Canada and the World
Current Events with a Canadian Perspective
Last update
19 November 2010
Human Trafficking
for the Sex Trade
Some of the most vulnerable people
are subjected to human rights abuses
because they are powerless to resist
Women, in many parts of the world, are among the least protected and survive a lowly
status in male-
Trafficking for Prostitution
Women from various countries are forced into the sex trade with promises of fake jobs as waitresses, models, or hostesses.
It’s impossible to know the exact numbers of women who are victims of sex traffickers, but the U.S. government estimates that about 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders every year. Some 80 percent of trafficking victims are female, and up to half are children.
According to one report (San Francisco Chronicle, October 2006), “Women trafficked for the sex industry are predominantly from Southeast Asia, the former Soviet Union, and South America.” The United States is among the top three destination countries, along with Japan, and Australia.
“Typically,” writes Meredith May, “they are locked inside their place of business,
forced to have sex with as many as a dozen men a day. Sometimes victims are forced
to live in the brothel, too, where five or six ‘co-
Sex-
Other major destinations for abducted sex-
An estimated 500,000 women from Central and Eastern Europe are working in prostitution in the European Union alone.
In 2004, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) estimated that 600 to 800 persons are trafficked into Canada annually and that 1,500 to 2,200 more are trafficked through Canada into the United States. In Canada, foreign trafficking for prostitution is estimated to be worth $400 million annually.
Once they reach their destination, victims are hidden inside homes, massage parlors, apartments, and basements, where they learn they’ve been deceived. But, by then they are trapped.
Their travel documents are taken, they are charged fees they will never be able to pay back, and threatened with violence to themselves or their families back home if they attempt to go to authorities. They often are poorly educated, frightened, and unable to speak the local language. Locked in their new dwellings, they are monitored with surveillance cameras.
Forced Labour: The New Slavery
Figures vary dramatically, but the International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates that at least 2.4 million people are trafficked for the purpose of some form of forced labour around the world.
Also, the ILO estimates that at least 12.3 million people are victims of forced labour
worldwide; that means that 9.8 million are exploited locally
rather than being taken
to another location to be forced into usually unpaid work. The child shown at left
is making bricks in India.
Nearly half, or 43 percent, are used specifically for sexual exploitation, 32 percent for labour exploitation, and 25 percent for a mixture of both.
An ILO background paper, “Fighting Human Trafficking: The Forced Labour Dimensions” was published in January 2008. The paper explains, “There are many ways in which a person can be coerced into undertaking work against their free will.
“Those most commonly associated with the forced labour resulting from human trafficking include the confiscation of personal identity documents, the threat of denunciation of irregular migrants to the authorities in the host country, deception of a trafficked person about the type of work he or she will eventually undertake, and withholding of wages over prolonged periods.”
Image credits
Isabel Bolinn
International Labour Organization
Sources
“Sex Trafficking.” Meredith May, San Francisco Chronicle, October 6, 2006.
“Fighting Human Trafficking: The Forced Labour Dimensions.” ILO, January 2008
“Human Trafficking in Canada.” RCMP, September 2010.
© Canada and the World, September 2010
All rights reserved
OPERATION SECLUSION
Between 2005 and 2009, the RCMP analysed the illegal movement of people and produced a report Human Trafficking in Canada in September 2010. Highlights of the report include:
“Recent convictions of human trafficking have mostly involved victims who are citizens and/or permanent residents of Canada trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation.
“Human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation has been mostly associated with organized prostitution occurring discreetly behind fronts, like escort agencies and residential brothels.
“Many human trafficking suspects have been linked to other organized criminal activities, such as conspiracy to commit murder, credit card fraud, mortgage fraud, immigration fraud, and organized prostitution, in Canada or abroad.
“Organized crime networks with Eastern European links have been involved in the organized entry of women from former Soviet States into Canada for employment in escort services in the Greater Toronto Area and possibly in massage and escort services in the Montreal area.
“Human trafficking has been identified in bawdy houses operated by Asian prostitution rings.
“Major Canadian cities with an established network of Asian organized crime are destinations for migrant sex workers from Asia.
“Investigations found that Asian sex workers are not necessarily recruited from overseas. Most foreign nationals that were found working in bawdy houses had entered Canada legally and looked for sex work after they arrived in Canada.
“Some convicted offenders of domestic human trafficking were found to be affiliated to street gangs known to law enforcement for their pimping culture.
“The victims were groomed, manipulated, and coerced to enter the sex trade.
Some victims of domestic human trafficking have been underage girls exploited through prostitution in exotic dance clubs and/or escort services.
“Significant human trafficking indicators were identified in some cases involving foreign national domestic workers who were smuggled into Canada by their employers.”