODC questionnaire asking them to identify and measure their organised crime problems. "Many do not know (what to say), and ask for our technical assistance."

A diplomat close to the UNODC said its campaign was running up against cultural traditions in some significant developing nations that tolerated human trafficking and related slave labour outlawed by U.N. conventions.

"In case of human trafficking, until now it often hasn't been tracked. It's only now that police in some countries are coming to realise that it's a crime," said the diplomat, asking not to be named.

"Normally, they would arrest a load of women and treat them like prostitutes and completely miss the point that they are actually victims of horrendous (trafficking to clients abroad)."

More than 110 countries have signed and ratified a U.N. protocol against human trafficking since December 2003 but many criminal justice systems have not curbed the practice.

READ THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE AT UK.News.Yahoo.com

Myanmar: Poverty Drives Hidden Sex Industry

A street vendor in Myanmar sells condoms. An estimated 20-30% of
prostitutes here have HIV. (AFP/File/Khin Maung Win)

YANGON, MYANMAR -- Sandar was 13 years old when her mother talked her into selling her virginity to help pull the family out of poverty.

Two decades later and still far away from that goal, Sandar has been arrested for prostitution more times then she can recall, jailed twice, and forced to pay bribes or have sex with policemen in exchange for her freedom.

Her friend Sei Sar Nyo, who sits beside Sandar grasping her hand, has been beaten for asking clients to use a condom. Sei Sar Nyo's family no longer talk to her, and she faces regular abuse in socially conservative Myanmar.

Despite the hardships, Sandar, who gave one name only and is now 33, and Sei Sar Nyo, 25, laugh when asked what other job they would do.

Nothing else would pay so well, they say.

"I'm not interested in any other business," says Sei Sar Nyo. "If I worked in a company I would earn 30,000 kyat (about 24 US dollars) in a month -- in this job I earn that in a night."

These two women come from very different social backgrounds, but ended up in Yangon's underground sex industry for the same reason -- to support their families in one of the poorest countries in the world.

Both are now working during the day for international charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), but their nights are spent selling sex in the city's brothels, restaurants and karaoke bars...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT News.Yahoo.com

India/Nepal Border: 21st Century Slave Trade

Meena Khatum, right, had to fight against brothel owners to be reunited with her son, Vivek.

INDIA/NEPAL BORDER (Nicholas Kristof for the NYT)- Anyone who thinks that the word “slavery” is hyperbole when used to describe human trafficking today should meet Meena Khatun. She not only endured the unbearable, but has also shown that a slave trader’s greed sometimes is no match for a mother’s love.

Human trafficking is the big emerging human rights issue for the 21st century, but it’s an awful term, a convoluted euphemism. As Meena’s story underscores, the real issue is slavery.

Meena was kidnapped from her village in north India by a trafficker and eventually locked up in a 13-girl brothel in the town of Katihar. When she was perhaps 11 or 12 — she remembers only that it was well before she had begun to menstruate — the slaver locked her in a room with a white-haired customer who had bought her virginity. She cried and fought, so the mother and two sons who owned the brothel taught Meena a lesson.

“They beat me mercilessly, with a belt, sticks and iron rods,” Meena recalled. Still, Meena resisted customers, despite fresh beatings and threats to cut her in pieces.

Finally, the brothel owners forced her to drink alcohol until she was drunk. When she passed out, they gave her to a customer.

When she woke up, Meena finally accepted her fate as a prostitute. “I thought, ‘Now I am ruined,’ ” she remembered, “so I gave in.”

Meena thus joined the ranks of some 10 million children prostituted around the world — more are in India than in any other country. The brothels of India are the slave plantations of the 21st century.

Every night, Meena was forced to have sex with 10 to 25 customers. Meena’s owners also wanted to breed her, as is common in Indian brothels. One purpose is to have boys to be laborers and girls to be prostitutes, and a second is to have hostages to force the mother to cooperate.

So Meena soon became pregnant. The resulting baby girl, Naina, was taken from Meena after birth, as was a son, Vivek, who was born a year later.

The two children were raised mostly apart from Meena. Meena alerted the police to her children’s captivity (the police were uninterested), so her owners decided to kill her...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT NYTimes.com

UNODC: To Launch Global Intitiative to Fight Human Trafficking

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime is launching a Global Initiative to fight human trafficking.

A series of regional events will be organised throughout the world designed to strengthen anti-trafficking networks and generate coordinated initiatives in preparation of a

Global Conference against Human Trafficking
Vienna, 27-29 November 2007

The Vienna Conference, involving government ministers, international organizations, NGOs and the private sector, will focus on three themes:

· Vulnerability: why does this tragedy still occur?

· Impact: the human faces of victims and the humanitarian costs.

· Action: to end trafficking in persons.

The aim is to generate the political will, a plan of action and the financial resources needed to have a significant world-wide impact on ending human trafficking.

Details of the proposed events will be announced in the coming weeks.

READ THE ORIGINAL PRESS RELEASE AT UNODC.org

Moldova: Helping the Deserted Children

When Anna was nine her mother left to look for work abroad

MOLDOVA - In Moldova, one in six adults has left to work abroad and the children they abandon become rich pickings for human traffickers.

Anna is 16. She lives alone in a ramshackle cottage with a cock and a hen called Romeo and Juliet.

She has a small scrap of land where she grows vegetables to feed herself.

"What I missed most in my childhood was toys and the warmth of my mother. I never felt I was loved," she says.

Anna's father has disappeared. Her mother went to work abroad when she was nine, leaving Anna and her 11-year-old brother under the eye of a neighbour.

But when her mother failed to send money home, the neighbour abandoned the children.

Their mother was away for two years.

"We didn't even know if my mother was alive," says Anna. "There were times when we didn't even have bread in the house."

Anna received fire wood and food from her school and the local mayor's office.

Each day a child under the age of seven is abandoned in Moldova.

Youngsters left alone because their parents work abroad have swelled the ranks of orphanages by 10% in recent years.

One in nine children is living with just one parent, relatives or a distant neighbour.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT News.BBC.co.uk

UN: Fund to Combat Human Trafficking

UNITED NATIONS - The United Nations proposed a new global fund Monday to fight international human trafficking and forced labor, a problem that it said had grown to epidemic proportions and was rarely effectively prosecuted by governments.

"Slavery is a booming international trade that involves several million people a year being trafficked in bondage," said Antonio Maria Costa, executive director of the UN Office of Drug and Crime, who announced the new initiative on trafficking in London.

"There is finally a growing awareness of a huge problem in terms of size, money and the human costs in terms of suffering," Costa added.

The UN estimates that 2.5 million people are trafficked and enslaved, although the crime is frequently unreported and many estimates are far higher. The International Labor Organization estimates that there are 12.3 million people across the globe in forced work. The U.S. government say that up to 800,000 people are shipped like commodities across international borders to serve as cheap labor.

About 50 percent of people smuggled and sold into forced work are minors and 80 percent are women and girls, according to a 2006 State Department study. Most end up working in the sex trade...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT IHT.com

India: Assam's missing women and the sex trade

Many of the missing women end up like these alleged arrested call girls

ASSAM, INDIA - The biggest problem in India's north-eastern state of Assam is separatist militancy. But it faces another, less well known issue. Thousands of its women, old and young, have gone missing over the past 10 years.

A recent police report says 3,184 women and 3,840 female children have gone missing in the state since 1996.

That's around two females a day on average.

The report was compiled by Assam police and their research branch, the Bureau of Police Research and Development.

The local police are far too busy, according to Assam police intelligence chief Khagen Sarmah, fighting insurgents.

"Our counter-insurgency commitments affects our normal policing duties like checking trafficking."

"Too many policemen are involved fighting the insurgents rather than following up on other crimes," Mr Sarmah said...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT News.BBC.co.uk

Israel: National service volunteer fights trafficking in women

ISRAEL - "Women trafficking and prostitution are one and the same, and the women who are exposed to both phenomena display similar symptoms," 21-year-old Naama Yehezkel says. As an activist for Isha L'Isha - the Haifa Feminist Center, which aids local and foreign women working in the sex industry, she should know.

"Women who engage in prostitution usually suffered sexual abuse or neglect at an early age. They're usually looking for a way to survive, and prostitution is just that - a means to survive, but not to live. Not in the full sense of the word, because the pimps know how to prey on them," she says.

Several weeks ago, Yehezkel toured the Tiberias hotel strip with volunteers from the Hotline for Migrant Workers. There, they handed out flyers and booklets listing emergency numbers for women who have fallen victim to human trafficking. They talked to hotel workers, kiosk employees and taxi drivers to find out where women were being exploited in the local sex industry...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT Haaretz.com

Moldova & Pridnestrovie: NGO's Urge Countries to Unity Against Sex Slavery

Pridnestrovie (green) is a de facto independent republic
within the