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One day I was playing on the computer when my mother entered and said she was bored. I have a great movie for you two to watch it- said my brother, Its name is Human traffic- he continued. At first I wasnt very interested in watching the movie, so I moved on with my chatting on the computer. While my brother was turning on the movie my mum was trying to convince me to watch the movie with her. I rejected, of course, I had a more interesting thing to do at the moment. The movie started. The first twenty minutes I was looking at the screen from time to time, but then I became so interested that I couldnt move my sight of it. I couldnt believe what I was watching. I couldnt believe that those things are happening in the real world too. I saw so many abused women and children, sexual exploitations, kidnappings, smugglings, threats, blackmailing, fear, torture with one word disaster. Then I stopped and said to myself: But this is just a movie!? But who would make a three and a half hours long movie, without a reason, without a point? Many times I caught myself staring at the attic at late night and thinking about those abused women and children, was that true or just another invented story!? I became very interested in this question, so I started exploring on the internet, watching documentaries, reading brochures and collecting every kind of material that could help me learning more about the human trafficking. I went so deep in this issue that in one point I regretted my curiosity. I lost my confidence in people, my fearlessness in walking down the streets and I started seeing the potential human trafficker in every persons eyes. There are many reasons for my decision of making this research paper exactly about the people trafficking. Firstly, I would like to show that not everything in this world is as pink as it seems, there are a lot of black and grey spots in front of which we mustnt restrict our sights and close our eyes. I would be very happy if every second person in this world comes upon one of the many real stories, wrote by victims of the human trafficking that I have read. The human trafficking is a global issue of great concern. Right now, the largest slave trade in history is taking place around the world. This slavery, called human trafficking, is a hidden evil that affects everyone, but especially women and children. People shouldnt be bought and sold, together we could make a difference and together we can stop the people trafficking.
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People trafficking
The modern day slavery, in other words called trafficking in human beings, means recruitment, transportation, transfer, sheltering or acceptance of persons, by means of threats or use of force or other forms of coercion or kidnapping, deception, cheating or abuse of powers or the condition of helplessness or by giving or taking money or benefit, in order to obtain the consent of a person who is in control of another person, for the purpose of exploitation. As a minimum, the concept of exploitation covers at least the exploitation of other persons by way of prostitution or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced services, slavery or practices resembling slavery, servitude or removal of organs.1 Human Trafficking is a global issue of great concern. The trafficking is widely recognized as a serious human rights violation. It violates the human rights of freedom, job, education, dignity, equality, health and also the most important right, the right to be alive. This issue mostly occurs in poor countries and countries with unequal gender relations. The most commonly, victims of human trafficking are adult women and girls, but there are also cases of men and boys. The main reasons of human trafficking are: sexual exploitation (prostitution), forced labor, false adoptions, forced and false marriages, forced committing crimes (begging, pick pocketing,
drugs trafficking and cybercrime) and the removal of organs.
The trafficking which is happening out of the countrys borders is named trans-national trafficking in human beings, but it does not always involve the illegal crossing of borders. It can also occur within a country, without crossing any national borders. Moreover, in many cases trafficked persons enter a country legally, for example as tourists, spouses, students, domestic workers or au pairs. To get to their victim, traffickers are using force, threats, bullying, compel, kidnapping and many other ways of forcing. The process of trafficking includes recruitment, cheating, transportation, transfer, acceptance, sheltering and hiding. Every single person could become a victim of human trafficking, no one is an exception. The traffickers can be hiding behind companies as: Model agencies, agencies for working in hotels, restaurants, bars, boats and building grounds, dating agencies, tourist agencies and the most in internet agencies.
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The definition emerges from the UN Protocol on the prevention, suppression and punishment of trafficking in human beings-known as Palermo Protocol
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employment
leaving their homes and travelling away. Victims provided are with often false
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travel documents and an organized network is used to transport them to the destination country, where they find themselves forced into sexual slavery and held in inhumane conditions and constant fear. At first the traffickers are nice and polite with the girls, they promise them better paid jobs, better way of living, fulfillment of their dreams, but the true treatment comes with crossing the borders and leaving miles away from home. In addition of the trafficker, some women take their young children with them, so they are also threaten with their detraction or liquidation. The girls are transported in foreign countries by trains, boats, buses, even with large trucks, just like animals, where they could not speak with the local people, they could not understand them and they cant ask for help. They are traveling with false travel documents and the traffickers have their original passports and identity cards. The victims in fear, obey the traffickers orders because they are threaten that if they do not answer to the traffickers will, they will be left alone and without money in those foreign counties and they will be turned into Immigration which will put them in prison and never let them leave and of course they wont ever see their families. The victims are ignoramus and uninformed so they believe that they will end up in prison because they are the ones who are committing a crime. If the Immigration catches them, they will be sent back in their countries. Although trafficking is widely recognised as a serious human rights violation, support for trafficked persons is still inadequate, only a small fraction of trafficked persons is identified, and an even smaller percentage decides to press charges.
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Universal declaration of human rights Kevin Bales, Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy, University of California Press, 1999
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Slavery is not legal anywhere but it happens everywhere! Nowadays there are 27 million slaves in the world. People forced to work without pay, under threat of violence and unable to walk away. Slaves work in fields, brothels, homes, mines, restaurants and anywhere slave owners feed their greed. The average cost of human slave around the world is 90$. Currently, economic instability appears to be the main reason for illegal migration movement throughout the world. Nevertheless, many of the willing migrants undertake the hazardous travel to their destination country with criminal syndicates specialized in people smuggling. These syndicates arrange everything for the migrants, but at a high price. Very often the travelling conditions are inhumane: the migrants are overcrowded in trucks or boats and fatal accidents occur frequently. After their arrival in the destination country, their illegal status puts them at the mercy of their smugglers, which often force the migrants to work for years in the illegal labor market to pay off the debts incurred as a result of their transportation.
The forced labor is quite common in the French, German, Belgian, Portuguese and Spanish colonies in Africa, and, to a lesser degree, in the British colonies (where the inhabitants perform such labor instead of taxation). It also involves people who have been imprisoned without trial in labor reform camps in China and North Korea because of their religious or political beliefs.
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The map above indicates that the primary countries of destination for victims of trafficking are the United States, Italy, Japan, Canada, Australia, and other 'advanced nations.'
In Asia, it takes the form most often of forced sex slavery. In Africa, young children are often kidnapped into rebel armies and given guns to fight in wars they don't understand. Some 15,000 people are trafficked into the US each year, with 50% of those being children. Over 800,000 are trafficked globally each year, with an estimated total of more than 20 million trapped in this underground industry.
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As you can see from this chart the most active countries in trafficking of human beings are the African poor countries, most of the Asian countries, Eastern European countries and South American countries. The most active of all is Russia with a percentage of 11.4. Russia is mostly a country of origin. Usually, girls from some poor villages who have lack of education, are looking for a better job and better life, but instead of it, are becoming victims of human traffickers because of their naivety. But Russia in many cases is a final destination too. Young women in bright miniskirts and high heels line up to sell themselves in the dingy back streets throughout the Russian capital. Moscow's illegal flesh markets are flourishing, with up to 30 women at each pickup point, standing in order of price for the night. Customers light up the lines with their car headlights and are asked to pay between $100 and $700 for a woman. Moscow is witnessing a surge in prostitution, including forced prostitution, as a result of Russia's booming economy.
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Conclusion
No sensible person believes that slavery could happen in the 21st century, far less, on our shores. We couldnt be more wrong! Slave-traffickers around the world have rediscovered how profitable it is to buy and sell people! Each one of the victims could be our mother, father, sister, brother, best friend, neighbor, daughter or son. Beside the fact that we are living in democratic communities and the human rights are more respected than ever, still this business found its own way to exist and increase, day by day. Human trafficking is the modern-day slavery. Trafficking occurs not just in foreign lands but on "the next street over". Human trafficking has emerged as a tragic whiplash of the economic transition that has occurred of the past 12 years in Eastern Europe. The slave-traffickers know how to take advantage of this. "It's the third-largest and fastest-growing crime worldwide (because it combines) high profit and low risk".4 After the illegal sale of drugs and weapons, the most profitable business is the people trafficking. The modern-day slavery is only occurring because we choose to ignore it. Although every federal agency is engaged in addressing the problem of trafficking, the private sector also needs to be involved. The police should work with the travel tour and hospitality industries and the legal community to discourage trafficking and help victims. No matter how difficult this battle is, it is vitally important all countries in the world to keep working together as a team, to battle this merciless criminals. At the same time, we need to create a climate of hope, for their victims. We need to give those victims the idea that their lives are still worth living, without shame, after all the desperation and hardship that theyve been exposed to. We need to form a lot of Transit Centers for Foreigners for sheltering the victims of trafficking in human beings. We need to encourage and protect the victims not to be afraid to turn over the traffickers, which will save a lot of human lives. Perhaps most importantly, we must face the fact, that none of this harm would be possible, if the people-themselves didnt create a demand for it. Lets help to each other, because no one is an exception and every one of us could be a victim of human trafficking one day.
said by Bradley Myles, deputy director of the Polaris Project, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that works to combat human trafficking internationally.
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References
Kevin Bales Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy University of California Press, 1999 PRACTICUM on the combat against trafficking in human beings and illegal migration, made by: IOM International Organization for Migration The movie: Human Trafficking, Director: Christian Duguay, 24 October 2005 (USA) www. gaatw.wordpress.com www.humantraffickingawareness.org www.icmpd.org www.interpol.int www.lastrada.org www.traffickingproject.blogspot.com www.redcross.org.mk www.stophumantraffic.com www.stopthetraffik.org www.squidoo.com www.utrechtlawreview.org www.unodc.org www.coe.int
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