Trafficking in Persons Report, 2006

Released by the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons
June 5, 2006

Letter from Secretary Condoleezza Rice

Dear Reader:

The movement to end trafficking in persons is more than a human rights objective; it is a matter of global security.

President Bush's National Security Strategy reaffirmed our belief that promoting democracy and human rights is the most effective long-term strategy for ensuring stability. Included in the Strategy's goals for ending tyranny, spreading freedom, and championing human dignity is our commitment to ending human trafficking: "Trafficking in persons is a form of modern-day slavery, and we strive for its total abolition. Future generations will not excuse those who turn a blind eye to it."

Human traffickers prey on the most vulnerable and turn a commercial profit at the expense of innocent lives. The State Department's efforts to end this evil trade exemplify transformational diplomacy. We work with international partners to secure the freedom of those who are exploited and call on governments to be effective and accountable in prosecuting those who exploit.

The movement to end trafficking in persons continues to gain momentum, thanks to Presidential leadership, Congressional commitment, and support from innumerable faithbased, community, human rights, and women's groups, as well as from individual citizens. Thank you for joining this abolitionist movement on behalf of the world's most vulnerable citizens.

Sincerely,

Condoleezza Rice

I. Introduction

Nepal/India: Reena was brought to India from Nepal by her maternal aunt, who forced the 12-year-old girl into a New Delhi brothel shortly after arrival. The brothel owner made her have sex with many clients each day. Reena could not  leave because she did not speak Hindi and had no one to whom she could turn.  She frequently saw police officers collect money from the brothel owners for every new girl brought in. The brothel owner coached Reena and all the girls to tell anyone who asked that they were 25 years old and had voluntarily joined the brothel. Reena escaped after two years and now devotes her life to helping other trafficking victims escape.

The 2006 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report: Its 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 sixth annual TIP Report. It is intended to raise global awareness, to highlight the growing efforts of the international community to combat human trafficking, and to encourage foreign governments to take effective actions to counter all forms of trafficking in persons. The Report has increasingly focused the efforts of a growing community of nations on sharing information and partnering in new and important ways. A country that fails to make significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking in persons, per U.S. law, receives a "Tier 3" assessment in this Report. Such an assessment could trigger the withholding of non-humanitarian, non-trade-related assistance from the United States to that country.

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 equally to address the "three R’s"— rescue, rehabilitation, and reintegration. The U.S. law that guides these efforts, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000, as amended, makes clear from the outset that the purpose of combating human trafficking is to ensure just and effective punishment of traffickers, to protect their victims, and to prevent trafficking from occurring.

More than 150 years ago, the United States fought a devastating war that culminated in the elimination of slavery in this country. Although most nations have eliminated servitude as a state-sanctioned practice, a modern form of human slavery has emerged. It is a growing global threat to the lives and freedom of millions of men, women, and children. Today, only in the most brutal and repressive regimes, such as Burma and North Korea, is slavery still state sponsored. Instead, human trafficking often involves organized crime groups who make huge sums of money at the expense of trafficking victims and our societies.

Saudi Arabia: Serena arrived from the Philippines to work as a housemaid in Saudi Arabia. Upon her arrival, her employer confiscated her passport and, with his wife, began to beat and verbally abuse her. On one occasion, her female employer pushed her down the stairs; another time, her male employer choked her until she passed out. She was not allowed to leave the house. As her passport had been confiscated, she could not flee. Serena was so unhappy, she was driven to attempt suicide. Once at the hospital, she was able to escape from her captors. She has sought redress through the Saudi court system and is waiting for justice in a shelter.

Focusing on Slave Labor and Sexual Slavery

Every year we add to our knowledge of the trafficking phenomenon. In the 2004 Report, we used U.S. Government data that disaggregated transnational trafficking in persons by age and gender for the first time. This data shows that, of the estimated 600,000 to 800,000 men, women, and children trafficked across international borders each year, approximately 80 percent are women and girls, and up to 50 percent are minors. The data also demonstrated that the majority of transnational victims were trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation. With a focus on transnational trafficking in persons, however, these numbers do not include millions of victims around the world who are trafficked within their own national borders. The 2006 Report sheds new light on the alarming trafficking of people for purposes of slave labor, often in their own countries. This is a form of human trafficking that can be harder to identify and estimate than sex trafficking, yet it may be much greater in size when we count domestic trafficking. It does not necessarily involve the same criminal networks profiting from transnational trafficking for sexual exploitation. More often, individuals are guilty of, for example, enslaving one domestic servant or hundreds of unpaid, forced workers at a factory.

A wide range of estimates exists on the scope and magnitude of modern-day slavery, both internal and transnational. The International Labor Organization (ILO)—the United Nations (UN) 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.

Race To The Bottom: In Search Of Exploitable Migrant Workers

Economic globalization has encouraged an unprecedented mobilization of unskilled and low-skilled labor in response to demand in labor-deficit markets for construction, manufacturing, agriculture, and domestic work. Migrant workers from less developed South and East Asian countries fill relatively short-term labor contracts in more developed Asian, European, and Near Eastern countries at an ever increasing rate. The ILO estimates the population of migrant laborers to be 120 million. Saudi Arabia (7.5 million), the United Arab Emirates (2.3 million), Malaysia (2.3 million) and Kuwait (1.3 million) lead the markets in demand for foreign migrant workers. The Philippines (7 million), Indonesia (3 million), Bangladesh (3 million), and Sri Lanka (1.5 million) are the leading suppliers of these workers. There is nothing wrong per se with migrant labor in this era of globalization but as shown below, abuses can lead to modern-day slavery. Structuring this mass movement of labor from supply to demand countries are contracts offered by recruiters representing labor agencies and employers; contracts between labor agencies and employers sanctioned by the state as "sponsors"; and overarching memoranda of understanding between source and demand governments. Contracts offered to workers by recruiters cover basic conditions of employment—including wages, hours, and duration—and cite the location and identity of the employer. The level of regulation and oversight of these contracts varies widely. Workers are prone to abuse and the risk of involuntary servitude when contracts are not honored or are replaced with new contracts containing less favorable terms after arrival in a destination country. Governments of source countries seek to prevent such exploitation by negotiating agreements with demand country governments. The Philippines government, with its strong Overseas Employment Agency, stands out as a leader in managed labor migration by protecting its overseas workers. Other labor source governments are less vigorous in protecting their workers abroad.

Demand country employers and their labor agents seek maximum efficiency from foreign contract laborers. When protections and regulations are insufficient to deter abuses, unscrupulous employers look for the most vulnerable groups of foreign workers to prey on and exploit. Some governments tacitly condone this predatory behavior. Clearly, a "race to the bottom" is underway in some key labor demand countries, as the least protected populations of workers are sought, including the Vietnamese, Bangladeshis, and Nepalese, while "troublesome" workers who demand rights and have their governments backing them up are increasingly shunned. Such selection is possible as long as universal standards against involuntary servitude are not enforced. In bilateral agreements, source governments should require cases of involuntary servitude to be criminally prosecuted in demand country courts. These agreements should also: require the registration of contracts with all parties; hold labor agencies responsible for the welfare of the workers; and require insurance, funded by labor agencies, to protect workers in the event of unforeseen problems such as an employer's bankruptcy.

A contract labor agency in Bangladesh recently advertised work at a garment factory in Jordan. The ad promises a three-year contract, $125 per month, eight hour workdays, six days of work a week, paid overtime, free accommodation, free medical care, free food, and no advance fees. Instead, upon arrival, workers (who were obliged to pay exorbitant advance fees) had passports confiscated, were confined in miserable conditions, and prevented from leaving the factory. Months passed without pay, food was inadequate, and sick workers were tortured. Because most workers had borrowed money, at inflated interest rates, to get the contracts, they were obliged, through debt, to stay.

The nationalities of trafficking victims 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. Some families give children to related or unrelated adults who promise education and opportunity—but deliver the children into slavery for money. 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 on labor standards can be weak in punishing the employers responsible for this form of trafficking. 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. As well, female victims of forced or bonded labor, especially women and girls in domestic servitude, are often sexually abused.

Over the next year, the Department of State, as directed by Congress, intends to continue focusing more attention on forced labor and bonded labor, while maintaining our campaign against sex trafficking.

Recruitment Fees And Debts For Migrant Workers: Precursors To Servitude

Many of the foreign contract workers found in conditions of involuntary servitude in labor "demand" countries are required to pay substantial fees before they are accepted for work. These fees are paid to either the labor recruiter in the source country or the labor company in the demand country or it is shared by both. The payments demanded of foreign workers are often in the range of $4,000-$11,000 and are described as a "job placement fee" or "employment fee." These fees are usually illegal under source country laws and are banned by international covenant. There is no rational basis for requiring low-skilled workers to pay fees; recruitment agencies in source countries and labor agencies in demand countries are paid commissions by employers who have demanded the services of low-skilled foreign workers. By seeking to extract payments from workers themselves, labor companies are "double-dipping"—and imposing a heavy debt burden that contributes to bonded labor or involuntary servitude. Research on involuntary servitude among migrant contract workers finds a strong link between forced labor conditions and the heavy fees or debt imposed on workers by labor recruitment agencies in the source country.

Private employment agencies should not charge, directly or indirectly, any fees or costs to workers. This is a principle that is gaining increased acceptance and attention around the world, as some labor source countries criminalize the imposition of unreasonable costs on workers. It is the responsibility of labor source country governments to adequately regulate labor recruitment agencies to ensure that laborers going abroad for contract work are not saddled with inappropriate costs that too often induce debt bondage later. Labor recruitment firms that engage in this highly exploitative practice should be punished criminally. Administrative sanctions such as fines and business closures are not sufficient to deter this crime. It is the responsibility of the receiving or "demand" country governments to proactively screen workers to ensure they are not victimized by debt bondage or forced labor; when identified, criminal investigations leading to potential prosecutions should be the response.

As with the 2005 Report, 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. A global effort to eliminate human trafficking is building momentum, as a result of the victim-centered TVPA, this annual Report, strong bipartisan U.S. leadership, increased attention from international organizations, devoted NGOs, and creative media focus. Nations are increasingly working together to close trafficking routes, prosecute and convict traffickers, and protect and reintegrate trafficking victims. We hope this year’s Report inspires people to make even greater progress.

Niger/Mali: The parents of 12-yearold Malik were convinced by a Koranic teacher—one of a revered group in Niger—that he would take the young boy to Mali, for further education. But once Malik and other Nigerien boys arrived in Mali from Niger, they were denied schooling and were forced by the teacher to beg in the streets for long hours to earn money for him. Malik eventually escaped. Strangers helped him return to his village in Niger where his family received him joyously after hearing of his ordeal.

Labor Trafficking Through Legal Recruitment

This Report sheds greater light on a trafficking phenomenon seen increasingly in Asia and the Near East—servitude imposed on a large number of migrant laborers who accept contracts in other countries for low-skilled work in construction, manufacturing, agriculture and as domestic workers. Unlike undocumented migrants who tend to be smuggled into a country illegally, these migrant workers are recruited legitimately in their home countries, usually in less developed countries, and travel to wealthier countries where low-cost foreign labor is in demand. After arrival, a portion of these migrant workers face unscrupulous labor agencies or employers who place them into a state of involuntary servitude. This can become forced labor or bonded labor, depending on the tools of coercion used to compel workers to enter into or continue in a state of servitude. A number of tactics are used by abusive labor agents or employers, including: changing the conditions of employment from those stipulated in contracts signed before the workers left their home country; confiscating and holding travel documents (passports, airline tickets, and alien resident identification cards); confinement; threatening physical force; and withholding wages.

The causes of this form of labor trafficking fall into two general categories: abuse of contracts and local laws that govern the recruitment and employment of migrant laborers; and the orchestrated placement of heavy costs and debts on these laborers in the source country or state, often with the complicity or even 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, although use or threat of physical force or restraint to compel a worker to enter into or continue labor or service is indicative of forced labor. Costs imposed on laborers for the "privilege" of working abroad are against international standards and 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 exploitative practices employed by unscrupulous labor agents or employers in the destination country, these costs or debts, when excessive, become a form of debt bondage.

The Myth of Movement

A person may decide to travel to another location for a job, within his or her own country or abroad, and still subsequently fall into involuntary servitude. Some governments and law enforcement agencies mistakenly focus on the voluntary nature of a person's transnational movement, and fail to identify the more important element of compelled service or forced labor that can occur after someone moves for employment. Movement to the new location is incidental. The force, fraud or coercion exercised on that person to perform or remain in service to a "master" is the defining element of trafficking in modern usage. The person who is trapped in compelled service after initially voluntarily migrating, or taking a job willingly, is considered a trafficking victim. The boy forced into a commercial fishing business on Lake Volta in Ghana is as much a victim of trafficking in persons as the Thai worker brought to the U.S. on a legal seasonal farm work visa and forced to work in conditions not described in the original contract, with the threat of being deported without pay if he fails to comply with the "new rules."

The Ukrainian woman who is lured to London through the fraudulent offer of a modeling job and then prostituted is as much a victim of trafficking in persons as the teenage Brazilian girl who is pushed into prostitution in a seaside resort town by her family. The forms of servitude and faces of those it victimizes are myriad.

The U.S. Government continues to learn about the scope and nature of human trafficking. In this Report, we have tried to point out areas where information is sparse and raise issues that merit further investigation. In some cases, lack of information or false information from undemocratic governments may have limited this Report. Given these qualifications, the 2006 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.

Uganda: Michael was 15 when he was kidnapped by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) to serve as a combatant in the Ugandan insurgent force. During his forced service in the LRA, he was made to kill a boy who had tried to escape. He also watched another boy being hacked to death because he did not alert the guards when his friend successfully escaped.

The Public Health Impacts of Sex Trafficking

Although victims of sex trafficking experience a grotesque range of health problems, the global public health impact of sex trafficking has not been quantified. Reviewing regional studies offers a sense of how physically and psychologically traumatizing sex trafficking is. For example, a study of women and girls trafficked for prostitution in East Africa reported widespread rape, physical abuse, sexually transmitted infections (STIs), and HIV/AIDs.[1] An assessment in Nepal of trafficking in girls found that 38% of rescued victims suffered from HIV/AIDs, as well as STIs and tuberculosis (TB).[2] In a study of women trafficked to the European Union, health impacts included extreme violence that resulted in broken bones, loss of consciousness, and gang rape. Complications related to abortions, gastrointestinal problems, unhealthy weight loss, lice, suicidal depression, alcoholism, and drug addiction were also reported.[3] Another study of women trafficked to the European Union found that 95% of victims had been violently assaulted or coerced into a sexual act, and over 60% of victims reported fatigue, neurological symptoms, gastrointestinal problems, back pain, vaginal discharges, and gynecological infections.[4] Less obvious health consequences of sex trafficking can include cervical cancer, caused by the human papillomavirus, which is more common among women who have sexual encounters with many men.

While there are few large health studies on trafficking victims, many well-designed studies on the health consequences of prostitution are useful in understanding the health impact of sex trafficking. For example, two studies from India found HIV rates were higher among prostituted girls than among prostituted women (12.5% vs. 5.4% and 27.7% vs. 8.4%).[5]

Recommendations:

To better understand the range and interrelationship of health problems associated with sex trafficking, health problems can be grouped into six categories including:

1. Infectious diseases: HIV, STIs, and TB 
2. Non-infectious diseases: malnutrition, dental health problems, and skin diseases 
3. Reproductive health problems: forced abortions, high-risk pregnancies and deliveries 
4. Substance abuse: alcohol, inhalants, intravenous drugs 
5. Mental health problems: depression; Post Traumatic Stress Disorder; suicide 
6. Violence: physical and sexual assaults; murder

Collecting data based on these categories of health will permit NGOs and government agencies to develop evidence-based interventions for prevention and care of victims as well as to focus resources according to the identified needs of the victims. On a larger scale, data will facilitate the development of treatment guidelines as well as public health recommendations to address sex trafficking. This approach requires leadership from public health professionals and the application of traditional public health methodologies and strategies.

1 Pearson, E. "Study on Trafficking in Women in East Africa." GTZ. December 2003
2 Bal Kumar KC, Subedi G, Gurung YB, Adhikari KP. "Nepal Trafficking in Girls With Special Reference to Prostitution: A Rapid Assessment." International Labor Organization. November 2001
3 Zimmerman, Cathy. The Health Risks and Consequences of Trafficking in Women and Adolescents: Findings from a European study. London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. 2003. http://www.lshtm.ac.uk/hpu/docs/trafficking final.pdf
4 Zimmerman, Cathy. Stolen Smiles: A Summery Report on the Physical and Psychological Consequences of Women and Adolescents Trafficked in Europe. London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. 2006
5 Sarkar K, Bal B, Mukherjee R, Saha MK, Chakraborty S, Niyogi SK, Bhattachary SK. "Young age is a risk factor for HIV among female sex workers-An experience from India." Journal of Infection, 2005, (vol):1-5. and Sarkar K, Bal B, Mukherjee R, Niyogi SK, Saha MK, Bhattacharya SK. "Epidemiology of HIV Infection among Brothel-based Sex Workers in Kolkata, India." Journal of Health, Population, and Nutrition. 2005;23(3):231-235.

Azerbaijan/UAE: After her father died when she was 9, Nayla was given to an orphanage. But her mother took her from the orphanage and sold her to traffickers who brought her to Dubai. She was prostituted in clubs in Dubai until she was 13 years old. After the Dubai police discovered her illegal status, Nayla was deported back to Azerbaijan. Once she returned to Azerbaijan, she was prostituted for three more years before becoming pregnant. She contracted AIDS either in Dubai or in Baku and gave birth to an HIV-positive baby last year.

IDENTIFYING VICTIMS OF TRAFFICKING

The Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) and the United Nations Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children call on governments to take adequate steps to protect victims of trafficking. Such protection is only possible if there is adequate identification of the victims of trafficking. The 2005 Report emphasized the need to screen vulnerable groups of people in order to identify victims of trafficking. The assessments contained in this year’s Report reveal that much work remains to be done. Self-Identification: A Myth. Some governments continue to rely on a "complaint-based" system of identifying trafficking crimes and trafficking victims. Assuming that an individual victim of trafficking will report the crime to appropriate authorities or will identify his or her status as a trafficking victim at the first opportunity, these governments respond only to reported cases. This reactive approach to trafficking is not adequate and does not fulfill the TVPA’s standard for victim protection.

The Reality. Few victims are willing to identify themselves upon initial contact with law enforcement authorities. They are fearful of real or imagined reprisals and are still undergoing trauma from the servitude experience. They cannot and should not be expected to immediately report objectively on the dimensions of their exploitation.

Proactive Screening: The Standard. Adequate victim protection requires proactive measures by governments to identify trafficking victims through careful and thorough interviews and counseling. Law enforcement authorities should be given training on how to identify indications of trafficking. Granting victims temporary shelter in a comfortable environment allows suspected victims of trafficking to receive counseling and to assess options, including their assistance with the prosecution of traffickers.

The Human and Social Costs of Trafficking

Victims of human trafficking pay a horrible price. Psychological and physical harm, including disease and stunted growth, often have permanent effects. In many cases the exploitation of trafficking victims is progressive: a child trafficked into one form of labor may be further abused in an other. It is a brutal reality of the modern-day slave trade that its victims are frequently bought and sold many times over—often sold initially by family members. Victims forced into sex slavery are often subdued with drugs and subjected to extreme violence. Victims trafficked for sexual exploitation face physical and emotional damage from violent sexual activity, forced substance abuse, exposure to sexually transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS, food deprivation, and psychological torture. Some victims suffer permanent damage to their reproductive organs. Many victims die as a result of being trafficked. When the victim is trafficked to a location where he or she cannot speak or understand the language, this compounds the psychological damage caused by isolation and domination by traffickers.

The Human Rights Dimension. Fundamentally, trafficking in persons violates universal human rights to life, liberty, and freedom. Trafficking of children violates the inherent right of a child to grow up in a protective environment and the right to be free from all forms of abuse and exploitation.

Promoting Social Breakdown. The loss of family and community support networks makes trafficking victims vulnerable to traffickers’ demands and threats, and contributes in several ways to the breakdown of social structures. Trafficking tears children from their parents and extended family. The profits from trafficking often allow the practice to take root in a particular community, which is then repeatedly exploited as a ready source of victims. The danger of becoming a trafficking victim can lead vulnerable groups such as children and young women to go into hiding, with adverse effects on their schooling or family structure. The loss of education reduces victims’ future economic opportunities and increases their vulnerability to being re-trafficked in the future. Victims who are able to return to their communities often find themselves stigmatized or ostracized. Recovery from the trauma, if it ever occurs, can take a lifetime.

Fueling Organized Crime. The profits from human trafficking fuel other criminal activities. According to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation, human trafficking generates an estimated $9.5 billion in annual revenue. It is closely connected with money laundering, drug trafficking, document forgery, and human smuggling. Where organized crime flourishes, governments and the rule of law are undermined and weakened.

Depriving Countries of Human Capital and Inhibiting Development. Trafficking has a disastrous impact on labor markets, contributing to an irretrievable loss of human potential. Some effects of trafficking include depressed wages, diminished workforce productivity, loss of remittances, and an undereducated generation. These effects lead to the loss of future productivity and earning power. Forcing children to work, and denying them access to education, reinforces the cycle of poverty and illiteracy that represses national development. When forced or bonded labor involves a significant part of a country’s population, this form of trafficking retards the country's advancement, because generation after generation of victims remain mired in poverty.

Public Health Costs. Victims of trafficking often endure brutal conditions that result in physical, sexual, and psychological trauma. Sexually transmitted viruses and infections, pelvic inflammatory disease, and HIV/AIDS are often the result of being used in prostitution. Anxiety, insomnia, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder are common psychological manifestations among trafficked victims. Unsanitary and crowded living conditions, coupled with poor nutrition, foster a host of adverse health conditions such as scabies, tuberculosis, and other communicable diseases. The most egregious abuses are often borne by children, who are more easily controlled and forced into domestic service, armed conflict, and other hazardous forms of work.

Erosion of Government Authority. Many governments struggle to exercise full law enforcement authority over their national territory, particularly where corruption is prevalent. Armed conflicts, natural disasters, and political or ethnic struggles can create large populations of internally displaced persons, who are vulnerable to trafficking. Human trafficking operations further undermine government efforts to exert authority, threatening the security of vulnerable populations. Many governments are unable to protect women and children kidnapped from their homes and schools or from refugee camps. Moreover, bribes paid to law enforcement, immigration officials, and members of the judiciary impede a government’s ability to battle corruption.

Romania: Maria, age 16, was tricked into traveling to Bucharest to find a job by a childhood friend. Unbeknownst to Maria, the friend had advertised in a Romanian port city that there was a "girl for sale." Maria was sold to a man who used her as a prostitute, along with an 11-year-old girl. For four months, she was forced to work as a street prostitute under the threat of beatings. She was fined, arrested, and interrogated numerous times by the police; however, her "protector" bribed the police to release her, thus forcing her to prostitute again.

The Methods of Traffickers

Slave traders 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 marriage, employment, educational opportunities, or a better life. The following fictitious scenarios are based on true trafficking cases and represent common circumstances in which trafficking occurs:

In one of Madagascar’s tourist destinations, a 15 year-old girl’s parents push her to engage in prostitution with older male tourists as a source of income for her family, while also hoping that she will find marriage, education, or a job abroad. Local people observe her frequenting tourist "hot spots," wearing tight clothes and eating and drinking with foreign men late into the night. Based on a tip from a hotelier, local officials apprehended one particular tourist on suspicion of victimizing this girl for purposes of child sex tourism. The man, however, pays her family a small sum of money to remain silent and not pursue charges.

In Burma's northern Shan State, a young woman travels to China's Yunnan province in search of work and to escape miserable economic conditions caused by decades of military misrule. Upon arriving in a Chinese border town, she is offered work at a local bar and restaurant. The owner recognizes that she is an undocumented alien in China, however, and confines her to a small hotel where she is prostituted for commercial sex with male Chinese tourists and traders.

In Afghanistan, a girl is promised to a man in a neighboring village to settle an age-old dispute between their families. Although young, she is taken out of school to marry a man she has never met. When she arrives, she is forced to cook, clean, and serve her husband’s entire family for 18-20 hours per day. If she does something wrong, she is beaten and her new "family" threatens to kill her if she ever tries to leave. One day, her husband decides to marry someone new, so he sells his first wife to another man who also forces her to serve him and his family’s needs.

In the Netherlands, an 18-year-old Nigerian girl arrives from her home in Edo State to earn money so that she can send home money to help her family. She is introduced to her "auntie" who assumes tight control over the girl and forces her into street prostitution. Police arrest her since she has no legal residency documents. They hold her in a detention center. She is offered the opportunity to "denounce" her auntie as a trafficker but she declines, fearing possible retribution from the auntie's friends in Nigeria. She is deported back to Edo State where she faces shame for returning penniless.

Caste And Slavery In South Asia

Raman was born at the same brick kiln site where his father and grandfather had worked their entire lives to pay off a debt incurred by his grandfather. For 15 years, Raman and his family earned three rupees (2 cents) per 80 kilogram bag of bricks to pay off the $450 advanced by the brick kiln manager. They were beaten with sticks and hit by the owner if they were not working hard enough or producing enough bricks. They could not leave, because the brick kiln owner threatened to hunt them down and beat them or bribe the police into arresting them. Sadly, Raman’s story is not unusual for millions of low-caste laborers believed to be trapped in debt bondage in South Asia. Bonded labor is a form of trafficking in which victims take loans from unscrupulous individuals—often as little as $16—and are coerced into repaying these debts by working in the factories, brick kilns, and rice mills owned by their lenders. Many of these men, women, and children never finish paying their loans, however, since bogus interest fees and living costs imposed by the owners keep increasing the debt. Often, entire families work for 14-16 hours per day, and the debt passes to the next generation until paid. Physical abuse is common, and some female bonded laborers are sexually assaulted by their owners. Children are generally not permitted to attend school, and some endure injuries as a result of the work. The caste system is a social hierarchy that has endured in South Asian culture for centuries. Greatly limiting its members’ economic options and opportunities for advancement, the caste system rigidly keeps most of its members confined in menial jobs; it also predisposes millions to slavery through bonded labor.

According to a 2005 ILO report, the overwhelming majority of bonded laborers in India are from the lower castes. They are found in large numbers in labor-intensive industries throughout India— rice mills, brick kilns, stone quarries, and the textile loom industry. Social discrimination contributes to their low wages, and members of these castes must often borrow money to meet their daily needs—feeding a vicious cycle of generational exploitation. Generations of families are consumed in this caste-based slavery, crippling the development of South Asian communities.

Nigeria/Italy: Gloria was promised work in Rome in a fabric factory. Before leaving her native Nigeria, she underwent a voodoo ritual purportedly to oversee her safety in Italy and ensure her loyalty to her sponsor or "Madam." Upon arrival in Rome, Gloria was beaten by her Madam, who told her she would have to repay a huge trafficking debt through an estimated 4,000 acts of prostitution. Gloria received more beatings when she refused Madam's demands. She eventually acquiesced though she was then beaten for not earning enough money. When she became pregnant, Gloria was forced to have an abortion. She eventually found the courage to overcome the threats of voodoo reprisal and to escape to reclaim her life. She is now recovering in a shelter in Rome.

The Many Causes of Trafficking

The causes of human trafficking are complex and often reinforce each other. Viewing trafficking in persons as a global market, victims constitute the supply, and abusive employers or sexual exploiters (also known as sex buyers) represent demand. Although customers for the products of forced labor can also be considered a component of demand, these consumers 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.

The supply of victims is encouraged by many factors, including poverty, the attraction of perceived higher standards of living elsewhere, lack of employment opportunities, organized crime, violence against women and children, discrimination against women, government corruption, political instability, and armed conflict. In some societies a tradition of fostering allows the third or fourth child to be sent to live and work in an urban center with a member of the extended family (often, an "uncle"), 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, untrained, and separated from his or her family, and the hoped-for educational and economic opportunities never materialize.

On the demand side, factors driving trafficking in persons include the sex industry and the growing demand for exploitable labor. Sex tourism and child pornography have become worldwide industries, facilitated by technologies such as the Internet, which vastly expand the choices available to "consumers" and permit instant and nearly undetectable transactions. 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 Gulf for domestic servants who sometimes fall victim to exploitation or involuntary servitude.

TRAFFICKING AND EMERGING MUSLIM LEADERSHIP

In some parts of the world, traffickers are distorting traditional Islamic customs to facilitate human trafficking. In several West African countries, for example, men posing as Muslim scholars recruit young boys from parents, promising to teach the children the Koran. Once they have custody of the boys, however, these men subject them to forced begging and abuse. In parts of West Africa and South Asia, traffickers recruit boys, girls, and women for journeys to Saudi Arabia, where they are forced into commercial sexual exploitation, begging, or work as camel jockeys.

Muslim leaders have responded to this problem by working with governments, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and international organizations to raise awareness about trafficking in their communities. Some have also used arguments based in Islamic scholarship to defend the rights of women and children against trafficking. In Senegal and Niger, Muslim leaders have collaborated with government ministries and UNICEF to combat trafficking. In Indonesia, an NGO called the Fahmina Institute founded by Kyai Husein Muhammad [see the TIP Heroes section of this Report for more information] distributes 22,000 leaflets against human trafficking every week in mosques after Friday prayers. Kyai Husein has also written extensively on employing Islamic law and teachings to combat trafficking.

In Bangladesh, a local NGO sensitized 2,100 imams in 2005 to the risks, threats, and modalities of trafficking and conducted a training of trainers for 100 imams. As a result, over 2,500 imams delivered specific anti-trafficking messages during Friday prayer services, reaching millions of Bangladeshis. The involvement of the Muslim community in the fight against trafficking raises hope that anti-trafficking messages will be heard worldwide.

UNACCOMPANIED MINORS, TRAFFICKING, AND EXPLOITATION

Since 2004, 120 Chinese children have reportedly disappeared from Swedish immigration centers. In all cases, the children arrived in Sweden on a plane from Beijing or Moscow and immediately asked for political asylum. Within days, they disappeared while cases were pending. Investigative leads indicate onward destinations included Denmark, Germany, Italy, France, and the Netherlands. Swedish law enforcement authorities believe a network of traffickers is behind the disappearance.

Unaccompanied minors (UAMs) can be lured from their countries of origin under false pretenses or might fall victim to exploitation after they arrive in a foreign country; their victimization is an important piece in the global trafficking picture. Although they are a relatively small percentage of the total population of foreign migrants in Europe, UAMs are inherently vulnerable to trafficking for both the purposes of sexual exploitation and forced labor.

They are typically from countries in Central and Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia. They are exploited in many different ways including for prostitution, as drug mules, as domestic servants, in sweatshop or restaurant work, through organized begging and pick-pocketing gangs, and as a result of forced marriage.

Several reliable non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have noticed a mysterious trend of unaccompanied Chinese minors arriving in Europe with cell phones, cash, and no apparent travel plans, who then suddenly disappear from authorities and reception centers. It is possible that these UAMs disappeared when they came into contact with criminal networks. Unaccompanied minors who are exploited by criminals are often not recognized as victims of, or investigated as cases of, trafficking. Trafficked children require fundamental protection and rehabilitation. A child’s first contact with authorities in destination countries could be the best opportunity to stop the trafficking chain.

Afghanistan: Naseema was forced by her mother into marriage at the age of four to a 30-year-old neighbor in an Afghan village. At her husband’s home, her father-in-law and 12 others in the family began torturing her. Her treatment included beatings and starvation, and she was forced to sleep outside in the cold with only a rug to protect her. Her abusers often used her as a human table, forcing her to lie on her stomach so they could cut their food on her bare back. At one point, her father-in-law locked her in a shed for two months and she was only allowed to leave once a day. The night before she escaped at the age of 12 in 2005, her father-in-law tied her hands together and poured scalding water over her head. She escaped the next day, fearing death at the hands of her husband’s family, and was found by a rickshaw driver who took her to the hospital for treatment; it took over one month for her to heal from the various injuries inflicted upon her. She is now in a shelter and attending school.

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE (DOD) RESPONDS TO LABOR TRAFFICKING IN IRAQ

A recent DOD investigation, prompted by late 2005 media allegations of labor trafficking in Iraq, identified a number of abuses, some of them considered widespread, committed by DOD contractors or subcontractors of third country national (TCN) workers in Iraq. Some of these abuses are indicative of trafficking in persons, and include: illegal confiscation of TCNs' passports; deceptive hiring practices and excessive recruitment fees; substandard living conditions; and circumvention of Iraqi immigration procedures. The TCNs are largely low-skilled workers from Nepal, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines.

The Department of Defense has responded swiftly with a number of measures to closely monitor the hiring and employment of foreign laborers. In April 2006, General George W. Casey, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq, issued specific labor guidelines to all Defense contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan. Chief among those measures was a mandate that all contractors cease the practice of holding or withholding employees' passports. Furthermore, DOD contracts will include the following guidelines to prevent trafficking in persons:

• All employees of Defense Department contractors or subcontractors will be provided a signed copy of their employment contract that defines the terms of their employment and compensation.
• Contractors and subcontractors must be licensed recruiting firms.
• Recruiting firms must not charge employees illegal recruitment fees.

Under the policy, contractors and subcontractors are required to comply with personal living space standards, international and host country laws for work visas, and transit and entry procedures. This response works to ensure the U.S. employs a "zero tolerance" policy against human trafficking domestically and abroad.

Bride Selling

A growing gender imbalance in areas of South and East Asia is increasingly driving the demand for trafficking victims. In China, although son-preference is a major factor behind skewed sex ratios, the country's one-child policy and poverty also exacerbate the supply and demand for bride trafficking. Girls are often aborted and there have been reports that in some cases female infants have been killed at birth, causing men to outnumber women in some parts of the country by 117 boys to 100 girls.

Yet, men still feel social pressure to marry, causing some who cannot find marriageable women to try buying brides from other regions of the country, or from border areas with neighboring countries, such as North Korea. These women, often sold by their parents or kidnapped from their villages, are forced into marriage, prostitution or concubinage. Popular areas from which to traffic brides domestically are poor areas of China's inland provinces, where poverty renders women more vulnerable to trafficking. Traffickers generally sell these girls and women in provinces with large female deficits. In fact, some experts believe that the kidnapping and sale of women has increased as China's economic development has accelerated, and that such trafficking accounts for 30-90 percent of marriages in some villages.

India faces a similar problem of gender imbalance in some regions, although it is sparked primarily by cultural attitudes that see girls as economic liabilities due to dowry demands by potential grooms. State statistics show a notable gender imbalance in some key regions: in Jammu and Kashmir, 111 boys for every 100 girls; Uttar Pradesh, 111; Sikkim, 114; Punjab, 114 (capital city Chandighar, 129); and Harayana, 116 as of the 2001 census. This gender gap has resulted in several million more men than women in the marriage market, creating a "marriage squeeze" and pressure for men to find women to marry. As a consequence, there are some cases in which women from Nepal, Bangladesh, and other areas of India have been bought or kidnapped as brides for "bachelor villages." The lack of women also contributes to greater demand for prostituted women and girls, fueling the demand for victims of trafficking. Trafficked brides are often discouraged from reporting their situations or running away because of social and economic pressure to remain in a marriage, lack of familiarity with the area to which they were trafficked, police or official complicity that compels the return of runaway brides, laws which re-victimize trafficked women by classifying and prosecuting them as illegal aliens, and the social discrimination they would likely face if they return home.

Liberia: A 13-year-old former child soldier from Liberia recounts: "They gave me pills that made me crazy. When the craziness got in my head, I beat people on their heads and hurt them until they bled. When the craziness got out of my head I felt guilty. If I remembered the person I went to them and apologized. If they did not accept my apology, I felt bad."


WORKING TO END DEMAND FOR THE VICTIMS OF SEX TRAFFICKING

The U.S. Government opposes prostitution and related activities, including pimping, pandering, and maintaining brothels, as contributing to the phenomenon of human trafficking. These activities are inherently harmful and dehumanizing. This position is codified in a National Security Presidential Directive (NSPD-22) and was reaffirmed in the Administration’s support for the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) of 2005, which "brings important attention to reducing the demand for the commercial sex acts that fuel sex trafficking."

In January 2006, President George W. Bush signed the TVPRA into law, stating, "We cannot put the criminals out of business until we also confront the problem of demand. Those who pay for the chance to sexually abuse children and teenage girls must be held to account. So we’ll investigate and prosecute the customers, the unscrupulous adults who prey on the young and innocent." The new law contains domestic provisions aimed at decreasing demand for sex trafficking victims. It authorizes block grants of $25 million by the Attorney General to states and local law enforcement to: investigate and prosecute buyers of commercial sex; educate individuals charged with or attempting to purchase commercial sex; and collaborate with local NGOs who are skilled at providing services to victims. The new law also provides $10 million to local governments and NGOs through the Department of Health and Human Services to help survivors of human trafficking and commercial sexual exploitation.

Effective Strategies in Combating Trafficking

To be effective, anti-trafficking strategies must target both the supply side (the traffickers) and the demand side (owners, consumers or, in the case of trafficking for sexual exploitation, the sex buyers). On the supply side, the conditions that drive trafficking must be dealt with through efforts to: alert communities to the dangers of trafficking, improve and expand educational and economic opportunities for vulnerable groups, promote equal access to education, educate people regarding their legal rights, and create better and broader life opportunities. Regarding traffickers, law enforcement must: vigorously prosecute traffickers and those who aid and abet them, fight public corruption which facilitates and profits from the trade, identify and interdict trafficking routes through better intelligence gathering and coordination, clarify legal definitions of trafficking and coordinate law enforcement responsibilities, and train personnel to identify and direct trafficking victims to appropriate care. On the demand side, persons who exploit trafficked persons must be identified and prosecuted. Employers of forced labor and exploiters of victims trafficked for sexual exploitation must be named and appropriately punished. With regard to sex slavery, public awareness campaigns must be conducted in destination countries to make it harder for trafficking to be concealed or ignored. Victims must be rescued, rehabilitated, reintegrated into their families, or offered alternatives if unable to return to their home communities. Local, state, national, and regional efforts to fight trafficking must be coordinated. By drawing public attention to the problem, governments can enlist the support of the public. Anti-trafficking strategies and programs developed with input from stakeholders (civil society and NGOs) are the most effective and more likely to succeed as they bring a comprehensive view to the problem.

Nations should cooperate more closely to deny traffickers legal sanctuary and to facilitate their extradition for prosecution. Such cooperation should also aim to facilitate the voluntary and humane repatriation of victims. Programs that protect witnesses should be encouraged. Knowledge about trafficking must be continually deepened, and the network of anti-trafficking organizations and efforts strengthened. Religious institutions, NGOs, schools, community associations, and traditional leaders need to be mobilized and drawn into the struggle. Victims and their families are important stakeholders in the fight against trafficking. Governments need to periodically reassess their anti-trafficking strategies and programs to ensure they remain effective in order to counter new methods and approaches by traffickers.

Finally, government officials must be trained in anti-trafficking techniques and methods, and trafficking flows and trends must be closely monitored to better understand the nature and magnitude of the problem so that appropriate policy responses can be crafted and launched.

Singapore: A 20-year-old Indonesian, formerly a maid in Singapore, remembers being abused: "The employer would get angry…. If she was very angry, she would slap me many times. I hadn’t finished my contract yet. She said I couldn’t go home. I couldn’t tolerate it. When I told the agent the employer had slapped me, she just said, 'You must suffer. You should control your feelings.' If a maid hasn’t finished her salary deduction [paying off up-front fees imposed by the agent/employer], and she calls the agent, the agent is angry. The agent also slapped me; they didn’t want me to leave without finishing the contract and the salary deduction."

Victim Protection

The TVPA gives us a victim-centered approach to address trafficking, combining anti-crime and human rights objectives. Without adequate protections for victims, efforts to address trafficking crimes are unlikely to be effective. The TVPA’s criteria for evaluating a government’s efforts to protect victims of trafficking includes 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."

Best practices in implementing this TVPA criterion include:

FIRST, a government should proactively identify victims of trafficking. Without victim identification, adequate protection is impossible. Government agencies should establish formal screening and victim identification procedures to screen at-risk populations such as persons apprehended for violations of immigration laws, prostitution laws, and begging or labor laws. Victims of trafficking should not be expected to identify themselves; proactive investigative techniques—through interviews in safe and non-threatening environments with trained counselors and appropriate language services—should be used to identify trafficking indicators.

SECOND, once identified, a suspected victim of trafficking should be afforded temporary care as a victim of a serious crime. This could include shelter and counseling that allow a potential victim to recount his or her experience to trained social counselors and law enforcement personnel at a pace with minimal pressure.

THIRD, confirmed trafficking victims should not be punished for crimes that are a direct result of being trafficked—such as not holding proper immigration documents or violation of prostitution, labor, or begging statutes. Trafficking victims should not be detained criminally, after they are identified as victims, in detention facilities, except in extreme circumstances. They should be treated as victims.

FOURTH, confirmed trafficking victims should be encouraged to cooperate with law enforcement authorities in the investigation of the crime committed against them. Furthermore, they should be encouraged to assist in prosecuting, if possible, the persons that trafficked or exploited them.

FINALLY, a trafficking victim who is unwilling or unable to cooperate in a trafficking prosecution can be returned to her community of origin provided that this return is accomplished in a responsible manner, with preparations made in advance for the victim’s safe return and reintegration. However, a victim should be offered legal alternatives to being removed to countries in which she would face hardship or retribution. Trafficking victims should not be subjected to deportations or forced returns without safeguards or other measures to reduce the risk of hardship, retribution, or re-trafficking.

What Is Child Sex Tourism?

Each year, more than one million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade. 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 sexual exploitation of children has devastating consequences. 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. These sexual offenders come from all socio-economic backgrounds and may hold positions of trust.

A Global Response

Over the last five years, there has been an increase in the prosecution of child sex tourism offenses. At least 32 countries have extraterritorial laws that allow the prosecution of their citizens for CST crimes committed abroad. In response to the grotesque phenomenon, NGOs, the tourism industry, and governments have begun to address the issue. The World Tourism Organization (WTO) established a task force to combat CST. The WTO, the NGO End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT), and Nordic tour operators created a global Code of Conduct for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation in Travel and Tourism in 1999. As of March 2005, 100 travel companies from 18 countries had signed the code. [See www.thecode.org]

What the United States Is Doing

In 2003, the United States strengthened its ability to fight child sex tourism by passing the Prosecutorial Remedies and other Tools to end the Exploitation of Children Today (PROTECT) Act and The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act. Together these laws increase penalties to a maximum of 30 years in prison for engaging in CST. Since the passage of the PROTECT Act, there have been over 20 indictments and over a dozen convictions of child sex tourists. The Department of Homeland Security developed the Operation Predator initiative to combat child exploitation, child pornography, and child sex tourism. The United States is also funding the NGO World Vision to conduct a major public awareness, deterrence, and crime prevention project overseas.

Governments should prioritize the issue, draft a plan of action based on comprehensive research, and designate a coordinator to engage NGOs, intergovernmental organizations, and the travel industry. Extraterritorial laws must prohibit all forms of child sex tourism and be enforced with sentences reflecting the heinous nature of the crime. Governments should also train law enforcement officers, fund public awareness campaigns, and arrange for shelter and assistance to victims.

The travel and tourism sector is recognizing they have a critical role to play in training their staff to report suspicious behavior and in alerting travelers to relevant laws. The private sector should also establish and enforce sound corporate policies repudiating the sexual exploitation of children, and insist that their contractors and suppliers do the same. Individuals must ensure they are not part of the problem, the demand, but rather part of the
solution by reporting incidents to the local police, U.S. embassy, or the U.S. Immigration and Customs hotline at 1-866-DHS-2ICE.

"TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS" DEFINED

The Trafficking Victims Protection Act defines "severe form of trafficking in persons" 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.

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 the 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.

"Debt bondage" means the status or condition of a debtor arising from a pledge by the debtor of his or her personal services or of those of a person under his or her control as a security for debt, if the value of those services as reasonably assessed is not applied toward the liquidation of the debt, or the length and nature of those services are not respectively limited and defined.

MORE ABOUT THE 2006 TIP REPORT

The TIP Report is the most comprehensive worldwide report on the efforts of governments to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons. The TIP Report covers the period April 2005 through March 2006.

What the Report Is and Is Not

The annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report includes those countries determined to be countries of origin, transit, or destination for a significant number of victims of severe forms of trafficking. Since 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.

The narrative also contains an assessment of the government’s compliance with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking as laid out in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000, as amended, and includes suggestions for 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 explaining why, using terms found in the TVPA as amended.

Per the TVPA's guidance, there are 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 and, 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 governments have issued statements, held conferences, and established task forces or national action plans to create goals for anti-trafficking efforts. However, statements, 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, 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.

Why the 2006 TIP Report Contains More Country Assessments

The 2006 Report includes an analysis of trafficking and government efforts to combat it in 149 countries, a net increase of seven ranked countries over last year. In previous years, some countries have not been included because it was difficult to gather reliable and sufficient information due to: the illegal and underground nature of trafficking; the absence or nascence of government anti-TIP efforts; the difficulty in distinguishing between trafficking and smuggling; the fear and silence of trafficking victims, who often cross borders illegally or are physically abused or coerced; the general lack of freedom of information in a country; or the lack of independent NGOs who can supply information. For some countries, there was information available, but the data did not support a finding that a significant number of three persons were trafficked to, from, or within a country—the general threshold for inclusion in the TIP Report. Over the past year, we have witnessed a stronger response from many governments, more public awareness campaigns alerting victims to protection services and greater transparency in anti-trafficking efforts. As a result of these positive actions, and the dedication of more Department of State resources, information was gathered on additional countries this year. The Department intends to include all countries with a significant number of trafficking victims in future reports, as more and better information becomes available.

TRAFFICKING AND WARFARE: CHILD SOLDIERS IN BURMA

Gruesome information about trafficked children forced to serve as child soldiers has most often centered on African countries such as Uganda and Sierra Leone. However, Burma’s prolonged conflict with ethnic forces and worsening political and economic conditions have left its population vulnerable to exploitation, creating an environment where children as young as 11 are forced into the military. Both the military and armed ethnic groups recruit child soldiers.

Both the U.S. Government and the United Nations have called on the Government of Burma to cease all recruitment and exploitation of children in the military. Despite these pressures, the Burmese Government refuses to address the practice of kidnapping children for the purpose of military exploitation.

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 combatingtrafficking. The Department hopes the Report will be a catalyst for government and non-government efforts to combat trafficking in persons around the world.

THE TIERS

TIER 1: Countries whose governments fully comply with the Act’s minimum standards. [detailed on p. 288]

TIER 2 : Countries whose governments do not fully comply with the Act’s minimum standards but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards.

TIER 2 SPECIAL WATCH LIST: Countries whose governments do not fully comply with the Act’s minimum standards but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards, and:

a) The absolute number of victims of severe forms of trafficking is very significant or
is significantly increasing; or
b) There is a failure to provide evidence of increasing efforts to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons from the previous year; or
c) The determination that a country is making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with minimum standards was based on commitments by the country to take additional future steps over the next year.

TIER 3: Countries whose governments do not fully comply with the minimum standards and are not making significant efforts to do so.

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, which 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, international organizations, officials, journalists, academics, and survivors. To compile this year’s Report, the Department took a fresh look at information sources for every country to make its assessments. Assessing each government’s anti-trafficking efforts involves a two-step process:

Step One: 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, as they exhibited indications of trafficking.

Step Two: Tier Placement

The Department places each country included on the 2006 TIP Report into one of the four 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 p. 288]. Governments that do, are placed in Tier 1. For other governments, the Department considers whether they made 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, if applicable, Tier 2 countries are placed on the Tier 2 Watch List.

The Special Watch List-Tier 2 Watch List

The 2003 reauthorization of 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 2005 Report; 2) Countries listed as Tier 2 in the current Report that were listed as Tier 3 in the 2005 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 minimum standards was based on commitments by the country to take additional future steps over the next year.

This category (including a, b, and c) has been termed by the Department of State "Tier 2 Watch List." There were 27 countries placed on Tier 2 Watch List in the June 2005 Report. Along with six countries that were reassessed as Tier 2 Watch List countries in September 2005 and three countries that met the first two categories above (moving up a tier from the 2005 TIP Report), these 27 countries were included in an "Interim Assessment" released by the Department of State on February 1, 2006.

Of the 33 countries on Tier 2 Watch List at the time of the Interim Assessment, 16 moved up to Tier 2 on this Report, while 4 fell to Tier 3 and 12 remain on Tier 2 Watch List for a third consecutive year. Haiti has been placed in the "Special Cases" category this year. 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, 2007.

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 assistance. Countries that receive no such assistance would be subject to withholding of funding for participation in educational and cultural exchange programs.

Consistent with the TVPA, such governments 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. These potential consequences will take effect at the beginning of the next fiscal year, October 1, 2006. 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 the imposition of sanctions, 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.

II. International Best Practices

Australia: Combating Child Sex Tourism.
The NGO, Child Wise , along with the Government of Australia, has sponsored a regional education campaign to combat child sex tourism that was adopted by the ten ASEAN Tourism Ministers on January 16, 2006. The program aims to heighten the awareness of child sex trafficking/tourism, among airline personnel, travel agents, and immigration and visa officials, as well as the general public. It urges target audiences to call a local hotline to report suspicious activities. The program is especially valuable for local law enforcement agencies' efforts to detect and prosecute pedophiles and child sex offenders. The 18th Global Task Force to Protect Children from Sexual Exploitation in Tourism invited Child Wise to present its campaign model at its March 10, 2006, conference in Berlin. Last year, Australia began 24 child sex tourism investigations, charged seven people, and secured one conviction. Thus far, Australia has prosecuted 17 people under its extraterritorial legislation.

Bangladesh: Disseminating Anti-Trafficking Information to At-Risk Women.
The Government of Bangladesh has instituted a program in which anti-trafficking information is distributed to members of micro-credit lending programs. Underprivileged women, particularly those in rural areas of Bangladesh, are the primary beneficiaries of microcredit; they are also among the most at-risk populations for trafficking. By distributing anti-trafficking brochures during microcredit lending sessions, the government reached 400,000 atrisk women in 39,061 sessions, warning these women of the dangers of trafficking. This example shows the beneficial relationship between anti-trafficking campaigns and broader economic and social development initiatives.

Bosnia and Herzegovina and Tajikistan: Effective Police Strategies.
The Anti-Trafficking Strike Force in Bosnia and Herzegovina conducted four major raids in 2005 and 2006 that resulted in the rescue of 26 victims and the apprehension of at least 14 traffickers. This unit exemplifies the importance of close cooperation between prosecutors and police in effectively executing successful raids to rescue victims and arrest traffickers. It also highlights the practical results of bringing different police agencies together to cooperate on trafficking investigations. As a result of one raid, one of the most notorious night bars in central Bosnia was shut down.

Tajikistan set up elite anti-trafficking units consisting of two to four specially trained police investigators in regions throughout the country. An increased number of these units led to 81 trafficking investigations in 2005, a significant increase from 2004.

Brazil: Targeting Major Re-entry Points for Victims Assistance Centers. Many victims trafficked abroad are eventually deported or repatriated back to their home countries and need a helping hand upon their return. In Brazil, most victims returning from foreign countries re-enter the country through Sao Paulo’s international airport. The State of Sao Paulo has worked in partnership with an NGO to establish a victim support center near the airport so that returning victims have prompt access to help. The NGO Association for the Defense of Women and Youth assisted more than 150 women and girls during the past two years by arranging transportation to get victims back to their final home communities and providing information about government protection services and legal procedures.

Colombia and Ecuador: Using Popular Culture to Spread Public Awareness.
Public and private partnerships are using mainstream entertainment to help spread antitrafficking messages. In Colombia, The United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC), worked with the producer of the popular soap opera "Everybody Loves Marilyn" to incorporate a storyline for the role of "Catalina" that dramatized the plight of a trafficking victim. Use of the widelyviewed television Spanish language series, broadcast throughout Colombia and exported to Venezuela, Ecuador, and the United States, educated the public, reaching large sections of the population. It also helped potential victims identify with the character, and understand some of the methods used to deceive victims and witness the abuse they could face in a trafficker’s hands.

In Ecuador, volunteers from the National Institute for Children and Family (INNFA) worked with visiting international musician Ricky Martin, his charitable foundation, and Colombian entertainer Carlos Vives to disseminate anti-trafficking messages and information that reached approximately 24,000 people attending their concerts in Quito and Guayaquil. Some 50,000 soccer spectators in Ecuador watched a game played on a field bedecked with a huge INNFA "No to Trafficking in Persons" graphic.

Ecuador: Using Public Transportation to Spread Anti-Trafficking Messages.
The municipality of Guayaquil and the Confederation of Taxicab Drivers for the greater Guayaquil area worked together with an NGO to raise public awareness by placing stickers with an anti-trafficking message inside local taxis. The stickers explain the nature of trafficking, warn about heavy penalties for traffickers, and encourage the reporting of trafficking crimes.

Ethiopia and Kuwait: Efforts to Protect Migrant Workers in Source and Destination Countries.
The Ethiopian Immigration Office provides printed information on trafficking in persons, including organizations to contact for help in foreign countries, to thousands of Ethiopians applying for passports to work outside the country. It also requires applicants to view an IOM-produced video, "Make the Right Choice," on the risks of human trafficking inherent in overseas employment and what to do in case of victimization.

The Kuwait Union of Domestic Labor Offices (KUDLO), an association of labor recruitment agencies, under the leadership of General Manager Hashim Majid Mohammed, paved the way for protection of expatriate workers in Kuwait. KUDLO partnered with the Al-Haqooq law firm and several source country embassies to provide free legal services to domestic workers who faced problems with their employers. KUDLO has been working hard to create the first Kuwaiti-run shelter for domestic workers, who will be able to get speedy legal and administrative assistance to resolve workplace problems such as the lack of pay or harassment. In response to the widespread problem of substituting contracts signed by workers in their home country, in their native language, with new, less favorable contracts in Arabic, KUDLO facilitated an agreement whereby the Indian Embassy and KUDLO review, sign, and file a copy of the contract of every Indian domestic worker before he or she comes to Kuwait. The agreement also provides insurance to the worker in case of health or legal problems. It is working to sign similar agreements with other embassies. KUDLO also brought together arriving migrants with their prospective employers to educate both in their rights and responsibilities.

Indonesia and Lithuania: Mobilizing Scouts and Students.
In 2004, the Scout Movement, which incorporates nearly all public school students across the country, began an antitrafficking campaign in Indramayu, West Java, where too many young women and girls fall victim to trafficking. In its current phase, the Scout Movement will provide anti-trafficking education to 25,000 students in 116 schools in the Indramayu area by August 2006. The Scout Movement has trained 285 school-level facilitators who utilize innovative training and a campaign kit containing a four-part video documentary, comic books, and other antitrafficking materials. The national Scout movement is considering expanding the program to other districts and instituting an anti-trafficking merit badge to encourage more Scouts to learn about and promote anti-trafficking efforts. The Scout’s involvement in anti-trafficking is part of a larger strategy initiated by the Indonesian Government, the American Center for International Labor Solidarity (the Solidarity Center), and the International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC) to mobilize existing mass-membership institutions and their significant networks to combat trafficking.

Similarly, Lithuania has also been raising awareness in the classroom. The Missing Person Families Support Center designed an educational program for schools to ensure students have adequate information on the risks of trafficking. Center employees give students one-hour lessons including viewing a documentary in which young victims tell their stories. Students also engage in a roundtable discussion and receive antitrafficking brochures. The Center conducts 20 of these sessions annually.

Malawi: Local Awareness Enables Identification of Traffickers.
To enhance its ability to combat child trafficking, the Government of Malawi hired district-level child protection officers to conduct country-wide sensitization meetings that educated rural communities about human trafficking. Informative posters and brochures were also used to raise awareness among local populations. Villagers in the Malawian town of Mchinji learned to recognize trafficking activities through this educational campaign and, soon after, quickly notified local police of a suspicious man attempting to cross the border with a group of children. An investigation ensued, and the man was convicted and sentenced to seven years imprisonment with hard labor for trafficking children. After receiving similar types of education in human trafficking, local communities in Burkina Faso and Guyana have also been able to successfully identify instances of trafficking in their communities.

The Philippines: Emphasizing Need for Task Forces at Local Level.
The city of Zamboanga formed a local version of the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT) that mirrors the national council. The body brings together local government units involved with trafficking to foster close coordination in pursuing TIP cases. During 2005, local police, prosecutors, and social workers effectively cooperated in order to achieve the first conviction in the country under the 2003 anti-trafficking law. After the victim in the case came forward, the city’s Social Welfare and Development Office worked with police to help investigate the case. Police also worked closely with the prosecutor’s office. Finally, the court made this trafficking case a priority, which allowed the case to be concluded in a record five months. The mayor’s office set an outstanding example by making known to local government agencies its commitment to fighting human trafficking.

Romania: Candid and Cooperative with Private Researchers.
The Government of Romania commissioned the most comprehensive report on human trafficking in Romania to date. The report was supported and partially financed by UNICEF, and researched by a nongovernmental entity. Researchers had complete access to government officials and official information enabling the report to be extremely candid and critical of current gaps in anti-trafficking policy. The report has already begun to serve as a roadmap for how to improve government efforts.

Global Law Enforment Data
The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) of 2003 added to the original law a new requirement: that foreign governments provide the Department of State with data on trafficking investigations, prosecutions, convictions, and sentences in order to be considered in full compliance with the TVPA's minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking (Tier 1). The 2004 TIP Report collected this data for the first time. The requirement is fully effective starting with this Report. The chart below compares data collected for this and the two preceding Reports:

Starting with this Report, governments must collect and provide full law enforcement data in order to qualify for Tier 1.

Year	Prosecutions	Convictions	New or Amended Legislation
2003	7,992	2,815	24
2004	6,885	3,025	39
2005	6,618	4,766	41

Child Domestic Servitude
The largest employment category in the world, for children under age 16, is domestic work in homes other than their own, according to the International Labor Organization. The overwhelming majority of these children are girls. Although the majority of children in forced domestic labor are between 12 and 17, in many countries, children are made to work at much younger ages.

Victims of child domestic servitude are routinely subjected to physical, mental, and verbal abuse, and suffer from a loss of freedom and denial of schooling. They are underfed and overworked. In some countries, such as Egypt, Indonesia, Brazil, and Nigeria, it is normal to have child domestics in one’s home. The children are either sent by their parents or lured from rural areas to the city with promises of making enough money to send back to their families. Removed from their own families, they are often forced to work long days, providing services around the clock for the employer’s family, such as house cleaning, cooking, laundry, and child care.

Although they typically live with the employer’s family, young victims are usually not provided with a room of their own and given no privacy. Routinely, they are forced to sleep on the floor in the corner of a room or under the kitchen table, and are made to eat leftovers. They are often subject to verbal, mental, and physical abuse from an early age by all family members, including other children. In many cases with child victims, they may not leave the home unsupervised and may be locked up when the family goes out.

The isolation of child domestic workers renders them highly vulnerable to sexual exploitation. Child domestics often face sexual abuse from the males in the household, including male children and relatives. Confined to the home, they are not able to flee, seek help, or return to their own homes. The stigma attached to child domestic workers coupled with their lack of education often leaves them with few employment options. What's more, the large populations of child domestics are often invisible to societies that are otherwise increasingly aware and active on other human rights problems. Some commendable efforts are underway to increase public awareness of their plight using innovative techniques. One such effort has been launched by the Indian NGO National Domestic Worker's Movement, aiming advertisements at India's middle and upper classes through fashion magazines.

The Policy of Victim Rescue
Human trafficking is modern-day slavery, involving victims who are forced, defrauded, or coerced into labor or sexual exploitation. While some victims of this crime are able to escape from involuntary servitude, many more are not able to break free on their own. They need help. Help usually comes in the form of a raid on the place where victims are held against their will. Victims of involuntary servitude in a labor situation are rescued through raids on sweatshops, or searches of homes exploiting domestic servants, for example. 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. Regardless of the type of rescue, the law enforcement operation—typically termed a "raid"—should be executed through legal means, under the proper authority, using warrants or other necessary court or police orders.

Smart Raids vs. Blind Raids
Law enforcement raids in search of trafficking victims are most effective when they involve good planning and information gathering. While it is unrealistic to get complete information on victims in servitude, learning enough to know, with a high degree of certainty, that trafficking victims are present in the commercial sex and labor sites is important. Victim information is usually obtained through law enforcement people working undercover or through strategicallyrecruited informants. Carefully planned to ensure the safety of all involved and with post-rescue care arranged for trafficking victims, these smart raids can free trafficking victims while minimizing harm to others.

Some law enforcement raids are blind: They are executed against a target without prior attempts to verify the existence of victims of trafficking in those locations. Blind raids can lead to poor results while inconveniencing or harming people not involved in trafficking. Law enforcement agents often become disheartened after such unsuccessful raids, especially if they assumed enslaved people would be found enthusiastically awaiting liberation. Bad experiences with blind raids can lead to less effort against sites where labor or sex trafficking is ongoing—or lead to cynicism regarding the human trafficking phenomenon.

Identifying Victims of Trafficking
The violence (physical and psychological) and intimidation that marks involuntary servitude means that victims are often reluctant to identify themselves as victims. This is true around the world and occurs for various reasons. First, victims are usually taught to fear law enforcement authorities and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). If victims are underage, they are typically coerced by traffickers and brothel keepers to claim they are adults consensually involved in prostitution. Adult trafficking victims may be coerced to hide indicators of trafficking— such as confinement, debt bondage, or threats of violence against them and their families. Labor managers and brothel keepers often threaten victims or their relatives with future harm if their situation is revealed.

Suspected victims must be removed from the site of exploitation, away from the threatening environment, and taken to a safe place. The state often needs to have temporary custody of these suspected victims, as victims or witnesses of serious crimes. In such an environment—usually in the form of a shelter—victims of human trafficking are more likely to reveal their true situations. The true ages of victims can be learned through self-reporting or medical examinations. Police and social counselors need time to interview and counsel suspected victims. This counseling period, ranging from several days to several weeks, should become a standard practice in countries with significant trafficking problems. Once a person’s status as a victim of trafficking has been determined, long-term care should be available to facilitate rehabilitation.

Children Used for Commercial Sex
U.S. Government policy on children (under the age of 18) used for commercial sex is unambiguous: They must be removed from exploitation as soon as they are found. The use of children in the commercial sex trade is prohibited under both U.S. and international law. There can be no exceptions, no cultural or socio-economic rationalizations that prevent the rescue of children from sexual servitude.

NGO Involvement
NGOs often help law enforcement officers carry out raids and rescues. They can offer psycho-social counseling skills that help identify trafficking victims, usually after they are removed from trafficking situations. NGOs and media representatives can also play a valuable role in holding law enforcement authorities to legal standards of crime prevention and victim care by bearing witness to, and demanding, accountability. NGOs, however, should not play a lead role in a raid or rescue, as they lack authority to perform law enforcement actions. NGOs and the media should avoid any practices that harm the rights of children or others.

Rights of Trafficking Victims
The U.S. Constitution (13th Amendment) prohibits slavery or involuntary servitude in the United States. We seek to ensure this basic standard in our efforts to combat trafficking in persons internationally. In approaching the prospective rescue of trafficking victims through law enforcement operations ("raids"), the rights of victims are paramount. Efforts should be made to minimize the number of non-trafficking victims affected by raids and rescues, but this must not preclude efforts to free every victim, who by definition, is in clear and present danger of physical harm. There should be no safety zone in which traffickers can abuse their victims without fear of law enforcement action.

VI. Country Narratives -- Countries Q through Z

SERBIA AND MONTENEGRO (TIER 2)

The union of Serbia and Montenegro (SaM) is a source, transit, and destination country for women and girls trafficked within the country and transnationally for the purpose of sexual exploitation. Victims identified in Serbia and Montenegro in 2005 came from SaM, Moldova, Ukraine, Russia, Romania, Bulgaria, and Croatia. Victims trafficked from or through the union were often trafficked through Croatia, then on to Western Europe. Roma children were trafficked internally for forced begging. IOM reported a growing trend in internal trafficking involving both Serbian and Montenegrin victims; a number of these cases involved repeated exploitation of the victims. An estimated 30-50 percent of females in prostitution in Montenegro are victims of trafficking; of that number, one-half are children.

The Governments of constituent republics Serbia and Montenegro, to which most authority has devolved, do not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, they are making significant efforts to do so. The two republics do not share counter-trafficking institutions, but conduct joint counter-trafficking activities on an ad hoc basis; this Report provides a separate analysis for each. Montenegro made tangible strides in prosecution and protection; Serbia increased efforts to protect victim witnesses, but law enforcement efforts remained weak. Both republics failed to take action against public officials complicit in trafficking. The Tier 2 designation is based on the weighted aggregate for both republics which, due to the significant efforts made by Montenegro, showed evidence of increasing efforts in 2005.

The Government of the Republic of Serbia made some modest, but unbalanced progress in its law enforcement response and victim protection in 2005. During the reporting period, a few major trafficking cases proceeded quickly; however, others languished in Serbian courts. The government issued a higher number of humanitarian visas for trafficking victims and began implementing a new witness protection law. Traffickers continue to receive relatively light punishment, but maximum sentencing improved to six-to-eight years in some cases. The government should institutionalize a referral mechanism to continue the increase in identification and protection for trafficking victims in Serbia. It should ensure its witness protection law is fully applied, to prevent re-traumatizing trafficking victims who are willing to assist law enforcement and testify against their traffickers. The government should continue to investigate and prosecute allegations of trafficking-related corruption and continue to take steps to improve the adjudication of trafficking cases.

The Republic of Montenegro made concrete progress in its overall anti-trafficking efforts in 2005. It increased its trafficking convictions, referred more victims for assistance and protection, and increased resources to assist and protect victims. Traffickers in Montenegro also continue to receive relatively light punishment. The government should institutionalize a referral mechanism to increase identification and protection for trafficking victims in Montenegro and ensure consistent funding for trafficking shelters. It should ensure its witness protection law is fully applied to prevent further harm to trafficking victims who are willing to assist law enforcement and testify against their traffickers. Some traffickers continued to escape official attention due to trafficking-related corruption. The government must vigorously address and prosecute trafficking-related complicity.

THE REPUBLIC OF SERBIA

Prosecution
A new criminal code for Serbia was adopted in July 2005 and became effective on January 1, 2006. It differentiates between trafficking and smuggling and covers all forms of trafficking. In 2005, the Serbian Government investigated 15 cases of trafficking, indicted 34 individuals for trafficking, and convicted 15 traffickers, a decrease from 25 convictions during the previous year. Sentences ranged from two to eight years' imprisonment. Most traffickers, however, are released after serving half of their sentences, following standard practice for all convicted criminals. In March 2006, the Serbian Supreme Court upheld an appeal of a 2004 Belgrade District Court conviction of the "Zarubica" case involving trafficking of women and girls from Moldova. The Supreme Court also increased the prison sentence from 3.5 to 4.5 years. These defendants, however, following standard judicial practice, remain on release, with no date yet set for serving actual imprisonment. Extensive police and border guard training yielded some significant results in 2005; police successfully interdicted two groups of traffickers at a border crossing in February 2006, one involving an international group of Serbians, Ukrainians, and Moldovans attempting to traffic Ukrainian girls into Serbia. There were no reports of trafficking-related corruption; however, there were allegations from one NGO of police complicity in a prostitution ring in Novi Pazar. Local officials from Novi Pazar have not responded to information requests from the NGO about these allegations.

Protection
The police and Agency for the Coordination of Protection to Victims of Trafficking worked together with NGOs to identify and refer 44 victims in 2005. All victims are provided shelter, medical and psychological services, and reintegration assistance; while NGOs provided most of these services, the government funded the salaries for workers in one shelter. The government increased the number of residence permits for victims of trafficking, approving 13 in 2005. The government amended a law to provide free medical services to trafficking victims in 2005; education of service providers is ongoing, as some NGOs reported cases of local hospitals refusing to provide services to victims. In January 2006, Serbia adopted a witness protection law applicable to victims of trafficking and implemented a victim witness protection unit. There were some reports of victims being poorly treated in courts outside Belgrade. Courts often require victims to testify against their traffickers repeatedly for criminal and civil proceedings, creating unnecessary trauma and travel costs. The government mandated that all municipalities establish a response team consisting of one police officer and one social welfare worker to provide assistance to victims; only a few local teams were active and functional in 2005, others failed to be responsive or have yet to be designated. Although Serbian police are responsible for the initial identification of trafficking victims, five victims were inappropriately detained, one of whom was deported in 2005. The police subsequently identified them as victims and transferred the four remaining victims to a shelter.

Prevention
The government’s anti-trafficking prevention activities remained nascent in 2005; NGOs continued to organize and fund the majority of Serbia’s public information campaigns. NGOs participate in the government’s anti-trafficking team and subgroups; however, the national team met only periodically throughout the reporting period and one subgroup did not meet at all. In 2005, the National Council developed and implemented a National Action Plan in consultation with NGOs. The National Council drafted an anti-trafficking strategy for 2006-2009 and submitted it to the Serbian Government for approval; the Prime Minister’s office has yet to approve the strategy, but elements of the Action Plan, consistent with the proposed strategy, continue to be implemented. NGOs distributed anti-trafficking awareness pamphlets and posters to Serbian youth to warn them about becoming victims of trafficking. Consular officers sought to prevent trafficking into Serbia by refusing over 4,000 visa applications from known countries of origin.

THE REPUBLIC OF MONTENEGRO

Prosecution
The Government of the Republic of Montenegro improved its law enforcement response to trafficking and increased its investigations and convictions of traffickers during the reporting period. In 2005, the government issued five indictments against seven individuals, initiated 14 investigations of trafficking, and convicted six traffickers in three cases. Sentences ranged from six months to five years, and all convicted traffickers are currently serving their sentences. The government continued to provide training to police, prosecutors, judges, and other officials on how to recognize, investigate, and prosecute trafficking. In 2005, in cooperation with Ukrainian officials, the government convicted and sentenced four traffickers to a total of 14 years for trafficking Ukrainian victims to Montenegro for labor exploitation. There were reports that some police and customs officials facilitated trafficking and corrupt officers provided security to commercial sex establishments in 2005.

Protection
The Government of Montenegro demonstrated increased efforts to protect and assist trafficking victims in 2005. It signed a memorandum of cooperation with NGOs to reinforce cooperation to protect and assist trafficking victims; police referred 25 victims to NGOs under the memorandum. In 2005, the government issued formal guidance on the issuance of temporary residence permits to victims of trafficking. Occasionally, police pressured victims to file formal police reports in order to qualify for shelter residency. In January 2006, the Montenegrin government took over funding for a trafficking shelter in Podgoricia, which reported housing 28 victims in 2005 and five potential victims as of February 2006. The Republic of Montenegro passed a witness protection law applicable to trafficking victims in 2004, but it has yet to apply it to protect a trafficking victim. Reportedly, border police screen for trafficking victims and informally monitor the border for evidence of trafficking; however, the government has yet to establish a formal referral mechanism to ensure victims are consistently and accurately identified and referred to NGO shelters. IOM reported that on rare occasions some potential trafficking victims were prematurely deported.

Prevention
In 2005, the Montenegrin Government, in cooperation with one NGO, organized workshops in many high schools and elementary schools to raise awareness and ways to recognize the potential risks of trafficking. The office of the national coordinator required monthly anti-trafficking progress reports from all relevant state agencies and the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare organized a seminar on trafficking in children. In 2005, the government updated its 2003 National Anti-Trafficking Strategy and various ministries adopted tailored action plans as required by the strategy.

KOSOVO

Kosovo, while technically a part of Serbia and Montenegro, continued to be administered under the authority of the United Nations Interim Administrative Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) in accordance with UN Security Council Resolution 1244 (1999). Since June 1999, UNMIK has provided transitional administration for Kosovo, and retains ultimate authority over anti-trafficking roles such as police and justice, but is slowly transferring capacity to local institutions. UNMIK is aware of the trafficking problem in Kosovo and continued to conduct anti-trafficking efforts with the OSCE, the Provisional Institutions of Self-Government (PISG), and local and international NGOs. Responsibility for social support to victims of trafficking is shared by UNMIK, PISG, and international organizations.

Kosovo is a source, transit, and destination point for women and children trafficked for sexual exploitation. Some involuntary domestic servitude and forced labor occurs. Internal trafficking continued to grow into a more serious problem. Over 80 percent of identified victims assisted were minors. IOM reported 64 percent of victims from Kosovo assisted in 2005 were internally trafficked, 15 percent were trafficked into Macedonia, with 13 percent trafficked into Albania and Italy. UNMIK’s Trafficking in Human Beings Unit (THBS) reported the foreign victims it assisted were trafficked mainly from Moldova, Albania, and Bulgaria. A growing number of Albanian and Kosovar victims were re-trafficked in Kosovo in 2005. The commercial sex trade continued to shift more underground and become increasingly clandestine in Kosovo, and traffickers increasingly use financial incentives to encourage victims to refuse assistance.

Prosecution
There continued to be a significant gap between the number of police raids and arrests in 2005; the THBS reported that traffickers are often tipped off to its operations. The THBS carried out 2,000 raids during the reporting period, but arrested only 33 suspects. In 2005, the THBS conducted 45 searches of private residences for trafficking victims. The THBS identified 49 victims, assisted 38, and repatriated 14. In July, three Albanian citizens were convicted of trafficking and sentenced to 10 and 12 years. In November a UNHCR official was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for exploitation of a minor. The majority of sentences for traffickers ranged from one to three years. Weak sentencing for convicted traffickers continued to be a significant obstacle, due to corruption and a cultural misperception of the key differences between trafficking and smuggling and force and consent. Prosecutors reportedly do not seek the strongest charges for traffickers due to misperception, lack of training and collusion with traffickers.

Protection
Investigation and prosecution continued to be hampered by a lack of adequate witness protection in 2005. Prosecutors continued to request the victim testify in the presence of their traffickers, although the law stipulated otherwise. In 2005, a consortium of local and international actors involved in anti-trafficking (the international and local police services, victim advocates, the OSCE, and local NGOs) introduced a standard operating procedure (SOP) to improve the previous duplicative and inefficient process of victim assistance and referral. Under the SOP, identified victims are referred by the THBS to one of 23 victim advocates across Kosovo who provide direct assistance to victims.

Prevention
In May 2005, the PISG published an action plan to consolidate all relevant anti-trafficking actors and actions under one framework. IOM and UNMIK led several anti-trafficking awareness campaigns in 2005, one of which targeted potential clients in the sex industry and one to increase victim assistance, including opening an anonymous hotline for victims and vulnerable groups. The Ministry of Education, in collaboration with an NGO, continued to be involved in awareness campaigns in schools.

IZVEŠTAJ O TRGOVINI LJUDIMA

Objavila Kancelarija za nadzor i borbu protiv trgovine ljudima

5. juni 2006.

Pismo državnog sekretara Kondolize Rajs

Dragi čitaoci,

Pokret za ukidanje trgovine ljudima predstavlja više od zaštite ljudskih prava – to je pitanje globalne bezbednosti.

Strategija za nacionalnu bezbednost predsednika Buša reafirmisala je naš stav o promociji demokratije i ljudskih prava kao najdelotvornijoj dugoročnoj strategiji za ostvarivanje stabilnosti. Ciljevi ove strategije za okončanje ugnjetavanja, širenje slobode i promociju ljudskog dostojanstva, podrazumevaju i našu obavezu da se zaustavi trgovina ljudima: „Trgovina ljudima je vid modernog ropstva, a mi nastojimo da ga potpuno ukinemo. Budući naraštaji neće oprostiti onima koji ovo budu ignorisali.”

Trgovci ljudima napadaju najugroženije i ostvaruju ekonomski profit na nevinim žrtvama. Napori Stejt departmenta da se ovo zlo okonča primer su transformacione diplomatije. U saradnji sa međunarodnim partnerima, obezbeđujemo slobodu eksploatisanima i pozivamo vlade da budu efikasne i odgovorne u krivičnom gonjenju eksploatatora.

Pokret za ukidanje trgovine ljudima nastavlja da jača zahvaljujući vođstvu američkog predsednika, posvećenosti Kongresa i podršci mnogobrojnih verskih, lokalnih, ženskih organizacija i grupa za ljudska prava, kao i pojedinaca. Hvala vam što učestvujete u ovom pokretu u ime najugroženijih građana sveta.

Kondoliza Rajs

I. UVOD

Nepal/Indija: Rinu je iz Nepala u Indiju dovela tetka po majci koja je dvanaestogodišnju devojčicu, ubrzo po dolasku, oterala u bordel u Nju Delhiju. Vlasnik bordela ju je svakodnevno prisiljavao na seksualne odnose sa mnogim klijentima. Rina nije mogla da pobegne pošto ne govori Hindu i nije imala kome da se obrati. Često je viđala da policajci uzimaju novac od vlasnikâ bordela za svaku novodovedenu devojčicu. Vlasnik bordela je Rinu i druge devojčice podučio da svakome ko ih pita kažu da imaju dvadeset pet godina i da su dobrovoljno u bordelu. Rina je pobegla nakon dve godine i sada rešila da život posveti drugim žrtvama trgovine ljudima kojima je neophodna pomoć pri bekstvu.

Izveštaj o trgovini ljudima za 2006. godinu: Namena

Stejt department je po zakonu obavezan da svake godine Kongresu Sjedinjenih Država podnese izveštaj o naporima stranih vlada usmerenim na ukidanje teških oblika trgovine ljudima. Ovaj izveštaj je šesti godišnji izveštaj o trgovin