A new study into human trafficking trends in East Africa reveals that the capitals of Kenya and Tanzania are the region's main magnet for children and adults tricked into exploitative labour including prostitution.
The research found that - although people initially may have travelled across East African borders voluntarily in search of greener pastures - they were invariably deceived by a range of actors including family, religious acquaintances, business men and retired prostitutes, into working in exploitative situations.
The new research, done by the International Organisation of Migration (IOM), concluded that the main cities in Kenya and Tanzania are the main recipients of trafficked adults and children in East Africa. The main countries of origin are Rwanda, Uganda, Burundi and Congo Kinshasa (DRC).
In Kenya, the study found evidence of Rwandan, Tanzanian and Ugandan victims of trafficking, including children, working in Nairobi as domestic labourers, in the commercial sex and hospitality sectors, and in the agricultural sector in various locations around the country.
Victims were identified in the Kenyan-Ugandan border town of Busia, while Tanzanian children were found working as cattle herders and in motorbike repair shops in Oloitoktok on the Kenyan-Tanzanian border, as well as begging on the streets of Nairobi and Naivasha.
In Tanzania, the IOM researchers found evidence of child trafficking from Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda for sexual exploitation, fishing, domestic servitude and agricultural labour.
Adult victims of trafficking into Tanzania were mainly identified in the domestic sector, as well as the mining, agricultural and hospitality industries.
But while Ugandan children are trafficked to all the countries in the region, Uganda was also registered as a destination for trafficked victims from Kenya, Tanzania and Rwanda. In addition, instability in eastern Congo was found to be fuelling the influx of trafficked children to Uganda.
Although information on Rwanda was scant, the country was identified as a source for victims destined for Italy, Norway and the Netherlands as well as for child victims destined for Nairobi and the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa as domestic workers and for sexual exploitation.
"The lack of referral mechanisms providing protection and support, especially for adult victims, is a major weakness in the counter-trafficking response in the region," the IOM researchers warned.
Indeed, Rwanda is the only country in the region where authorities have established shelter and hotline services to assist victims of gender violence, including victims of trafficking. However the lack of appropriate referral mechanisms across its border was hampering efforts to expedite the return and rehabilitation of cross-border victims, according to IOM.
The results of the study were presented at a Nairobi workshop to senior East African government officials, civil society groups and international experts. Participants called for the implementation of a region-wide 116 emergency number - an internationally recognised hotline number for trafficked children, which is currently in use in Kenya.
From here.
Thinking about ethics and current events (Began 1 April 2008)
Showing posts with label child labor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label child labor. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
Friday, January 29, 2010
Child Trafficking in Haiti
Children, the most vulnerable members of Haiti’s population, are suffering terribly as a result of the disastrous earthquake, many losing parents, homes and health. As if that was not bad enough, they are now more likely than ever to be captured by traffickers who buy and sell children for sex and cheap labour, says an expert on the subject.
From her base in India, which has seen the same thing happen after natural disasters, Nicolette Grams of the International Justice Mission predicts that trafficking gangs will be moving in to seize their prey. She says human trafficking is a problem in Haiti at the best of times, affecting a quarter-million Haitian children each year.
These slaves, known as restavecs, are typically sold or given away to new families by their own impoverished parents. Physical and sexual abuse is common for restavecs. Many owners use the girls as in-house prostitutes, sending them to live on the street if they become pregnant.
Not all of these trafficked children end up as domestic slaves within Haiti—plenty of others are promised work in the Dominican Republic but are instead sold to work in agricultural fields or brothels across the border. Poor children who escape a life in bondage most often end up in street gangs; if they are fortunate, they may be accepted into overcrowded orphanages.
Given the life and death needs facing the authorities and aid workers, watching out for traffickers is most unlikely to be on their list of priorities. Some voices have been raised against whisking children overseas with a view to adoption, but at least those children are being cared for well and can always be reunited with relations if that seems best for them.
Better adoption than enslavement.
Meanwhile, an international organisation whose solution to the social problems of Haiti is to prevent children being born, also continues to ply its trade there. International Planned Parenthood is appealing for funds for “basic first aid, as well as obstetric care and family planning” in Haiti, where its two largest clinics have been destroyed.
Before the earthquake each of these clinics was dishing out condoms, chemical contraceptives and abortions to 200 Haitians a day through the local IPPF affiliate, Profamilia (sic), and has been doing that sort of thing since 1984. Despite that, or perhaps because of it, Haiti has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world, and the highest in the Western hemisphere.
One hoped these people would keep quiet about birth control, for once, as they deal with women who have lost children or other family members. Basic first aid and obstetric care could easily consume all the funds they raise.
One organisation that you can be sure is focused on helping mothers is MaterCare International, which is also appealing for funds for its emergency effort in Haiti.
From here.
From her base in India, which has seen the same thing happen after natural disasters, Nicolette Grams of the International Justice Mission predicts that trafficking gangs will be moving in to seize their prey. She says human trafficking is a problem in Haiti at the best of times, affecting a quarter-million Haitian children each year.
These slaves, known as restavecs, are typically sold or given away to new families by their own impoverished parents. Physical and sexual abuse is common for restavecs. Many owners use the girls as in-house prostitutes, sending them to live on the street if they become pregnant.
Not all of these trafficked children end up as domestic slaves within Haiti—plenty of others are promised work in the Dominican Republic but are instead sold to work in agricultural fields or brothels across the border. Poor children who escape a life in bondage most often end up in street gangs; if they are fortunate, they may be accepted into overcrowded orphanages.
Given the life and death needs facing the authorities and aid workers, watching out for traffickers is most unlikely to be on their list of priorities. Some voices have been raised against whisking children overseas with a view to adoption, but at least those children are being cared for well and can always be reunited with relations if that seems best for them.
Better adoption than enslavement.
Meanwhile, an international organisation whose solution to the social problems of Haiti is to prevent children being born, also continues to ply its trade there. International Planned Parenthood is appealing for funds for “basic first aid, as well as obstetric care and family planning” in Haiti, where its two largest clinics have been destroyed.
Before the earthquake each of these clinics was dishing out condoms, chemical contraceptives and abortions to 200 Haitians a day through the local IPPF affiliate, Profamilia (sic), and has been doing that sort of thing since 1984. Despite that, or perhaps because of it, Haiti has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world, and the highest in the Western hemisphere.
One hoped these people would keep quiet about birth control, for once, as they deal with women who have lost children or other family members. Basic first aid and obstetric care could easily consume all the funds they raise.
One organisation that you can be sure is focused on helping mothers is MaterCare International, which is also appealing for funds for its emergency effort in Haiti.
From here.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
China's Left-Behind Children
In China's rural areas young children are left when their parents go to work many miles from their towns and villages. These children have little to no supervision and are exploited as laborers and often sexually abused.
Here is a report:
An explosion at an illegal firecracker workshop in Guangxi has left 13 village school children dead and injured. All the victims were “left-behind children” whose parents were working in factories hundreds of kilometers away in neighbouring Guangdong.
The explosion occurred in Yanghui village in Hezhou at around eight o’clock on the morning of 12 November when the children were assembling firecrackers in the workshop before going to school. All of the children were primary school students. At least one child died in the explosion and five others suffered burns on more than 90 percent of their bodies. Another child later died in hospital.
The workshop owner, Xie Qingsui, fled the scene after the explosion, and local police launched a massive manhunt. According to the official Xinhua news agency, Xie was eventually detained by police in Guangxi’s Mengshan county two days later on 14 November. Another man suspected of involvement in the case had earlier handed himself into the local police.
The tragedy highlighted not only the problem of child labour but also the vulnerability of left-behind children in particular to abuse and exploitation. The Party secretary of Yanghui village told Xinhua that about 70 percent of all villagers aged between 20 and 50 years old were currently working away in Guangdong. Their children were left behind with grandparents or other elderly relatives who were unable to give them proper care and attention.
As CLB pointed out in its research report on the children of migrant workers in China, left-behind children are especially vulnerable to crime and exploitation by unscrupulous adults in their neighbourhood precisely because they do not have proper parental care.
The report cites for example a survey on sexual violence in Zhechuan, Henan province, which showed that 34 percent of the 62 rapes in the county involved left-behind children. Most of the victims were only aged between five and 12 years old, while the offenders were usually acquaintances or neighbours aged over 50.
Source: China Labour Bulletin
Here is a report:
An explosion at an illegal firecracker workshop in Guangxi has left 13 village school children dead and injured. All the victims were “left-behind children” whose parents were working in factories hundreds of kilometers away in neighbouring Guangdong.
The explosion occurred in Yanghui village in Hezhou at around eight o’clock on the morning of 12 November when the children were assembling firecrackers in the workshop before going to school. All of the children were primary school students. At least one child died in the explosion and five others suffered burns on more than 90 percent of their bodies. Another child later died in hospital.
The workshop owner, Xie Qingsui, fled the scene after the explosion, and local police launched a massive manhunt. According to the official Xinhua news agency, Xie was eventually detained by police in Guangxi’s Mengshan county two days later on 14 November. Another man suspected of involvement in the case had earlier handed himself into the local police.
The tragedy highlighted not only the problem of child labour but also the vulnerability of left-behind children in particular to abuse and exploitation. The Party secretary of Yanghui village told Xinhua that about 70 percent of all villagers aged between 20 and 50 years old were currently working away in Guangdong. Their children were left behind with grandparents or other elderly relatives who were unable to give them proper care and attention.
As CLB pointed out in its research report on the children of migrant workers in China, left-behind children are especially vulnerable to crime and exploitation by unscrupulous adults in their neighbourhood precisely because they do not have proper parental care.
The report cites for example a survey on sexual violence in Zhechuan, Henan province, which showed that 34 percent of the 62 rapes in the county involved left-behind children. Most of the victims were only aged between five and 12 years old, while the offenders were usually acquaintances or neighbours aged over 50.
Source: China Labour Bulletin
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Week 6 Discussion Topic
John Majewski (1986), author of The Freeman Ideas on Liberty, paints view of life during the industrial revolution era that runs counter to what we have generally be given in history textbooks of young children forced to work long hours with little rest or food. However, according to Majewski (1986), “conditions were not near as deploring nor were morality rates as high as many of us assumed." He maintains that women and children during the industrial revolution were probable no worse off than they were before.
Although the industrial revolution meant difficult labor conditions, people were accustomed to hard work. Further, unemployment rates. Rural residents migrated to urban areas to find employment. With a greater number of adults working, child labor probable saw a decrease. The industrial revolution, according to Majewski (1986), “made it possible for western societies to banish child labor”.
One of the students in the class, Dora, has this to say: "One can assume that the pollution and sanitation conditions resulting from an increase of population in the urban areas was possible beyond today’s reader’s imagination. Lack of proper disposal of waste products creates friendly environments for disease causing magnets to inhabit and spread. However, it appears that the quality of life stabilized as society became industrialized. The industrial revolution created a mass of social problems which in turn created social groups that worked together to solve problems such as waste disposal and disease control. Social organizations such as Capitalism, Majewski (1986), “are credited for instigating improved living conditions and paving the way to shape our society, as we know it today”.
What are your thoughts on child labor then compared to child labor today in many parts of the world?
Although the industrial revolution meant difficult labor conditions, people were accustomed to hard work. Further, unemployment rates. Rural residents migrated to urban areas to find employment. With a greater number of adults working, child labor probable saw a decrease. The industrial revolution, according to Majewski (1986), “made it possible for western societies to banish child labor”.
One of the students in the class, Dora, has this to say: "One can assume that the pollution and sanitation conditions resulting from an increase of population in the urban areas was possible beyond today’s reader’s imagination. Lack of proper disposal of waste products creates friendly environments for disease causing magnets to inhabit and spread. However, it appears that the quality of life stabilized as society became industrialized. The industrial revolution created a mass of social problems which in turn created social groups that worked together to solve problems such as waste disposal and disease control. Social organizations such as Capitalism, Majewski (1986), “are credited for instigating improved living conditions and paving the way to shape our society, as we know it today”.
What are your thoughts on child labor then compared to child labor today in many parts of the world?
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