14 February 2007
Private Groups Spearhead Anti-Trafficking Efforts, February 14, 2007(New York groups press for state anti-trafficking law)
By Judy Aita
USINFO Staff Writer
New York -- Since mid-January, members of the international human rights group Equality Now have gathered outside a Manhattan court house every Thursday to draw attention to the need for a strong law to outlaw human trafficking in the state of New York. The organization is part of a growing coalition of nonprofit groups helping trafficking victims through aid, public awareness campaigns and lobbying.
Equality Now's effort to support passage of a state law against human trafficking is the coalition's latest action in decades of work to stop human trafficking, a modern form of slavery estimated to involve millions forced into sex trade or servitude worldwide. The coalition plans to continue its weekly demonstration until the New York State Legislature passes a law against human trafficking. (See related article.)
"New York is a major port of entry, transit and destination for human trafficking," Taina Bien-Aimé, executive director of Equality Now, said in an interview February 7. "Sex trafficking disproportionately affects women and girls and involves organized crime, some governments as well as individuals, and very few remedies are available for people who are trafficked."
Equality Now, whose efforts to combat trafficking focuses on the demand that fuels the trade, especially the sex-tourism industry, has been a leader in getting local officials to shut down sex tours.
The human rights organization's anti-trafficking effort was spurred by an article in Newsweek magazine in the early 1990s mentioning 25 sex-tour operations in the United States. Bien-Aimé said that it is "very, very difficult to even count how many tour operations there are," but they range from individuals operating over the Internet to companies with offices in major U.S. cities.
Equality Now's efforts to close Big Apple Oriental Tours was helped by then New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer (now governor) who indicted Big Apple's owners using a law that prohibits solicitation of and profiting from prostitution. It was the first criminal action of its kind in the United States against a sex-tourism company.
The organization now employs a male lawyer who goes undercover to find traffickers and then works with local law enforcement authorities to bring them to trial. Legal restrictions prevent Equality Now from discussing cases, Bien-Aimé said, but cases often have an international aspect.
The passage of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act in 2000 gave the U.S. Department of Justice more authority to prosecute traffickers. Between fiscal years 2001 and 2006, the department prosecuted 360 defendants and earned 238 convictions. Nearly 75 percent of these cases have dealt with sex trafficking; the others primarily involved forced-labor incidents. (See related article.)
State laws need to emphasize the coercive aspects of trafficking, provide a defense for women who were coerced into prostitution, and penalize the trafficker. A strong and effective law against human trafficking also should define trafficking as fraud, deception and coercion; focus on those who patronize the sex industry; and provide services to help victims in rehabilitating their lives, Bien-Aimé said.
DIRECT HELP FOR THE TRAFFICKING VICTIMS
Other nonprofit organizations in New York provide services to trafficking victims, some catering to young people 12 to 21 years old. They provide food and shelter, legal services, counseling, education and recreation opportunities.
At The Door, one of the largest programs for young people in New York, counselors and teen leaders work to identify possible trafficked youth among the marginalized adolescents already participating in its many programs. They also work with government and other nonprofit agencies serving immigrant youth to raise awareness and identify victims, even going into neighborhoods with simple information campaigns.
Magali Romero, an 18-year-old Door member and leader, described how one group planned a simple outreach program to let trafficking victims know that people were ready to help.
One of the rare times that victims are allowed out on their own is to wash their clothes, Romero said. The young people designed fliers and put them in neighborhood Laundromats. The fliers asked simple questions such as "Are you allowed to go to school?" and included a number to call for help.
Not all of The Door's cases involve the sex trade. The organization currently is helping an 18-year-old Afghan boy who lost his parents and was forced into servitude by people who promised to help him get to the United States, said Anya Gorovets, an advocate organizer at The Door.
Safe Horizons, which helps about 350,000 victims of violence each year, established its anti-trafficking program in December 2001. In addition to providing social and legal services for trafficking victims, Safe Horizon staff members also educate and train others in the community to increase awareness and bring about changes that members hope will reduce and ultimately end trafficking.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has called the abolition of human trafficking “the great moral calling of our time.” Speaking in June 2006 on the release of the State Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report, she said the United States had distributed $400 million in assistance to other nations in recent years, helping them improve systems to combat human trafficking and provide more support for victims.
For more information on U.S. policy, see Human Smuggling and Trafficking.
