Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery

Lecture Resources

[Lecture Resources | Resources for Teachers | Country-by-Country Reports ]

Forced Begging

Bulgaria & Greece

Human Trafficking Scheme from Bulgaria Busted in Greece

Sofia News Agency, August 16, 2012

www.novinite.com/view_news.php?id=142382

[accessed 17 August 2012]

Police in Greece have cracked a network for human trafficking from Bulgaria, in which Bulgarians were forced to beg.

The undisclosed number of Bulgarians were held in an apartment in the central Greek city of Larissa.

The Bulgarians were among the country's poor, and were lured with promises for work in Greece. After that, they were forcefully held, were made to beg in various European countries, and were severely beaten at each attempt to escape.

Greek police discovered the network, after a 58-year-old male Bulgarian was hospitalized after being abandoned outside the city following such a beating.

France

Romanian Premier Interviewed in 'Le Monde'

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty RFE/RL Newsline, 02-08-05

www.hri.org/news/balkans/rferl/2002/02-08-05.rferl.html#69

[accessed 5 February 2011]

[69] ROMANIAN PREMIER INTERVIEWED IN 'LE MONDE' - Prime Minister Adrian Nastase said in an interview to the French daily "Le Monde" on 2 August that Romania finds itself in an "extremely delicate and difficult situation" as a result of the Romany criminal networks allegedly engaging in human trafficking and forcing handicapped children into begging in France.

Guinea Bissau

Guinea-Bissau-Senegal: On the child trafficking route

UN Integrated Regional Information Networks IRIN, Bafata, 23 November 2007

www.irinnews.org/report/75485/guinea-bissau-senegal-on-the-child-trafficking-route

[accessed 8 March 2015]

Children, brought from Guinea-Bissau to Senegal years ago, line up at the airport in Dakar to return home after years of beatings and forced begging.

100,000 CHILD BEGGARS - In 2004, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimated there were up to 100,000 child beggars in Senegal (close to one percent of the population), the majority of them talibés. The head of UNICEF in Guinea-Bissau, Jean Dricot, says most of those child beggars come from Guinea-Bissau. “They don’t have schools. They don’t have access to healthcare. They sleep 40 or 50 to a room. They spend all day on the street getting money that they have to hand over at night,” Dricot said. Jorge, the young talibé, is now back in his country, owing to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) and a Senegalese government-run welcome centre called Ginddi, two of many institutions assisting in the repatriation of children to Guinea-Bissau.

Ireland

Leanbh - Protecting Begging Children

The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children ISPCC Services

At one time this article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here]

[accessed 6 September 2011]

THE DANGERS OF BEGGING - · Children who are abandoned to beg or forced to beg with parents (sometimes from early infancy) represent a clear-cut child protection issue.· Such children are often deprived of their constitutional right to education.  They are exploited, demeaned and have their human dignity assaulted.  They are out in all kinds of weather placing their health, physical, emotional and psychological development at risk.

Moldova

Human trafficking: The faces and sorrow at the heart of a UN report

UN News Centre, 13 February 2009

www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=29907&Cr=&Cr1=

[accessed 21 February 2011]

Anna (not their real names) was beaten throughout her childhood in Moldova, and fled her home in despair at age 12. But those who “helped” her run away to a supposedly better life trafficked her to Poland where she was forced to beg on the streets and beaten if she did not make enough money.

Ana spent five years begging in Poland before she managed to escape and was returned to Moldova by the local police.

Pakistan

'Rat people' forced to beg on Pakistan's streets

Agence France-Presse AFP, Gujrat, Pakistan, Aug 1, 2008

news.smh.com.au/world/rat-people-forced-to-beg-on-pakistans-streets-20080802-3oqf.html

[accessed 19 August 2014]

www.smh.com.au/world/rat-people-forced-to-beg-on-pakistans-streets-20080802-3oqf.html

[accessed 13 August 2020]

Outside a Muslim shrine in this dusty Pakistani city, a "rat woman" with a tiny head sits on a filthy mattress and takes money from worshippers who cling to an ancient fertility rite. Nadia, 25, is one of hundreds of young microcephalics -- people born with small skulls and protruding noses and ears because of a genetic mutation -- who can be found on the streets of Gujrat, in central Punjab province. Officials say many of them have been sold off by their families to begging mafias, who exploit a tradition that the "rat children" are sacred offerings to Shah Daula, the shrine's 17th century Sufi saint.

According to local legend, infertile women who pray at Shah Daula's shrine will be granted children, but at a terrible price. The first child will be born microcephalic and must be given to the shrine, or else any further children will have the same deformity. Hussain said Nadia was just a young child when she was dumped at the shrine 20 years ago in the dead of the night. Her parents were never traced, he says.

"Some of these children, the handicapped ones especially, are accompanied by relatives," he told AFP. "But begging gangs also look for poor parents who will sell them because they are a burden to feed and shelter." Sohail said his department had busted more than 30 gangs across the province involved in exploiting street children, some of which had broken the limbs of children so that they would earn more as beggars. - htsc

Senegal

The Department of Labor’s 2004 Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor

U.S. Dept of Labor Bureau of International Labor Affairs, 2005

www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/tda2004/senegal.htm

[accessed 21 December 2010]

INCIDENCE AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - Senegal is a source and transit country for child trafficking to Europe for sexual exploitation. Senegal is also a destination country for children trafficked from surrounding countries. Most trafficking victims are young males forced into exploitive begging for Koranic teachers. These boys, known as talibés, spend the majority of the day begging for their Koranic teachers and are vulnerable to sexual and other exploitation. Domestically, some Koranic teachers bring children from rural areas to Senegal’s major cities, holding them under conditions of involuntary servitude. Children from Guinea and Guinea-Bissau can also be found begging in Senegal’s streets as part of this exploitive practice.

CURRENT GOVERNMENT POLICIES AND PROGRAMS TO ELIMINATE THE WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOR - In March 2004, the government participated in a workshop in Mali to discuss regional strategies for addressing child trafficking in West Africa. In July 2004, Senegal signed a bilateral agreement with Mali to combat child trafficking between the two countries. Since 2003, Senegal’s Family Ministry has operated the “Ginddi Center” in Dakar to receive and care for street children, including trafficking victims.  Pursuant to Senegal’s 2004 anti-trafficking accord with Mali, trafficked Malian children are kept at the Ginddi Center prior to repatriation.

Thailand

Human-Trafficking Of Children In Tak Province

Pattaya Daily News, 29 March 2007

www.oldpdn.com/shownews.php?IDNEWS=0000002625

[Last accessed 29 December 2010]

On a monthly basis, a small number of children vanish. These children, according to Thongsuk, are forced into working as beggars, labourers and prostitutes in Malaysia, Bangkok and Nakhon Sawan. It has also been reported that the children are badly maltreated by those who employ them, even giving them electric shocks if they don’t bring in sufficient money from begging. 

Some of the schemes that the immigrants perpetrate are: selling their children, luring some away and stealing others, even hiring out babies for 20 Baht daily to be used as fronts for begging.

Yemen – Saudi Arabia

Children in Poor Countries Need Help

International Herald Tribune, July 29, 2010

gulfnews.com/news/gulf/yemen/gangs-smuggling-yemeni-children-to-saudi-arabia-1.273504

[accessed 4 December 2011]

GANGS SMUGGLING YEMENI CHILDREN TO SAUDI ARABIA - Saudi and Yemeni officials said gangs in Yemen are kidnapping children and sending them to Saudi Arabia as beggars. Some families "rent their children" to these gangs for want of money. Children are mostly sent to Makkah and Madinah.

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