Sex trafficking

The 2000 UN Trafficking Protocol defines trafficking as...

The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons by means of threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power, or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour services, slavery or practices similar to slaver, servitude or the removal of organs. [1]

what is sex trafficking? recruiting, harbouring, transporting, receiving

DEBT BONDAGE

43% of the victims of human trafficking are used for forced commercial sexual exploitation among these 98% are women and girls

Sex trafficking also can occur within debt bondage, as women and girls are forced to continue in prostitution through the use of unlawful “debt” purportedly incurred through their transportation, recruitment, or even their crude “sale” – which exploiters insist they must pay off before they can be free.

CHILDREN AND THE COMMERCIAL SEX TRADE

according to Unicef, two million children are subjected to prostitution in the global commercial sex tradeInternational covenants and protocols obligate criminalization of the commercial sexual exploitation of children. The use of children in the commercial sex trade is prohibited under both the Palermo Protocol and U.S. law as well as by legislation in countries around the world. There can be no exceptions and no cultural or socioeconomic rationalizations preventing the rescue of children from sexual servitude.consequences on minors, unwanted pregnancy, psychological trauma, disease, malnutrition, drug addiction

TECHNIQUES OF CONTROL USED BY SEX TRAFFICKERS AND PIMPS

A sophisticated understanding of the realities on the ground is necessary to ensure that sex trafficking victims are not wrongly discounted as consenting adults.

too often, police, prosecutors, judges, and policymakers assume a victim has free will if she has physical ability to walk away

HOW PREVALENT IS TRAFFICKING?

Reliable data collection on the prevalence of trafficking is problematic due to a number of reasons, including:

  1. TRAFFICKING IS UNDERGROUND, HIDDEN AND ILLEGAL
  2. LACK OF CONSISTENT DEFINITIONS AND UNDERSTANDING INTERNATIONALLY
  3. FEW GOVERNMENTS SYSTEMATICALLY COLLATE DATA
  4. HIGHLY POLITICISED TRAFFICKING RELATED POLICIES
  5. AGE ASSESSMENT OF YOUNG PEOPLE CAN BE DIFFICULT
  6. BUT... EVERY YEAR, BETWEEN 700,000 AND 4 MILLION WOMEN AND CHILDREN ARE TRAFFICKED INTO WESTERN EUROPE
  7. WANT TO LEARN MORE? GO TO THE RESOURCES AREA

View Resources

  1. http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/what-is-human-trafficking.html#What_is_Human_Trafficking
  2. Trafficking in Persons Report 2011 - US Department of State http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/2011/164220.htm
  3. Siddharth Kara, 2009, Sex Trafficking: Inside the business of modern slavery
  4. Comic Relief Campaign Prevention Review Interview 9, Western Europe/North America, 2012
  5. Modern Slavery, K. Bales 2009
  6. Daphne Programme Trafficking booklet 2007

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