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India among worst ranked countries in tackling human trafficking
India ranks as a Tier II Watch List country -- only one level better than worst-performing Tier III countries such as Saudi Arabia and Zimbabwe -- in the 2010 Trafficking in Persons report (TIP) compiled by the US State Department
The American State Department has published a Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report that measures efforts by countries to fight human trafficking. This years report implies that India ranks among those countries whose governments do not fully comply with the Trafficking Victims Protection Acts (TVPA) minimum standards, but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards.
Additionally, the three following conditions were found in India: first, that the absolute number of victims of severe forms of trafficking was very significant or was significantly increasing; second, that there was a failure to provide evidence of increasing efforts to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons, over the previous year; third, that the determination that India was making significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with minimum standards was based on commitments by India itself to take additional steps over the next year.
Commenting further on India, the TIP report argues that the Indian government did not demonstrate sufficient progress in its law-enforcement, protection, or prevention efforts to address labour trafficking, particularly bonded labour. Therefore, India is placed on the Tier II Watch List for the seventh consecutive year, the report says.
The TIP also notes that there were few criminal convictions of forced labour during the reporting period, and that police raids of brick kilns, rice mills, factories, brothels, and other places of human trafficking were usually prompted by NGO activists, as were efforts to provide rehabilitation and protective services to victims removed from human trafficking.
The definition of trafficking under the TVPA says a person may be a trafficking victim regardless of whether they once consented, participated in a crime as a direct result of being trafficked, were transported into the exploitative situation, or were simply born into a state of servitude. The TIP report adds that at the heart of this phenomenon are the myriad forms of enslavement including forced labour, sex trafficking, bonded labour, debt bondage among migrant labourers, involuntary domestic servitude, forced child labour, child soldiers, and child sex trafficking.
While most of South Asia ranks along with India as Tier II Watch List countries, Pakistan is notably ranked as Tier II -- one level better than India. Thus, while the Pakistan government did not fully comply with the TVPAs minimum standards, it was making significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with those standards, with none of the three additional conditions found in India. Most developed countries, even some developing countries such as Colombia and Nigeria, were ranked as Tier I countries in the TIP report, that is, countries whose governments fully complied with the TVPAs minimum standards.
Further, national and state government anti-trafficking infrastructure, and implementation of the Bonded Labour (System) Abolition Act (BLSA) remained weak, the report observes, and though the number of government shelters increased, some continued to be of poor quality. Public officials complicity in trafficking remains a major problem, the report adds.
The report estimates that more than 12 million people are trafficked globally every year, but hails the growing determination in most parts of the world to combat modern-day slavery through stepped-up law-enforcement and legislative action.
A not-so-positive trend in this years report is the feminisation of trafficking, with more women being involuntarily placed in domestic or maid work, either in their home countries or abroad. In other cases -- as in a documented case in the United Arab Emirates -- women are hoodwinked into accepting what they are told will be maids jobs in a foreign country, only to find themselves prostituted out.
Cases of large-scale trafficking of men have fallen off, not so much as a result of better enforcement against the practice but because the global recession has curtailed the building boom in the Middle East and other regions. Fewer large development and infrastructure projects mean less need for armies of manual labourers.
Source: The Hindu, June 16, 2010
InfoChange India News & Features development news India - India among worst ranked countries in tackling human trafficking
India ranks as a Tier II Watch List country -- only one level better than worst-performing Tier III countries such as Saudi Arabia and Zimbabwe -- in the 2010 Trafficking in Persons report (TIP) compiled by the US State Department
The American State Department has published a Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report that measures efforts by countries to fight human trafficking. This years report implies that India ranks among those countries whose governments do not fully comply with the Trafficking Victims Protection Acts (TVPA) minimum standards, but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards.
Additionally, the three following conditions were found in India: first, that the absolute number of victims of severe forms of trafficking was very significant or was significantly increasing; second, that there was a failure to provide evidence of increasing efforts to combat severe forms of trafficking in persons, over the previous year; third, that the determination that India was making significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with minimum standards was based on commitments by India itself to take additional steps over the next year.
Commenting further on India, the TIP report argues that the Indian government did not demonstrate sufficient progress in its law-enforcement, protection, or prevention efforts to address labour trafficking, particularly bonded labour. Therefore, India is placed on the Tier II Watch List for the seventh consecutive year, the report says.
The TIP also notes that there were few criminal convictions of forced labour during the reporting period, and that police raids of brick kilns, rice mills, factories, brothels, and other places of human trafficking were usually prompted by NGO activists, as were efforts to provide rehabilitation and protective services to victims removed from human trafficking.
The definition of trafficking under the TVPA says a person may be a trafficking victim regardless of whether they once consented, participated in a crime as a direct result of being trafficked, were transported into the exploitative situation, or were simply born into a state of servitude. The TIP report adds that at the heart of this phenomenon are the myriad forms of enslavement including forced labour, sex trafficking, bonded labour, debt bondage among migrant labourers, involuntary domestic servitude, forced child labour, child soldiers, and child sex trafficking.
While most of South Asia ranks along with India as Tier II Watch List countries, Pakistan is notably ranked as Tier II -- one level better than India. Thus, while the Pakistan government did not fully comply with the TVPAs minimum standards, it was making significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with those standards, with none of the three additional conditions found in India. Most developed countries, even some developing countries such as Colombia and Nigeria, were ranked as Tier I countries in the TIP report, that is, countries whose governments fully complied with the TVPAs minimum standards.
Further, national and state government anti-trafficking infrastructure, and implementation of the Bonded Labour (System) Abolition Act (BLSA) remained weak, the report observes, and though the number of government shelters increased, some continued to be of poor quality. Public officials complicity in trafficking remains a major problem, the report adds.
The report estimates that more than 12 million people are trafficked globally every year, but hails the growing determination in most parts of the world to combat modern-day slavery through stepped-up law-enforcement and legislative action.
A not-so-positive trend in this years report is the feminisation of trafficking, with more women being involuntarily placed in domestic or maid work, either in their home countries or abroad. In other cases -- as in a documented case in the United Arab Emirates -- women are hoodwinked into accepting what they are told will be maids jobs in a foreign country, only to find themselves prostituted out.
Cases of large-scale trafficking of men have fallen off, not so much as a result of better enforcement against the practice but because the global recession has curtailed the building boom in the Middle East and other regions. Fewer large development and infrastructure projects mean less need for armies of manual labourers.
Source: The Hindu, June 16, 2010
InfoChange India News & Features development news India - India among worst ranked countries in tackling human trafficking
