SECURITY COUNCIL ARRIA FORMULA MEETING

Implications of Human Trafficking for International Peace and Security

Good morning. At the outset I would like to thank UNODC and the UK Mission to the United Nations for proving me the opportunity to talk about an issue which concerns us all-human trafficking and modern-day slavery. Human trafficking is the flip side of globalisation. Just as business has become transnational, so has organized crime. The trafficking of human beings, run by organized criminal networks, is now considered the third largest illegal trade after drugs and arms. It crosses borders and countries. It claims new victims every day.

The UN estimates that more that 2 million girls, boys, women and men are trapped in slave-like situations all over the world-the direct result of organized human trafficking. These numbers are just the tip of the ice-berg-they are based on testimonials of those who are documented-those who are victims and survivors who now have a voice. Hundreds of thousands of victims are invisible –kept in captivity and have no access to any justice system whatever.

On the other hand the perpetrators of this crime-the profiteers and buyers-that constitutes the Demand for human trafficking-are invisible and work with impunity. They have elaborate networks-in this case known as supply chains of people-from recruiter, to the transporter, to the smuggler, to the agent and middleman, to the factory contractor or overseer, to the brothel manager, to the money lender and to owners of the trafficked people and the industries which profit off the trafficked people.

This business is dominated by huge cash transactions. There is an overlap between those trafficking in people and those trafficking in drugs, arms and terrorism. Often the criminal gangs use the same infrastructure and human resources. Cash from one business is transferred to another with no trail. Human Trafficking provides easy access to money for those dealing with arms, drugs or terror. It allows for money-laundering and fuels a black market economy thus undermining the economic security of states. At the same time it undermines the individual security of citizens by putting them at risk to kidnapping, sale, purchase, rape and extreme violence. It deprives countries of productive work forces by putting its youth in captivity. It encourages the subversion of labour laws by providing cheap labour at discount rates which can be exploited mercilessly and kept in slave-like situations.

It undermines the economic, political and civil security of individual citizens and states both internally and externally. States that turn a blind eye to the trafficking of its people are caught in a vicious cycle where organized criminal networks get further entrenched and human trafficking begins to seem an insurmountable and overwhelming problem. Criminal justice systems get weakened as apathy or indifference to the problem grows.

As money and human resources shift to the hands of organized crime gangs the civil security of states in undermined. Borders are weakened as traffickers keep looking for shifting source and destination areas to beat crime systems in any one country. Smuggling and forced migration become part of the methods of trafficking.

The social fabric of each country is disrupted and a new civil life emerges where trafficked women in prostitution or domestic servitude send money home to idle men in villages who cannot nurture children but spend time gambling, drinking or pimping.

Why is this possible in a world which is increasing modern and democratic? Why have new forms of slavery emerged? Where do the solutions lie to combat it? The answers lie with the victims and survivors of human trafficking. They know where the problem is and where the solutions lie.

I am here to speak on behalf of victims and survivors of human trafficking. I represent an organization from India called Apne Aap Women Worldwide which has a membership of over a thousand trafficked human beings. They are women and children trapped in prostitution. They were kidnapped, sold, coerced, tricked or forced into situations of exploitation. Some were as young as seven. They have been kept in small locked rooms and raped repeatedly. Most die by the time they are thirty or thirty five. They never had a past and they have no future. They live in absolute terror.

They increasingly ask that the problem be acknowledged. They want their exploitation to be recognized as a crime. They want states to admit that they are citizens of the state whose human rights have been violated. They want protection both their own state and the global community to provide them protection. Their fist demand is visibility.

Their second demand is relief. They want immediate relief from the violence, trauma and sever exploitation that they were subjected to. They want both the process of human trafficking to be tackled as well as its outcomes, which include prostitution, domestic servitude, early marriage, child labour, bonded labour, organ trade, cheap labour, and pornography. In this context they say that border management is not the answer to trafficking-but a range of comprehensive interventions from prevention, to protection to prosecution is an effective response to countering trafficking. They want measures to counter trafficking to put their human rights at the centre.

Their third demand is accountability. They want those responsible for trafficking to be punished and stopped. They want interventions to focus on the responsibility of those who buy trafficked people such as buyers of prostituted sex and those “entrepreneurs” (traffickers, procurers, pimps, brothel owners, and managers, owners of plantations and factories and money lenders) who make a profit off trading in women and girls, boys and men.

So far a large number of trafficking interventions have focused on the victim through rescue and post rescue care. While this has provided much-needed relief to victims and survivors, it has not made a dent in the trafficking industry. According to a study by the National Human Rights Commission of India, most traffickers state that they identify the demand areas before indulging in trafficking to ensure ‘prompt delivery.

Demand for trafficked people –from end-users to those who make a profit of the trade has become the most immediate cause for the expansion of the trafficking industry. Providing services and instituting preventive mechanisms among those at risk to trafficking has provided protection to pockets of vulnerable people but not detracted the traffickers. According to the same National Human Rights Commission Study 82.5% of traffickers stated that they supply women/ children to brothels on demand. When increased vigilance and new laws prevented traffickers from sourcing women and children from Nepal to Mumbai and Kolkata, they simply shifted their area of operations to Bihar, West Bengal, the hill states of the northeast and Jharkhand in India because a demand for trafficked women and children continued to exist.

Therefore, it is imperative to address the Demand for Human Trafficking.  An increase in convictions against traffickers and buyers will serve to make this trade untenable. Countries have to strengthen their law-enforcement response to trafficking and work across borders to tackle the organized nature of the crime bringing traffickers to book, confiscating the illegal assets created out of trafficking, making the traffickers compensate for the damages and penalizing them. All act as a deterrent to traffickers and buyers and restores a sense of justice to the survivor.

Countries and UN agencies can work together to address human trafficking and reestablish rule of law. An example is the collaboration between UNODC, the Government of India and some NGOs, through training on trafficking has been provided to police officers. As a direct result of training of police officers, a trafficker was caught, prosecuted and now stands convicted.

If the numbers of convictions go up, the costs of operations of human trafficking will become untenable and the business models of traffickers will be disrupted. This will be the best way of countering trafficking.

Addressing the demand for human trafficking, use of the law and its full implementation can only be done by states individually and in collaboration bi-laterally and multilaterally. It is urgent that the UN and its members take the leadership on this.

It requires collaboration at all levels between policy –makers, civil society, parliamentarians, law enforcement and judiciary within a country, and between different governments across countries. It require UN bodies to engage at all levels from providing prevention in high-risk or trafficking prone areas to protection of the trafficked and prosecution of the traffickers and buyers. It requires the UN to provide a special focus in conflict-prone areas where law-enforcement is weak or has broken down. It requires strict enforcement of the SG’s bulletin among its own staff. Then and only then can we confront this 21st centrury slavery.

As Sigma Huda,the United Nations Special Rapporteur On Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children says, “Demand created by users is not the only factor that drives the sex-trafficking market. However, it is the factor which has received the least attention and creative thought in anti-trafficking initiatives”.

Today Ms Huda has been arrested and is unable to travel to Geneva to present her report on the status of trafficking in the world. This is a big blow to the anti-trafficking movement. I urge member states to wield their influence to ensure her travel to Geneva to fulfill her obligations to the UN. We need to work on all fronts to re-establish the rule of law and provide protection to the  citizens of the world today