Modern form of slavery is without shackles!
Global
Research, April 15, 2014
Steve McQueen, director of this year’s
Oscar winner for best film “12 Years A Slave,” mentioned in his acceptance
speech last month that 21
million people are
living in slavery today. That quoted figure comes from the 2012 report issued
by the United Nation’s International Labor Organization (ILO) that has been
attempting to gather international data for over a decade now. In the
Asia-Pacific region where most of the world’s forced laborers come from at 56%,
an estimated 11.7 million people, followed by Africa at 18% or 3.7 million
people live in bondage. Considering that at the peak of America’s slavery prior
to the Civil War that ultimately declared it illegal, the total was four
million people,
fathoming that over five times that number are currently suffering in slavery
here in the twenty-first century, casts some serious doubts on whether us
humans are evolving as a species at all.
The following statistics come from the 2012
ILF report. The global economic
meltdown in recent years has only given rise to conditions ripe for escalation
of modern slavery. A total of 18.7 million people or 90% become forced laborers
in the private sector of individual homes or private enterprise as opposed to
the 10% or 2.2 million people that suffer state-imposed forms of forced labor.
Of those 18.7 million forced to work in private settings, 4.5 million (or 22%)
are forced into sexual exploitation while 14.2 million (or 68%) are victims of
forced labor such as in agriculture, domestic work, construction or
manufacturing.
The most concentrated area of forced labor
victimization is in central and southeastern Europe at 4.2 humans out of 1000
followed by 4 out of 1000 in Africa.
Slavery is lowest in developed nations and the European
Union at 1.5 per 1000 people. The world average is 3 people in every 1000 are
forced into labor.
An appalling 26% of all modern slaves or
5.5 million are children under 18, the majority underage girls forced into
child prostitution and pornography. Other children are forced into working in
sweat shops while young boys 12 and older are frequently recruited and forced
to become child soldiers. The majority at 56% (11.8 million) of the world‘s
forced laborers remain in their home country. As an example India has been
identified as a nation where many of its own poor citizens are forced into
slave labor. However, of the 44% (9.1 million) that are forced into labor
across borders, the vast majority being women and children are sold into the
highly profitable sex trafficking trade often operated by organized crime
rings.
Though slaves around the world today may
not be legally beaten, shackled or sold as property like African American
slaves suffered for over two centuries between 1619-1865, an estimated 32
billion dollars is
generated annually in an underground industry classified as a type of slavery –
human trafficking. Many sources estimate profits far greater than the United
Nations total of 32 billion. Only guns and drugs are more lucrative criminal
enterprises.
According to the UN,
transporting individuals from their homes to another location against their
will into involuntary servitude or forced labor involves at least 2.5 million
human trafficking victims worldwide at any given time. Seventy nine percent of
victims of the human trafficking trade fall into the slavery category of
sexually abused women and underage children. Female victims are both women and
girls snatched up from their only familiar environment, forcibly taken across
borders, and there all alone in a strange land surrounded by cruel, depraved
strangers speaking in foreign tongues, they are forced into prostitution
although some become domestic work as nannies, maids, cooks or factory workers.
Fifteen percent of human trafficking victims are men most often forced into
conditions of hard labor.
Because many nations neither have the will
nor the formal mechanism in place to assess how many humans are slaves, actual
numbers have been difficult to attain. Plus due to the common perception of
slavery being so stigmatized with shame, along with fear of potential
immigration problems or violent retribution from slave trade perpetrators, many
victims understandably resist going to authorities and reporting this largely
invisible crime against humanity. Some are victims of the Stockholm syndrome
where they actually identify with their enslavers.
Of course the illicit nature of both
slavery as well as prostitution as part of the seedy underbelly of a brutally
violent industry covertly run by organized crime, also acts as a formidable
barrier resulting in severe underreporting and relatively few cases ever being
brought to prosecution. All of these factors have contributed to a growing
international problem that has been slow for organizations of both victim
advocacy as well as national and transnational law enforcement agencies to
effectively come together to tackle its immensity.
Yet since last month’s Oscar winning film
delving into this enormously important subject matter, more recent developments
just in this last week alone are beginning to shine a sliver of light and
modest reason for optimism on this long overlooked and indelible human stain.
Last Thursday the pope many believe comes closest to embodying the spirit of
the most famous saint Francis of Assisi, Pope Francis himself met privately
with four ex-slaves to top off a two-day global conference bringing much needed attention to the blight of
modern slavery. The pope is calling for an orchestrated partnership and two
pronged approach between churches around the world offering spiritual guidance
and compassion to victims and international law enforcement spearheading the
coordinated investigative crackdown necessary to arrest what Francis calls this
“scourge” on humanity from spreading beyond its current worldwide operation.
Police chiefs from the
continents of North and South America, Africa, Asia and Europe were all in
attendance, including countries where the problem of human trafficking has been
most severe – Albania, Brazil, Nigeria and Thailand. It was reported that this
rather weighty topic of global slavery was discussed in the pope’s meeting last
month with President Obama.
This first time conference on slavery in
the twenty-first century comes fresh on the heels of the pope’s
apology to the world for all
the damage his religion has inflicted on the thousands of innocent victims of
sexual abuse perpetrated by pedophile Catholic priests and clergymen through
the ages. In the US alone from 1985 to 2000 an estimated 1,400sexual abuse lawsuits were filed against priests
resulting in billions of dollars in settlements reached. Papal critics and
abuse advocates view the pope’s personal apology as a genuine first big step in
the right direction toward bearing some responsibility for the sins of his
church. But many still await the pope’s specific concrete plan of action to
substantively tackle and begin making further inroads toward resolving this
endemic pandemic he inherited.
Benjamin Skinner wrote in his eye-opening
landmark book A Crime So Monstrous (Free Press, 2008) that “there
are more slaves today than at any point in human history” – six years ago
citing 27 million people living in bondage – a full six million more than ILO’s
latest 2012 count. The estimated variance of numbers is a testimonial to the
enormity of difficulty compiling and accurately tracking slavery’s
pervasiveness in the modern world. It seems highly unlikely that at such an
early stage of still organizing a global commitment toward its eradication that
slavery is actually decreasing in the ensuing years since Skinner’s book was
published. If anything, the human trafficking industry has been expanding both
its area and scope of operations, particularly in east Asia.
Less than a month ago at the Vatican a new
initiative released by multiple faiths represented announced a Memorandum of
Agreement and Joint Statement establishing the Global
Freedom Network designed
to abolish modern slavery and human trafficking by 2020. Its statement on
slavery:
“The physical, economic and sexual exploitation of men,
women and children condemns 30 million people to dehumanization and
degradation. Every day we let this tragic situation continue is a grievous
assault on our common humanity and a shameful affront to the consciences of all
peoples.”
In efforts to educate and inform the
public about modern slavery and human trafficking, a series of ongoing articles
have been covered by such newspapers as the Observer and Guardian, both
announced as UK winners of the Anti-Slavery
Day Media Awards last
week. The Guardian launched a series called “modern day slavery in focus” that
depicts the atrocious conditions of Nepalese
workers in the Middle Eastern
nation Qatar in preparation for the 2022 World Cup.
Similar to the Sochi Olympics, a common
pattern has emerged with construction of massive stadium complexes for major
international sporting events that under pressured deadlines pre-set the stage
for inhumane work conditions with high potential for human trafficking of
forced slave laborers. The Guardian tells the tragic story of a sixteen
year old boy from Nepal attempting
to escape poverty back home arriving in Qatar to work in a cramped forced labor
camp exploited by a trafficking broker that produced a forged passport claiming
the boy was 20. Instead of receiving the promised pay wage, the 16-year old was
forced to sign his life away in indentured servitude but within two months was
dead. Nepal’s foreign employment board estimates that 726 Nepalese migrant
workers died overseas in 2012, marking an 11% increase from the previous year.
More foreign workers abroad especially from Asia are being misled and lured
into this world of exploitation, corruption and deception that increasingly
results in slavery and death.
In a related matter, the UK Parliament is
in the throes of drafting Europe’s first modern anti-slavery bill calling for
lifetime sentences for convicted human traffickers. Debate centers around
simplifying the law to increase the rate of conviction. Last week Oscar winning
director Steve
McQueen weighed in his
criticism calling for the bill to be rewritten so as to not turn victims of
slavery themselves into criminals. A revised reworking is underway.
Even a publicity
stunt was just announced of an April 15th
Guinness record breaking event of a whirlwind 7-city tour across Europe in just
24 hours emphasizing awareness of human trafficking to raise money for the
leading US anti-trafficking policy organization ECPAT-USA. This week also marks
the third annual human trafficking awareness week at Chico
State University in California. Last weekend a bi-national
conference with delegates from
El Paso, Texas and across the border city Juarez held a joint conference on
modern slavery and human trafficking to reduce its occurrence between Mexico
and the US.
It appears that lawmakers and church
faiths alike from the local to international level in conjunction with local,
national and Interpol policing agencies are mobilizing task forces like never
before to generate momentum in addressing the plight of modern slavery. A
number of advocacy organizations in recent years have been fighting to make
this destructive and sinister human rights violation among the worst kind a
global priority and it appears their efforts are finally now just beginning to
pay off. But real progress towards eradicating slavery requires a lot more than
just an ephemeral, “flavor-of-the-week” cause and mindset.
These recent small steps only highlight
humanity’s seminal starting point in the modern era to collectively exercise
the political will to prioritize, fund and coordinate a concerted effective
global effort and campaign over the long haul to ultimately end slavery on this
planet once and for all.
Joachim
Hagopian is
a West Point graduate and former Army officer. His written manuscript based on
his military experience examines leadership and national security issues and
can be consulted at http://www.redredsea.net/westpointhagopian/.
After the military, Joachim earned a masters degree in psychology and became
a licensed therapist working in the mental health field for more than a quarter
century.
Url of this article:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-human-trafficking-a-modern-form-of-slavery/5377853
After the military, Joachim earned a masters degree in psychology and became a licensed therapist working in the mental health field for more than a quarter century.
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