Trafficking of women and children in Southeast Asia.

AuthorFlamm, Mikel
PositionExploited, Not Educated

It is estimated that more than two million people worldwide are being trafficked each year, the majority of whom are women and children. Within the Southeast Asian region alone, over 225,000 are transported across borders, according to United States State Department statistics.

Trafficking was more often associated with the illegal trade of goods across borders, namely contraband and particularly drugs. However, over the past ten years this trade has taken a giant leap forward to include the trafficking of human beings, mainly women and children. Often tricked into believing they will be given legitimate work, these people soon find themselves caught in a web of exploitation and deceit, ending up in the sex trade, which generates funds that exceed the amount made in the drug trade, estimated at between $6 billion and $7 billion per year.

Although there are no hard accurate numbers, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) estimates that in the past thirty years trafficking of women and children in Asia for sexual exploitation has victimized over 30 million people. These victims usually come from poor families, lured into promises of a better life for themselves and their families. They might be offered a job or an education, while others are kidnapped and sold by friends and family members for profit. It is a ruthless business where money overpowers basic human rights.

Traffickers often use local people in a community or village to find young women and children, and target families who are poor and vulnerable. In some situations, family members sell children to middlemen or traffickers. The parents are deceived into believing their children will get a good job or an education, and out of respect for their parents they will do as they are told. However, most of the time they end up in a brothel or other business where they are forced to have sex with clientele.

Christa Crawford, an American lawyer currently working on a special project for the United Nations that is aimed at providing Governments in the region with ways to strengthen and develop anti-trafficking legislation, said: "One of the major problems with making arrests is that people do not want to be used as witnesses against the agents or gangs involved in trafficking. Since there are no witness protection programmes here, there is always the fear factor of being harmed later on. Consequently, few cases ever reach a conviction. In the United States, there is the Trafficking and...

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