Human Traffiking and migrant smuggling
Sexual exploitation
Sexual exploitation includes rape, prostitution, sexual photography, subjection to pornography or witnessing sexual acts and sexual assault or sexual acts to which the adult has not consented or was pressured into consenting.
Source: https://www.sunderland.gov.uk/article/12180/Sexual-exploitation
Organ removal
Organ trafficking is the recruitment, transport, transfer, harbouring, or receipt of living or deceased persons or their organs by means of the 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 to, or the receiving by, a third party of payments or benefits to achieve the transfer of control over the potential donor, for the purpose of exploitation by the removal of organs for transplantation.
Source: https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/2010/egm-vienna-organ-trafficking.html
Forced labour
Forced labor is most like historic American slavery: coerced, often physically and without pay. All other categories of slavery are a subset of forced labor and can include domestic servitude, child labor, bonded labor and forced sex.
Source: http://www.endslaverynow.org/learn/slavery-today/forced-labor
Forced begging
Forced begging is a form of exploitation that can result in human trafficking. Some beggars are being forced to do so by others. They have to hand over all or most of their earnings to the person who is forcing them to beg. People can be beaten, threatened with violence or psychologically pressured into begging. Children can be forced to beg by their parents, siblings, guardians, or by a third party, including criminal gangs, distant relatives, neighbours or family friends.
Source: https://iomx.org/en/beg/
Debt bondage
Debt bondage and peonage, happens when people give themselves into slavery as security against a loan or when they inherit a debt from a relative. It can be made to look like an employment agreement but one where the worker starts with a debt to repay – usually in brutal conditions – only to find that repayment of the loan is impossible. Then, their enslavement becomes permanent.
Source: http://www.endslaverynow.org/learn/slavery-today/bonded-labor
Child soldiers
Boys and girls suffer extensive forms of exploitation and abuse that are not fully captured by that term. Warring parties use children not only as fighters, but as scouts, cooks, porters, guards, messengers and more. Many, especially girls, are also subjected to gender-based violence.
Source: https://www.unicef.org/protection/children-recruited-by-armed-forces
Domestic servitude
Domestic servitude is the seemingly normal practice of live-in help that is used as cover for the exploitation and control of someone, usually from another country. It is a form of forced labor, but it also warrants its own category of slavery because of the unique contexts and challenges it presents.
Source: http://www.endslaverynow.org/learn/slavery-today/domestic-servitude
Forced marriage
Forced marriage is an institution or practice where individuals don’t have the option to refuse or are promised and married to another by their parents, guardians, relatives or other people and groups.
Source: http://www.endslaverynow.org/learn/slavery-today/forced-marriage
Human trafficking is the trade of humans for forced labor, sexual slavery, or commercial sexual exploitation for the trafficker or others. This may encompass providing a spouse in the context of forced marriage or the extraction of organs or tissues, including for surrogacy and ovary removal. Human trafficking can occur within a country or trans-nationally. Human trafficking is a crime against the person because of violating the victim’s rights of movement through coercion and commercial exploitation. Human trafficking is the trade in people, especially women and children, and does not necessarily involve the person’s movement from one place to another.
People smuggling (also called human smuggling and migrant smuggling) is a related practice characterized by the consent of the smuggled person. Smuggling situations can descend into human trafficking through coercion and exploitation. Trafficked people are held against their will through acts of coercion and forced to work for or provide services to the trafficker or others.
According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), forced labor alone (one component of human trafficking) generates an estimated $150 billion in profits per annum as of 2014. In 2012, the ILO estimated that 21 million victims are trapped in modern-day slavery. Of these, 14.2 million (68%) were exploited for labor, 4.5 million (22%) were sexually exploited, and 2.2 million (10%) were exploited in state-imposed forced labor. The International Labor Organization has reported that child workers, minorities, and irregular migrants are at considerable risk of more extreme forms of exploitation. Statistics show that over half of the world’s 215 million young workers are observed to be in hazardous sectors, including forced sex work and forced street begging. Ethnic minorities and highly marginalized groups are estimated to work in some of the most exploitative and damaging sectors, such as leather tanning, mining, and stone quarry work.
Human trafficking is the third-largest crime industry in the world, behind drug dealing and arms trafficking, and is the fastest-growing activity of trans-national criminal organizations.
Human trafficking is condemned as a violation of human rights by international conventions. In addition, human trafficking is subject to a directive in the European Union. According to the 2018 and 2019 editions of the annual Trafficking in Persons Reports issued by the U.S. State Department, Belarus, Iran, Russia, and Turkmenistan remain among the worst countries to protect human trafficking and forced labor.
Although to protect and assist human trafficking’s victims with full respect for their rights as established in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Trafficking Protocol had 117 signatories and, as of November 2018, 173 parties.
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) defines human trafficking:
Human trafficking and migrant smuggling are global and widespread crimes that use men, women, and children for profit. The organized networks or individuals behind these lucrative crimes take advantage of people who are vulnerable, desperate, or simply seeking a better life. UNODC strives to eradicate these crimes through the dismantling of the criminal enterprises that trade in people and the conviction of the main perpetrators. Ultimately, our work safeguards people from the abuse, neglect, exploitation, or even death associated with these crimes.
In cooperation with fellow lawyers from all over the world, our office provides FREE legal assistance in all cases of human trafficking.
If you feel that you are exposed to some form of human trafficking, please report your claims here.