US: Trafficking May Spike
Published: 24 June 2009
By Beth
Trafficking in persons – for labor, sexual servitude and organ harvesting – may spike because of the worldwide recession, according to the US State Department’s annual human trafficking report released June 16. At least 12.3 million adults and children worldwide are subjected to forced labor, forced prostitution and forced organ harvesting, according to the report. It noted that rising unemployment worldwide could boost the supply side of human trafficking, while businesses moving underground to avoid taxes and unionized labor could boost the demand. The study, published annually since 2000, is also a scorecard on governments’ efforts to enforce anti-trafficking laws, and ranks countries based on how they address the problem. Countries are ranked in three tiers – Tier 1 countries show the most effort to combat trafficking, Tier 3 countries fail to comply with the minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. Wealthier Are Mostly in Top Tier Wealthier developed nations once again made up the most of the top tier. Croatia , Georgia and Macedonia Albania , Bosnia-Herzegovina , Bulgaria , Kazakhstan , Kosovo, the Kyrgyz Republic , Romania and Serbia The Tier 2 “watch list,” where there is little evidence of progress that the countries say they are making or the number of trafficking victims is large or increasing, included Azerbaijan, Moldova, Montenegro, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. In Tier 3 were North Korea , Saudi Arabia , Kuwait and Iran “The human trafficking phenomenon affects virtually every country, including the United States America Clinton also said that for the first time, next year the report would include the US --Beth Kampschror
