Human trafficking is the worlds fastest growing industry, according to the 2009 State Department Trafficking in Persons Report over 80% of those victimized by transnational trafficking are women and children. According to the International Labor Organization (End of Child Labor Within Reach 2006), each year, some 1.2 million children are trafficked for the purposes of labor, while another 1 million are trafficked into the sex trade.

Do watch the news, read news articles, or my blog posts and question what you can actually do that will make a difference?  Feel you are stretched for time or don’t have any money to give?  Well there is something that you can do today to help end child trafficking.  Help those in the field, and other concerned citizens like yourself to pass the Child Protection Compact Act of 2009 (HR 2737).  The bill was introduced by Chris Smith, U.S. Representative for New Jersey’s 4th District, a leader in the fight against modern slavery. However the introduction of the CPCA is only the beginning in what is often a long legislative process, one that can only be successful with a united voice of the American voter.

Now is your chance to use your voice and put your vote to the test, as when it comes down to it the voice that is heard on the hill begins with you. Members of Congress look to their constituents for direction and support, and we need you to take the opportunity now to let your representatives know what matters most not only in your district, but across the country. Therefore let us all unite together to urge Members of Congress to support the Child Protection Compact Act (CPCA)of 2009, and together we can see that we move one step closer to bringing an end to modern slavery.

What does the Child Protection Compact Act (HR 2737) mean?
This groundbreaking legislation seeks to eradicate trafficking in children by focusing on assistance and collaboration with eligible individual countries through the implementation of Child Protection Compacts.  Many countries have passed anti-trafficking, child labor, child marriage, and similar laws to combat modern slavery, however there is not always the means to enforce these laws.  The lack of enforcement of such laws continues to leave children unprotected.  The CPCA would help enforce anti-trafficking laws in targeted countries by providing them with technical assistance and training. These target countries are ones who have shown a level of political will to fight human trafficking, but have been without adequate resources, know-how, and the capacity to follow up with survivors.  Therefore if enacted, the CPCA will offer additional resources for the targeted countries law enforcement, victim protection services, and deterrence through the apprehension and prosecution of human traffickers.

SEC. 6. CHILD PROTECTION COMPACT.

(a) Compact- The Secretary, acting through the Ambassador, may provide assistance for a country only if the country enters into an agreement with the United States, to be known as a ‘Child Protection Compact’, that establishes a 3-year plan for achieving shared objectives in furtherance of the purposes of this Act.

(b) Elements- The Compact should take into account the national child protection strategy of the country and shall contain–

(1) the specific objectives that the country and the United States expect to achieve during the term of the Compact;

(2) the responsibilities of the country and the United States in the achievement of such objectives;

(3) the particular programs or initiatives to be undertaken in the achievement of such objectives and the amount of funding to be allocated to each program or initiative;

(4) regular benchmarks to measure, where appropriate, progress toward achieving such objectives, including benchmarks for each program or initiative;

(10) the strategy of the country to sustain progress made toward achieving such objectives after expiration of the Compact.

What can you do?
Get a meeting with, call, write, e-mail the Congressional Representative and,or Senators in your home state and district. Let them know how important it is to you that we abolish modern-day slavery in our time, and give a voice to children across our country that have been silenced by the invisible chains of modern slavery. This is essential in all 50 states as we work to get this bill to the next stage of life, and closer to being a reality.

If you have reason to suspect that someone is a victim of human trafficking, please call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline on 1-888-373-7888. Multilingual call specialists are on standby 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. All calls are confidential.

Today, 16th June, is the International Day of the African Child, honored worldwide since 1991, the day is set in which to celebrate the life of an African child. The day was founded in remembrance of the massacres of the innocent children and adults  who participated in the June 16th  Soweto Uprising, in South Africa in 1976, when some ten thousand children marched in protest of the  quality of their education and demanding their right to be taught in their native languages.  During the Soweto Uprising hundreds of those children marching were shot, another hundred plus  people were killed and thousands injured over the following weeks as protests continued.  The day was thus established to mark not only the courage and sacrifice of those in Soweto, but to give a voice to the plight of all African child.  Thirty-three years later the day still gives continued awareness of the still vital need for the improvement of education for all African children.

Today’s major event is the 11th session of the Children’s Parliament, held in Cameroon. This years focus is on child and maternal mortality, according to the United Nations (UN) Millennium Campaign some 50,000 African children under five years old die from preventable and, or curable diseases. Yesterday the campaign called on all African states, civil society organizations and the private sector to not only tackle the issues of; child and maternal mortality, high school dropout rates and poor quality standards of Universal Primary Education. According to the campaign 38 million children of primary school age in Africa continue to remain out of school.

“Child survival, protection and development are not only universal aspirations enshrined in the MDGs; they are also human rights issues ratified in the International Convention on the Rights of Children and the African charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child,” said the UN Millennium Campaign Communications Coordinator for Africa and Acting Deputy Director for Africa, Ms. Sylvia Mwichuli. “Investing in the health and education of African children and their mothers is a sound economic decision and one of the surest ways for a country to secure its future. Reducing child mortality and ensuring universal primary education requires strong political commitment.” (Day of the African Child: The Unending Plight of African Children)

Children of Africa’s 54 countries are all unique and diverse, nonetheless they share the same struggle for daily survival, as disease often run rampant, child labor and the use of child soldiers impacts most of the continent. Their diversity aside the children of Africa are more often displaced by force or urbanization than another continent, they suffer more than any other nations from HIV/AIDS, education is a right all too often missed, while child labor and trafficking often surpass it in demand.  The Day of the African Child leaves one to reflect on the often dire needs of children across Africa, and give focus on the need to increase equal access to suitable education, health, and the protection against abuses such as physical and sexual abuse, trafficking, the recruitment of child soldiers, child labor and child marriages.

While  children across the vast expanses of the Africa continent have received an international day of recognition, the true day of recognition has yet to be seen.  Recognition and value for the true worth of the African child will come only when their voices are truly heard and an investment in their collective future is seen; when one sees and end to gender inequality,  when their little bodies are no longer seen as disposable and an end to demand is seen for their use as tools of the sex trade, labor and weapons of war.  Until that day children across the continent of Africa continue to suffer unjustly, their abusers receive little recourse for their actions, and the majority of the governments sit idly by.  Therefore take a moment  today to share their stories of suffering and hope, for then tomorrow may be a better day for children around the globe.

For more information on the legal framework regarding child participation see Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which includes the right of the child to be heard and have his or her view given consideration in all judicial and administrative proceeding affecting him or her. For further information please see the African Charter on the Right and Welfare of the Child, for which article 4 states, how is in the best interest of the child and thus provides for the right of the African child to have his or her view considered in all proceedings affecting him or her.

Today is World Day Against Child Labor, and this year we have reached historical importance of the day as in 2009 we are also celebrate the 10th anniversary of the adoption of ILO Convention No. 182, which addresses the need for action to eliminate the worst forms of child labor.

Today marks the 2008 World Day Against Child Labor, this years theme is: ‘Education: The right response to child labor’. This year the ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) has established the campaign to tackle the right to education for all children to brake the chain of child labour that envelops millions of children worldwide.

According to the International Labour Organization (ILO) there is an estimated 165 million children between the ages of 5 and 14 actively involved in child labour. Children are often forced to work long hours and are often forced to work in harsh and dangerous conditions. Child labour has a direct link to poverty, and provides a substantial barrier to a child’s education…thus enabling a barrier to a child’s education and increasing the literacy gap. Education is often taken for granted in developing nations, however many poor and impoverished families are forced to face the choose to send their child to school or work to help the family…it is that choice that has sent millions of children out of the classroom, often disparagingly girls, to toil in fields, factories, homes and the streets.

This years theme is, Give Girls a Chance: End Child Labor, which addresses the need for action to tackle the worst forms of child labour. Whilst celebrating progress made during the past ten years, the World Day will highlight the continuing challenges, with a focus on exploitation of girls in child labour. This years campaign has three main goals:

• Policy responses to address the causes of child labour, paying particular attention to the situation of girls.
• Urgent action to tackle the worst forms of child labour.
• Greater attention to the education and skills training needs of adolescent girls - a key action point in tackling child labour and providing a pathway for girls to gain Decent Work as adults.

Child labor continues across the globe in various forms, and is seen in all industires.  This week, International Labor Rights Forum’s (ILRF), Executive Director Bama Athreya was in Geneva at the ILO’s annual gathering, where they helped to organize an event yesterday about the continued use of forced child labor in Uzbekistan’s cotton industry. The event featured speakers including Kailash Satyarthi of the Global March Against Child Labor as well as many other leading figures from human rights and labor organizations, government officials and companies.  The agenda from the event is available online here , you can also see my previous posts; A Call for a Boycott on Child Picked Uzbek Cotton and Child Picked Cotton…Central Asia’s Child Labor, for more information.  The event in Geneva comes less than a week after ILRF released a new report detailing how forced child labor continues to be used in the most recent cotton harvest in Uzbekistan. Additionally, Uzbek human rights advocates just released a new call for an international boycott of Uzbek cotton.

Other industries which have been brought into the public spotlight include the cocoa industry, as seen in the following posts.  Currently the ILRF is working with US and Liberia-based organizations to fight the use of child labor and abuse of workers’ rights on a rubber plantation in Liberia operated by the Firestone tire company. You can see more and join the fight at the Stop Firestone campaign, as well as the following article which describs the ongoing problems and click here for recent articles in regards to the environmental problems caused by Firestone’s practices.

The use of child labor impacts children’s rights in a multitude of aspects, the most detrimental in the long term is often seen in a childs right to education.  In order to meet the UN’s Millennium Development Goals by 2015, which has set to see that all children receive and complete a full their primary education, regardless of gender. However if the goals are to be meet then we must work to see that education is free, an issue which many families still struggle to attain funds for or are forced to choose between funds for school or often food for the family. Other issues of major priority include; gender equality in all levels of education, education and awareness about the issues and facts of child labour, and teacher shortages.

Education is not only a human right for all children, but the gateway out of poverty, as education is empowerment and empowerment is the key to brake the cycle of poverty.

About 75 million children, worldwide, do not have the privilege of basic primary education. The International Labor Organization, at its on-going 97th conference, noted that education was critical to breaking the cycle of child labor and poverty, as well as eradicating child labor in its worst forms by 2016…”  http://www.vanguardngr.com/index.php?opt…)

For more information and resources on this years campaign to end child labor see:

The International Labor Organization (ILO)

International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF)

WHAT YOU CAN DO?

*ASK HERSHEY, MARS & NESTLE TO STOP USING CHILD LABOR: After you have asked Hershey, Mars and Nestle know that you want them to stop child labor in their cocoa supply chains, then ask 5 friends to join you?  Click here to tell your friends!

* CREATE MORE AWARENESS WITH CHILD LABOR POSTERS: Click here to see ILRF’s child labor campaign posters and to find out how to order some.

* USE ILRF’S CHILD LABOR CLASSROOM RESOURCES: Help spread the word in your community be using our educational resources here. The ILO and Education International have additional classroom materials specifically for World Day Against Child Labor 2009 available here.

* MAKE GOOD PURCHASES: To support companies that respect labor rights, check out our Chocolate Company Scorecard and the Shop with a Conscience Consumer Guide.

* ASK YOUR FRIENDS TO JOIN THE ACTION LIST: The best way to get the latest information about child labor and new ways to take action is to sign up for ILRF’s urgent action list.  As we launch new campaign efforts in the coming months, we need more voices calling for change.

Earlier this month Nicolas Kristof, a long time advocate on all forms of modern slavery, wrote a piece entitled, Girls on Our Streets, in which he sought not to bring attention to modern slavery itself, but to the plight of young girls right here in our own backyard.  American teenage girls continue to work the streets largely because of the lack of interest shown by authorities and society as a whole.

The issue of modern slavery is nothing new; it has been making headlines for some time now. In general as a society we have become more open and aware of the issues of modern slavery, and if you ask someone do they know about modern slavery, they do quite often know, but the issues isn’t that they are aware of modern slavery it is what aspects they are aware of and what they are not aware of. The response is most often you mean like what they have in Russia, or Asia, and if they are thinking of slavery here in the United States, they are thinking of immigrant girls and women sold in to sex slavery, and all of course this is all a harsh reality, but it is not the only and full reality.

However were we have continued to remain in the dark is in regards the slavery which is covering our own streets. The real face of modern slavery is not one face; the face of modern slavery could be anyone of any class and race, however we often fail to see the many faces of slavery which are lost in the crowd. The faces of young American Latino and African American girls on our streets are seen instantly as prostitutes, they are not looked upon as victims of slavery; however the average of entry into prostitution in the United States is 12-13 years-old.

We live in a world of denial…“it doesn’t happen to here…”, or “it couldn’t happen to me or someone I know”, but the reality is that it does happen here, and it could happen to anyone. Therefore to answer the question, “Are we still clueless about modern slavery?”, “Yes”, but “why” is the question that we really need to answer. We have allowed pimping and a Hip Hop culture to glamorize the pimp life style and thus we as a society have allowed ourselves to turn a blind eye to modern slavery on our streets and in our backyards. The business of pimping is the business of slavery, and as a society if we see slavery as outlandish on the streets of Bangkok, then why are we not outraged to see it on our own streets? If we begin to look through the lens of slavery without the glamorized tint we would see that pimps are nothing other than slave owners.

Slavery is defined as someone, held by force, fraud or coercion…Pimps on the streets of New York, as in the brothel owners in Phom Pen, use the same tactics, each prey on the more vulnerable members of society, they use false relationships of friendship, family and love to lure and hold young girls, while slowly wearing that their mental fiber. Once their hold begins they increase their strength and hold with the use beatings, the threat of violence…they instill fear and use humiliation to chain their ‘slaves’.

Self-esteem is both the chain that binds girls to slavery, but it is also the key that can free them. An impressionable then, or adult for that matter, can find either hope and joy, or suffering and pain, thanks to those who guide them in life. In the wrong hands an impressionable child can become a weapon of war, a tool or a commodity. However in the right hands they can become quite literally anything they want to be. The key to the future…the key to unlocking the chains of slavery is empowerment and self-worth, is the foundation of empowerment. If girls, or any person, are led to believe that they are not worth anything, then they no longer strive for anything further. When day in and day out you are told you cannot reach the high shelf you soon begin to believe it, and maybe you couldn’t reach the top shelf, but in time you would either grow on your own, or given encouragement you would soon begin to seek ways and solutions to help you reach it. Therefore if one is held down for too long no longer do you try to reach, thus you no longer strive for better things in your life.

Pimps and traffickers know that empowerment is detrimental to their ‘business’, thus why they seek out and prey on the most vulnerable, so that they can easily manipulate and breakdown their victims’ and turn them into one of the most profitable commodities in the world. So how does this dynamic continue to grow in spite of the obvious detrimental and illegal nature? Has our society literally kept its self in the dark despite the fact that modern slavery is the second leading trade over the arms trade, surpassing the drug trade, and it is estimated that in two years that the human trade will be number one?

it is the reality of some 100,000 and 3 million minors involved in prostitution every year in the United States (Department of Justice estimates). No longer can we look at these girls as criminals, but we must see them for what they are victims and treat them as such, so that they may become survivors. Please see GEMS to learn more about the program, and how you can support Rachel and all the very young girls who have been victimized by sex trafficking in the United States.

Then how do we permanently turn on the lights and show the full scope and detriment that this plague, this human flesh trade, has become? We must continue to increase awareness that it is a crime that affects us all, seek to address demand, increase funding for rescue and restore programs, including police training and task forces, and most importantly to brake the cycle of the trade we must invest in the empowerment of both at-risk populations and survivors.

If you have reason to suspect that someone is a victim of human trafficking, please call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline on 1-888-373-7888. Multilingual call specialists are on standby 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. All calls are confidential.

What do you sell when you have nothing left to sell, you have no money, no food, little water, and no prospects of employment? The future looks bleak and so you sell the only thing you have left…your own child! For if you cannot sale one child then how can you feed the others?

News of war orphans, child trafficking, forced labor and kidnappings are nothing new in the international media, however the media fails to shine a clear and bright light on the true extensive nature and scope of the problem. These horrendous crimes against children are nothing less than common place in many countries, a daily activity that has made children little more than a cheap commodity.

For example a 2008 report on Swaziland reviled a  frightening look at the number of female orphans in the country continue to grow at a substantial rate, leaving them ripe for sexual exploitation, as more and more female orphans are reported abused.  One factor for the large scale number of orphans across the continent, especially Western Africa is the HIV/AIDS epidemic, which UNICEF estimates will leave some 200,000 Swazi children orphans in the next two years alone, this is more than one-fifth of the country’s current population.

The increase of orphan’s undoubtedly places a strain on what is already a strained system in many countries, as orphanages often lack adequate funding which then hinders their capabilities to provide appropriate care. Orphans are often given little access to education, physical and mental health care and other resources needed to aid in their growth and development.  This strain is often then the focus of international aid, and thus many private institutions begin to spring up, and international donors  soon become the main funding source for many orphanages.  While this seems like the perfect solution, it is not, and the increase often makes it even harder to regulate and enforce child welfare laws and regulations.

All too often as an international community we seek to apply only a band-aid solution to a problem and while band aids are needed, they will not be enough to heal a gaping wound and if one never looks back to see that the wound is healing properly then we can never truly heal and recover from the situation. It is this same band-aid philosophy that is often applied to orphan children and the communities for which they live in, however we cannot just give them food and shelter and expect them to grow and prosper into successful adults, we must see that they are given more if we are to help brake this cycle.  It is this attempt to apply a one-size fits all philosophy to the orphan situation, that has now led to orphanages becoming a breading ground in many cases for abuse and child trafficking, as well many impoverished families are beginning to see orphanages as a solution to escape poverty for themselves or their child.

In the recent article, Protecting children from orphan-dealers, which emerged following the rape of an eight-month-old boy in an Ghanaian orphanage, which led to investigations into the countries orphanages, only proved what activists have been claiming as wide-spread abuse across West African orphanages. In this particular case is was discovered 27 of the 32 children living in the home were not actually orphans.

A January 2009 study by the Social Welfare Department – responsible for children’s welfare and supervising orphanages – showed that up to 90 percent of the estimated 4,500 children in orphanages in Ghana are not orphans and 140 of the 148 orphanages around the country are un-licensed, said the department’s assistant director Helena Obeng Asamoah.

So is so much attention being paid to orphanages?  Mostly the international community see’s  orphanages as easy solution, said Joachim Theis, UNICEF head of child protection for West Africa. “You have a building, you house children in it, it is easy to count them. And they are easy to fundraise for. It is a model that has been used for a long time. But it is the wrong model.”

So what do we do? First of all governments must also enforce existing laws, and work to strengthen the country’s social welfare departments. The failure of these systems is what has led to the increase of illegal and unregulated orphanages, and therefore there must be an increase in other areas such as foster care, education and support for single parent and impoverished families. By increasing such programs like meals at school, adequate and free education and healthcare, as well as community support and assistance in employment and aid, can all aid in preventing a family from placing a child into care. In the long run for both child and community, keeping children out of orphanages is the ideal solution.

Slumdog Millionaire has been the media buzz again today, but this time the hype isn’t over the film or the portrayal of life in India’s slums, but of allegations of the trafficking of one of the films child stars.

At the center of all the hype was 9 year-old, Rubina Ali, as stories flooded across international media channels today, about her father allegedly trying to sell her to an Arab couple for around $300,000, by her father Rafiq Qureshi.  The story at the center of the controversy was from the UK’s News of the World undercover investigation, which allegedly led to the offer to ’sell’ Rubina for adoption to the undercover couple. Both Rubina and her father have denied the allegations. Rafiq has now made statements to attest that while he had received offers from parties willing to pay to ‘adopt’ the child, that none were being seriously considered.

While the story will now undoubtedly remain under close media scrutiny and investigation by the …., it serves to highlight the extreme situation of desperation in India’s slums and how poverty fuels human trafficking.  In the February 26, 2009 posting,  The Reality of Slumdog Millionaire’s, the issue of treatment for the young starts was raised many believed the child stars were not adequately cared for and protected from the Oscar winning films aftermath.  Concerns have been raised since the filming began not only over the treatment and exploitation of the children by the film’s producers, but also their own families.  So while some may look to the child actors of India’s slums as being given a chance at a prosperous future thanks to being quite literally plucked from the streets for the film, others see the children as exploited and many just see their moment of fame as false hope.  The fate of all of Slumdog Millionaire’s young stars remains to be seen, and it not only depends on fortune and fame, but their families, communities and their ability to gain a full education and escape the cycle of of so many families who find themselves with little options for escape from life in the slums.

Rubina Ali’s, father was quoted then saying:

“I am very happy the movie is doing so well but it is making so much money and so much fame, and the money they paid us is nothing. They should pay more.” (Herald Sun)

The case of Slumdog Millionaire, illustrates the clear and unbinding hold that poverty has on the families of the child stars. Poverty has led millions of parents across the globe feel they can no longer carry the burden weighing on their shoulders, and soon one finds themselves turning to their children as a tool to escape the desperation of hunger and the feeling of hopelessness. Children are turned out to work for the survival of the family, often they are sent to the fields, into brick factories, on to the streets to beg, to the mines, or to the lakes to fish, and even worse many are literally sold into slavery. Rubina Ali appears to have escaped this fate, however this is not the fate for millions of Indian children. UNICEF estimates that some 12.6 million children are engaged in hazardous jobs, leaving India with the largest number of child laborers in the world under 14 years-old.

India is a source, transit and destination country for human trafficking, the high numbers of chid trafficking outside of the country is attributed to India’s porous border with Nepal, Pakistan and Bangladesh. However according to a study conducted by Shakti Vahini, “Trafficking in India” (2006), 10% of human trafficking is external, while almost 90% is internal.

See also, India’s Real Slumdog Millionaire

We are happy to inform you that the Foreign Policy Association’s Children’s Rights Writer/Blogger, Cassandra Clifford, will now also be writing on Human Rights for the Examiner. Cassandra will not be leaving the FPA, but working with the Examiner to expand upon the reach and awareness of Human Rights using a unique local perspective. Cassandra is the new DC Human Rights Examiner, for which she plans to cover events and conduct interviews with those working on the ground in the Greater Washington DC area.

See some of Cassandra’s first stories on the Examiner, such as those listed below, click here.

The Dark Side of The Washington Post
Friday, April 17th, 2009
Katherine Chon, the Co-Founder and President of DC based Polaris Project, has recently posted a two part blog The Washington Post: A Paper Pimp?…

Emancipation Day, reflecting on our slave past, but what about slaves today?
Wednesday, April 15th, 2009
Today Washington, D.C., celebrates Emancipation Day, a day which commemorates the day on which in 1862, President Abraham…

The human trade
Sunday, April 12th, 2009
Modern slavery, otherwise known as Human Trafficking, holds some 27 million men, women and children by force or …

If you have a great story idea, event or interview for the Examiner or the FPA please contact Cassandra at,  cassandra.clifford at gmail.com

LESOTHO: Cash for kids
This month, 5,000 orphans and vulnerable children in three districts of Lesotho will start benefiting from a new government scheme to alleviate the poverty preventing them from going to school, having enough to eat and staying healthy. About 55 percent of the estimated 180,000 orphaned children in the tiny mountain kingdom, which has the third highest HIV prevalence in the world, have lost one or both parents to the virus.

BENIN: Can subsidised caesareans cut maternal deaths?
Benin’s government is in its first week of helping women pay for caesarean operations in an effort to reduce the number of women dying during childbirth every year, estimated at 2,000 according to the government.

PAKISTAN: Malnutrition, low immunity threaten children’s lives
Malnutrition - combined with diarrhea, pneumonia and tuberculosis (TB) - is the biggest cause of child mortality in Tharparkar District in Pakistan’s southern Sindh Province. Infant and child mortality (children under 12 months and 5 years respectively) is much worse here than the national average, according to local officials. The figures compare unfavorably with Pakistan’s overall infant mortality rate of 75 per 1,000 live births. Each year 396,000 infants die, according to the Population Reference Bureau, a US-based body

Pakistan flogging video draws international concern
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has joined a chorus of criticism being levied in response to a grainy video of Pakistani Taliban flogging a young girl. “This is just unacceptable. While I appreciate all these different systems and traditions in many different countries, the respecting and upholding [of] basic human rights, this is most important,” Ban said. The video has enraged rights advocates and led recently reinstated Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikar Chaudhry to order an investigation.

SRI LANKA: Pregnant women at greater risk in conflict
Thousands of pregnant women caught up in the fighting between government forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) are in urgent need of healthcare, according to aid workers. “Women do not stop getting pregnant or giving birth to their babies even when on the move or when living in camps,” Lene Christiansen, country representative for the UN Population Fund (UNFPA)

Young Indians called to political action by Mumbai attacks
The gun assault in Mumbai, India, that left more than 170 people dead has served as a call to action for young people in India who have used the Internet and social media to rally others to vote. Inspired in part by the election of the relatively youthful Barack Obama in the U.S., young Indian voters are looking for leaders to solve the problems of government dysfunction and national security.

BURKINA FASO: WFP expands food voucher pilot
Families in Burkina Faso’s second-largest city, Bobo-Dioulasso, have begun receiving US$3 vouchers that can be cashed in for maize, cooking oil, salt, sugar and soap. The distribution is the second half of a World Food Programme (WFP) urban hunger-alleviation experiment launched on 13 February in the capital, Ouagadougou, to help people cope with high food prices.

INDONESIA: Government comment raises confusion on routine immunisation
A remark by Indonesia’s health minister could undermine the routine immunisation programme - a key component in containing outbreaks of preventable diseases among children. Routine immunisation coverage has already deteriorated in the past few years, say health specialists. About half-a-million children in Indonesia receive no immunisation by their first birthday, a recent government survey stated, while another 2.4 million children are only partially immunised.

Male child abductions haunt Chinese families
Chinese desire for male offspring combined with the government’s restrictive reproductive polices has resulted in a thriving trade in stolen male children. Chinese authorities claim the problem affects only about 2,500 youngsters a year, but children and families’ advocates believe abducted children might number in the hundreds of thousands.

SOUTH AFRICA: A need to redefine “orphan
Child-headed households certainly exist in South Africa, but the commonly held wisdom, reinforced by the media, that extended families cannot absorb any more orphans, and the number of child-headed households has been rising steeply in recent years due to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, has never been backed up by solid data. New research by the Children’s Institute of the University of Cape Town has found that the popular perception of both “AIDS orphans” and child-headed households has little basis in reality. The Institute estimates that AIDS orphans actually only account for 37 percent of the total 18.2 million orphans in South Africa, and that 80 percent of those have a surviving parent.

Slum cooker protects environment, helps poor
Kenya’s huge and squalid slums don’t have much of anything, except mountains of trash that fill rivers and muddy streets, breeding disease. Now Kenyan designers have built a cooker that uses the trash as fuel to feed the poor, provide hot water and destroy toxic waste, as well as curbing the destruction of woodlands.

SUDAN: Biking for safer childbirth
Five powerful scrambler motorbikes with a sidecar “bed” have been deployed by the Ministry of Health to boost access to health facilities for pregnant women, officials said.
“We have a problem bringing critically sick people to the few referral facilities available,” said Atem Nathan Riek, director-general of primary healthcare for Southern Sudan, which has among the worst rates of maternal mortality in the world.

Madonna: The Child trafficker
Malawi’s courts are expected to rule on 3 April on Madonna’s petition for an 18-month interim adoption order for a four-year-old girl named Mercy, which local human rights organizations have termed as just another round of “child trafficking” by the rich and famous.

Brazil builds walls around Rio de Janeiro slums
The government of Rio de Janeiro is building concrete walls to prevent sprawling slums from spreading farther into the picturesque hills of this world-famous tourist destination…Construction has begun in two favelas, or shantytowns…Violence between gangs and with police periodically erupts beyond the favelas, forcing stores and roads in entire neighborhoods to shut down. Occasionally juvenile gangs ransack tourists on the beach in posh districts such as Ipanema or Leblon.

YEMEN: “We have run out of money”
Members of the tiny Jewish community in Sanaa, Yemen’s capital, say they have not received their monthly food rations or any government financial assistance for the past three months. Rabbi Yahya Yusuf, leader of the 65-member community, told IRIN the Jews had been “suffering terribly” of late; many had been finding it very difficult to even feed their children.

AFGHANISTAN: Food aid not reaching most vulnerable women, children
Despite a July 2008 joint emergency appeal for US$404 million to help the most vulnerable 550,000 pregnant and lactating women and under-five children in Afghanistan, nutritious food aid - specially fortified food -is yet to reach those in need. Some 24 percent of lactating women are malnourished, over 19 percent of pregnant women have a poor nutritional status (low on minerals, vitamins, food insecure and weak) and about 54 percent of under-five children are stunted, according to a joint survey by UN agencies and the government.

Slavery Monument in Zanzibar

Yesterday, March 25th, the UN marked the second annual International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

The story of the end of the slave trade deserves to be told here at the United Nations.  Indeed, the defense of human rights is at the heart of this Organization’s global mission.  Our Charter proclaims equal rights.  The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that “no one shall be held in slavery or servitude”.  -Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon

However, as we take a moment to remember the some 12-17 million victims of the Transatlantic slave trade, let us remember and never forget our horrendous past, but let us also remember that we have not fully escaped the ghosts of slavery.

“Despairingly credible comparisons of scale and suffering may be drawn with the trans-Atlantic trade in Africans in the Americas in which more than 12 million people were forcibly transported over the ocean in four hundred years. It is to our great shame that if today’s statistics are correct, and 700, 000 people are now being trafficked across borders into slavery annually, we will have equaled that total in a mere 20 years.” - Mrs. Ndioro Ndiaye Deputy Director General International Organization of Migration (IOM)

The figures in the statement by Mrs. Ndiaye and the IOM leave the figure for modern slavery at 14 million, however leaders in the modern anti-slavery movement, such as Kevin Bales, President and Co-founder of Free the Slaves,  cite the figures as some 27 million.  Figures for the Atlantic Slave trade and modern slavery are both undoubtedly underestimated, regardless of the exact number any number of persons held in any form of slavery is plainly unacceptable.   It is clear that we have not fully learned the lessons from the legacy of the 400-year slave trade.

The establishment of the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade will hopefully serve to bring more awareness to the issue and increase the pressure on states to increase awareness and educate on the the issue of both historic and modern slavery.  Thus this day, along with the work of countless modern abolitionists, charities, states and the passing of more and more legislation against these modern crimes, will aid in the prevention of modern slavery, and see that future generations never have to hear the word slavery, but in that of a historic context.

To learn more about Human Trafficking/Modern Slavery see the following resource pages: Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking Links

Human Trafficking Conventions and Laws

Slavery and Trafficking Related Books

Human Trafficking and Modern Slavery Reports and Publications

Human Trafficking and Slavery Related Movies and Documentaries

Also see my other posts on Child Trafficking, Slavery, and Child Soldiers

If you have reason to suspect that someone is a victim of human trafficking, please call the National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline on (1-888-373-7888). Multilingual call specialists are on standby 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. All calls are confidential.