Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery Poverty drives the unsuspecting poor into the
hands of traffickers Published reports & articles
from 2000 to 2025 gvnet.com/humantrafficking/Bangladesh.htm
Bangladesh is a
source and transit country for men, women, and children trafficked for the
purposes of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation. A significant
share of Bangladesh’s trafficking victims are men recruited for work overseas
with fraudulent employment offers who are subsequently exploited under
conditions of forced labor or debt bondage. Children – both boys and girls –
are trafficked within Bangladesh for commercial sexual exploitation, bonded
labor, and forced labor. Some children are sold into bondage by their
parents, while others are induced into labor or commercial sexual
exploitation through fraud and physical coercion. Women and children from
Bangladesh are also trafficked to India and Pakistan for sexual exploitation. - U.S. State Dept
Trafficking in Persons Report, June, 2009 Check
out a later country report here or a full TIP Report here |
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CAUTION:
The following links have been culled from the web to
illuminate the situation in HOW TO USE THIS WEB-PAGE Students If you are looking
for material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on
this page and others to see which aspects of Human Trafficking are of
particular interest to you. Would you
like to write about Forced-Labor? Debt
Bondage? Prostitution? Forced Begging? Child Soldiers? Sale of Organs? etc. On the other
hand, you might choose to include possible precursors of trafficking such as poverty. There is a lot to the subject
of Trafficking. Scan other countries
as well. Draw comparisons between
activity in adjacent countries and/or regions. Meanwhile, check out some of the Term-Paper resources
that are available on-line. Teachers Check out some of
the Resources
for Teachers attached to this website. ***
FEATURED ARTICLES *** Human Trafficking
Becomes Attractive Nation.ittefaq.com,
11 February 2005 – Source: nation.ittefaq.com/artman/publish/printer_16178.shtml [accessed 21 January 2011] They
said tens of thousands of women and children are trafficked out each year
from Inside the slave
trade Johann Hari, The
Independent, 15 March 2008 www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/inside-the-slave-trade-795307.html [accessed 21 January
2011] They are promised a
better life. But every year, countless boys and girls in Bangladesh are
spirited away to brothels where they have to prostitute themselves with no
hope of freedom. This is the story of
the 21st century’s trade in slave-children. My journey into their underworld
took place where its alleys and brothels are most dense - Asia, where the
United Nations calculates 1 million children are being traded every day. It
took me to places I did not think existed, today, now. To a dungeon in the lawless
Bangladeshi borderlands where children are padlocked and prison-barred in
transit to Indian brothels; to an iron whore-house where grown women have
spent their entire lives being raped; to a clinic that treat syphilitic
11-year-olds. She comes into the
room swaddled in a red sari, carrying big premature black bags under her
eyes. She tells her story in a slow, halting mumble. Sufia
grew up in a village near Khulna in the south-west of Bangladesh. Her parents
were farmers; she was one of eight children. “My parents couldn’t afford to
look after me,” she says. “We didn’t have enough money for food.” And so came the lie. When Sufia was 14, a female neighbour
came to her parents and said she could find her a good job in Calcutta as a
housemaid. She would live well; she would learn English; she would have a
well-fed future. “I was so excited,” Sufia
says. “But as soon as we arrived in
Calcutta I knew something was wrong,” she says. “I didn’t know what a brothel
was, but I could see the house she took me to was a bad house, where the
women wore small clothes and lots of bad men were coming in and out.” The neighbour was handed 50,000 takka
– around £500 – for Sufia, and then she told her to
do what she was told and disappeared. - htcp Choosing Death by
Fire Over Marriage - Forced Marriages Are Driving Some Women to
Self-Immolation Leela Jacinto, ABC News,
Dec. 11 abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=79767&page=1 [accessed 21 January
2011] The abduction came as a complete surprise to Miah, a London-based community youth activist who had been dating Shipa for several years. Shipa's family had earlier accepted a marriage proposal put forth in the "correct way" by Miah's family, and the young Briton was unaware that her parents had no intention of actually allowing their daughter to marry a man of her choice. On the morning of Oct. 12, 1995, Shipa was whisked to a cousin's place near Heathrow Airport, then flown to Bangladesh. She was not informed about her family's plans for her future until just a few hours before boarding the plane. ***
ARCHIVES *** Interpol wants 6
Bangladeshi human traffickers Muntakim Saad,
Daily Star, 27 November 2020 www.thedailystar.net/backpage/news/interpol-wants-6-bangladeshi-human-traffickers-2001709 [accessed 27
November 2020] Interpol put six human traffickers of Bangladesh in their "wanted-list", on charges of deceiving jobseekers and "wrongfully confining and killing" people over ransom demands. The step came up following the killing of 26 Bangladeshi migrant workers in a Libyan desert town Mezda in May this year. Talking to Reuters, earlier, Syeda Zannat Ara, special superintendent of the CID, said these are the traffickers who trick people from Bangladesh by taking money from them with promises of jobs abroad. They then keep them hostage in Libya and torture them for more money. On May 28, some traffickers killed 30 migrant workers, including 26 Bangladeshi nationals. The killing took place at a smuggling warehouse in Mezda, near the city of Gharyan, southwest of Libya's Tripoli. Twelve more Bangladeshis were also injured in the attack, nine of whom were repatriated. Stolen lives: The
harrowing story of two girls sold into sexual slavery Yudhijit Bhattacharjee,
National Geographic Magazine, 28 September 2020 [accessed 30
September 2020] The day Sayeda left home, the boy she eloped with took her by bus from Khulna to a town near the Indian border. Arriving at night, they walked through a forest until they got to a riverbank. Sayeda noticed others on the same path, including young girls, but didn’t think much of it. At the river’s edge, the boyfriend bribed a policeman, and the two climbed into a boat that dropped them on the other side. They were in India. The boy took her to a house close to the river, where they stayed for a few nights. There, Sayeda met another girl who also had been brought over from Bangladesh, and she became suspicious. Sayeda confronted her boyfriend, and he told her she was going to work in a brothel. When she refused, he said, “I’ll kill you and dump you in the river.” Even if she could have escaped, Sayeda didn’t know whom she could have turned to for help. She had entered India illegally, and she didn’t see how she could go to the police. “I got so scared that I said OK,” she said. Bangladesh arrests
human traffickers after migrants’ murder in Libya Vatican News [accessed 23 June
2020] THE CARNAGE -- The group of 42 migrants, including 38 Bangladeshis, was held captive in a trafficking warehouse in Mizdah, around 180 kilometres from the Libyan capital Tripoli, the Bangladesh Embassy in Libya said, quoting one of the survivors of the carnage. The survivor said that they had paid between $8,000 and $10,000 to the traffickers to reach Europe through Libya. However, as the trafficking gang began torturing them to extort more money, the hostages attacked and killed one of the traffickers. In retaliation, the gang opened fire on them killing 30 and injuring 12. BANGLADESH DEPENDS HEAVILY ON REMITTANCES -- Bangladesh is one of the world's largest exporters of labour and depends heavily on money sent home by its overseas workers. More than 10 million migrants sent $18.32 billion to Bangladesh in 2019, the third highest recipient of remittance in South Asia. According to the Bureau of Manpower, Employment and Training (BMET), in 2019 alone, over 700,000 migrant workers left the country in search of employment abroad and over 73 percent of remittances were sent from the 7 Gulf Cooperation Council countries alone. EXPLOITATION BY BROKERS -- However, unlicensed brokers are known to charge workers thousands of dollars with promises of good jobs abroad that don't exist. Campaigners say that the country's dependency on unofficial brokers for recruitment opens the path to exploitation. Bangladesh’s Child
Marriage Problem Is the World’s Human Trafficking Crisis Corinne Redfern,
foreignpolicy.com, 8 November 2019 foreignpolicy.com/2019/11/08/bangladesh-child-marriage-human-trafficking-crisis/ [accessed 9 November
2019] First Papiya was forced into marriage at 12 years old. Then she was trafficked into sexual slavery. Approximately 52 percent of girls in Bangladesh are lost in the chasm between child marriage prevention and trafficking rehabilitation: coerced into marriage as children and left without the support they need to protect themselves and safely break out. Papiya was still trapped in a brothel in the village of Kandipara when I first met her in March 2017. She told me how she fled her in-laws’ house barefoot in the middle of the night, leaving her sandals by the door so that slap of their soles on the stairs didn’t wake her 22-year-old husband. As the sun rose, she spotted a rickshaw driver sleeping by the side of the road and begged him for help. He agreed with a smile, she remembered. Then he drove Papiya to a brothel and sold her for more money than he’d usually make in a month. Bangladesh asks
Brunei to deport suspects in human trafficking ring Malay Mail, 5
October 2019 [accessed 12 October
2019] Bangladesh's top diplomat in Brunei said he had received repeated complaints from workers who had paid thousands of US dollars to be taken to the wealthy South-east Asian nation on the promise of jobs that never materialised. “They keep bringing more people even though there are no jobs,” Bangladesh's High Commissioner to Brunei Mahmud Hussain told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Bangladeshis were being charged about US$4,000 by agents who either failed to get them any work at all or made them work for very low pay, Hussain said. Hannan Sikdar, 22, sold his family's land to raise the US$3,500 that he paid a broker in Bangladesh for a job in Brunei. “I was told that I would earn so much that I would be able to send 25,000 takas ($300) back home every month,” Sikdar said from Brunei by phone. After reaching Brunei, Sikdar went to work for a week, then was told not to come again. The agent told him he would have to find a new job himself and threatened to have him deported unless he handed over a portion of his monthly salary. Human Trafficking
Takes Centre Stage in Bangladesh International
Organization for Migration IOM, 24 May 2019 www.iom.int/news/human-trafficking-takes-centre-stage-bangladesh [accessed 24 May
2019] Cox’s Bazar – Bangladesh is boosting efforts to combat human trafficking with a 2018-2022 national plan of action to improve enforcement through better inter-agency coordination, improved training of officers and harmonization of existing laws. The plan, developed with technical support from the International Organization for Migration (IOM), was presented to local officials and counter trafficking specialists at a conference in Cox’s Bazar this week. It follows legislation passed in 2012 to counter human trafficking in this South Asian country of 160 million. Limited socio-economic opportunities drive thousands of Bangladeshis to look for opportunities abroad. But many are believed to fall into the hands of human trafficking networks, ending up in forced labour or other exploitative situations abroad. Trafficking in persons also occurs internally within Bangladesh. 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Bangladesh U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, 30 March 2021 www.state.gov/reports/2020-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/bangladesh/
[accessed 11 May
2021] PROHIBITION OF
FORCED OR COMPULSORY LABOR Some individuals recruited to work overseas with fraudulent employment offers subsequently were exploited abroad under conditions of forced labor or debt bondage. Many migrant workers assumed debt to pay high recruitment fees imposed legally by recruitment agencies belonging to the Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies, and illegally by unlicensed subagents. Children and adults were also forced into domestic servitude and bonded labor that involved restricted movement, nonpayment of wages, threats, and physical or sexual abuse (see section 7.c.). Traffickers exploited workers in forced labor through debt-based coercion and bonded labor in the shrimp and fish processing industries, aluminum and garment factories, brick kilns, dry fish production, and shipbreaking. NGOs reported officials permit traffickers to recruit and operate at India-Bangladesh border crossings and maritime embarkation points. The over 860,000 undocumented Rohingya men, women, and children in refugee camps, who do not have access to formal schooling or work, are vulnerable to forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation, particularly by local criminal networks. International organizations report that officials take bribes from traffickers to access refugee camps. PROHIBITION OF CHILD
LABOR AND MINIMUM AGE FOR EMPLOYMENT The Labor and Employment Ministry’s enforcement mechanisms were insufficient for the large, urban informal sector, and authorities rarely enforced child labor laws outside the export-garment and shrimp-processing sectors. Agriculture and other informal sectors that had no government oversight employed large numbers of children. The government found children working eight to 10 hours per day in restaurants, engineering workshops, local transportation, and domestic work. The government also reported underage children are found in almost all sectors except the export-oriented ready-made garment (RMG) and shrimp sectors. Children engaged in the worst forms of child labor in the production of bidis (hand-rolled cigarettes), footwear, furniture and steel, glass, matches, poultry, salt, shrimp, soap, textiles, and jute, including forced child labor in the production of dried fish and bricks. Children also performed dangerous tasks in the production of garments and leather goods bound for the local market, where the Bangladesh Labor Foundation reported 58 percent of workers are under 18, and 18 percent are under the age of 15. Freedom House
Country Report 2020 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/bangladesh/freedom-world/2020 [accessed 23 April
2020] G4. DO INDIVIDUALS
ENJOY EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY AND FREEDOM FROM ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION? Bangladesh remains both a major supplier of and transit point for trafficking victims, with tens of thousands of people trafficked each year. Women and children are trafficked both overseas and within the country for the purposes of domestic servitude and sexual exploitation, while men are trafficked primarily for labor abroad. A comprehensive 2013 antitrafficking law provides protection to victims and increased penalties for traffickers, but enforcement remains inadequate. 2017 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor Office of Child
Labor, Forced Labor, and Human Trafficking, Bureau of International Labor
Affairs, US Dept of Labor, 2018 www.dol.gov/sites/default/files/documents/ilab/ChildLaborReport_Book.pdf [accessed 15 April
2019] www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ILAB/child_labor_reports/tda2017/ChildLaborReportBook.pdf [accessed 23 April
2020] Note:: Also check out this country’s report in the more recent edition DOL
Worst Forms of Child Labor [page 138] Many children in Bangladesh engage in dangerous work in the informal manufacturing sector. (3; 4; 5; 6) Children working in informal garment production work as many as 16 hours a day and often carry heavy loads, use hazardous machinery, and handle chemicals without protective equipment. (7; 33) Children employed in tanneries similarly lack protective equipment and experience continuous exposure to heavy metals, formaldehyde, and other hazardous chemicals. (4; 5) In addition, some children in Bangladesh work under forced labor conditions in the dried fish sector and in the production of bricks to help pay off family debts to local moneylenders. (1; 2). Bangladeshi
trafficking victim rescued in India, 2 held The Daily Star, 29
August 2015 www.thedailystar.net/country/bangladeshi-trafficking-victim-rescued-india-2-held-134548 [accessed 30 Aug
2015] Indian police claimed to have rescued a Bangladeshi teenage girl from human traffickers in North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal last week. According to the victim, she set out with a woman to visit a relative’s house. But the lady took her at Bashihat Mahkuma Baduria border area and handed her over to Saju. When Saju was handing her over to Mollah in Bortghat area, the girl threw a tantrum. Local police reached the spot immediately, rescued the girl and arrested the duo. Iranian islands a
torture ground for duped migrants Mohammad Jamil Khan,
Dhaka Tribune, 4 April 2015 www.dhakatribune.com/2015/apr/04/iranian-islands-torture-ground-duped-migrants [accessed 13 April
2015] www.dhakatribune.com/uncategorized/2015/04/03/iranian-islands-a-torture-ground-for-duped-migrants/ [accessed 20 January
2018] When hard-working Bangladeshi migrants arrive in the UAE looking for jobs, they are steered by dreams of turning their own lives around, while they seize every opportunity before them to earn a little extra for their loved ones back home. But that leaves them vulnerable to exploitation by unscrupulous opportunity seekers. An Iran-based gang of human traffickers lure the Bangladeshi men with promises of better jobs in European countries – mostly in Turkey, Greece and Italy; but as soon as they are smuggled out of the United Arab Emirates, the workers are held captive in islands near the Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas. Hideouts on the islands – located in the 39km stretch of the Strait of Hormuz – are used to torture the Bangladeshi expatriates, while their families back home are contacted to demand ransom. Many of the hostages are unable to survive the torture, and die there at the hands of their captors. Prostitution and
forced labour: trafficking in human beings in
Bangladesh Sumon Corraya,
Asia News, Dhaka, 26 February 2015 [accessed 26
February 2015] In Bangladesh,
human trafficking feeds humans to the sex trade and forced labour market. According to the Centre for Women and
Child Studies, boys who fall into them tend to be under ten; girls tend to be
between 11 and 16. However, it is not uncommon for children under eight years
of age to become sex slaves, segregated in brothels or bawdyhouses. Adult and teenaged
Bangladeshis end up in the sex trade or forced into slave-like conditions
like begging. In some cases, extremely poor parents sell their children. In
other cases, traffickers trick them or force them into giving up their
children. Many brothel owners
or pimps force teenagers to take steroids to make them more
"attractive" for customers. Side effects are devastating on their
bodies, and can even cause death. According to official data, 90 per cent of
the women are aged between 15 and 35 and take steroids, which cause
dependency that is hard to break. Tortured maid tells
of two and half years' ordeal Aminul Islam, The Daily
Star, Mymensingh, 10 May 2014 www.thedailystar.net/city/torture-maid-tells-of-two-and-a-half-years-ordeal-23469 [accessed 12 May
2014] risebd.com/2014/05/10/a-tortured-house-maid-slave-labor-persists-in-bangladesh/ [accessed 17 January
2016] www.thedailystar.net/tortured-maid-tells-of-two-and-half-years-ordeal-23469 [accessed 20 January
2018] The horrific tale
of her life came to light after some locals rescued her in the early hours of
Wednesday from Phulbaria Old Bus Stand area, where
she was left by her employers by a private car. “Jesse used to tell
me that she had bought me as a slave at Tk 40,000
from Monira and Joyati,
and therefore, I have to work for free,” Bedena
said. The couple used to torture her
by spraying hot water on her body, stabbing her with hot kitchen knives, and
beating her up with sticks and rolling pins, alleged Bedena. Jesse as usual tortured her Tuesday
morning on the pretext that Bedena could not
prepare breakfast in time, leaving her unconscious. She discovered herself in the bathroom
after regaining her consciousness. Horrifying torture The Daily Star, 20 April
2014 www.thedailystar.net/backpage/horrifying-torture-19883 [accessed 25 August
2014] www.thedailystar.net/horrifying-torture-19883 [accessed 20 January
2018] In the face of
acute poverty, his father, a farmer, sent him at this early age to the
capital to work as a domestic help, said Mohammad Sadek
Ali, a cousin of the boy. Another cousin Yasmin brought him along from Kishoreganj to Dhaka city around two and a half months
ago and arranged a job for him at a house in Mohammadpur
near Shia Mosque. "The people at
the house where I worked fed me once a day. I was given some rice in the
morning and that was it," Masum told The Daily
Star at DMCH yesterday. Masum's diminutive body is
scarred all over. Deep purple welts were seen on his back that is already
crisscrossed by old scars. He said he
had been hit on the head with a rod and that the scars were from the injuries
when the homemaker had flogged him with a bundle of wires. A black blister was seen on his left elbow.
"She burnt me here with a hot iron spoon," Masum
said. His cousin sister rescued him on
Friday as she discovered him in this appalling state. The child said he
had to sleep inside the bathroom. “The floor used to be wet.” He used to do the laundry, drag mattresses
up to the rooftop to put them out in the sun and sweep and mop the floor. Exploitation of
Bangladeshis in Malaysia - HR activist terms it human trafficking Porimol Palma, The Daily Star, April 11, 2009 thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=83694 [accessed 25 August 2014] www.thedailystar.net/news-detail-83694 [accessed 20 January 2018] The exploitative
practices centring Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia
constitute nothing other than human trafficking; the governments of
Bangladesh and Malaysia have not been able to protect the workers' rights,
said Irene Fernandez, a veteran migrants' rights activist of Malaysia. When they brought
workers in surplus numbers to Malaysia, they were only interested in making
fast cash. The outsourcing companies told Bangladeshi job brokers 'you pay me
500 ringgit per worker and find jobs for them and do whatever'. So,
Bangladeshi job brokers then bought the workers from the outsourcing
companies, and literally made them slaves. The brokers then told the workers
'you go and work, I will give you food and lodging'. And the workers were put
to work for two, three, or four months. So, the contract that had been signed
between the workers and recruiting agencies in Bangladesh, which was attested
by the Bangladesh government, had no meaning any more. The question is
now, why no action is being taken against the Malaysian outsourcing companies
for the fact that they violated the contracts. Again, the governments of both
countries have not been able to enforce the rules. Malaysia has to make its
companies accountable, and Bangladesh has to make its recruiting agencies
accountable. Because the passports of the workers are being held and the
workers who don't have any job are being locked up by the job brokers or the
outsourcing companies, it constitutes nothing but human trafficking. And,
with the global economic recession, the situation is going to worsen, because
many of the companies, particularly in the manufacturing sector, are
collapsing. Bangla aiding NE
human trafficking Guwahati, March 27,
2009 www.assamtribune.com/scripts/details.asp?id=mar2809/at09 [accessed 21 January
2011] The Director General
of Assam Police GM Srivastava today stated that neighbouring
countries, especially Attributing the
rise of human trafficking cases in the region to poverty and the simplicity
of the people here, the Assam Police chief stressed on the need for an
attitudinal change amongst the people to wipe out the menace from the
society. Govt cancels licences of 32 agencies The Daily Star, 2008-05-26 thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=38262 [accessed 18 April
2012] The government has
cancelled the licenses of 32 travel and recruiting agencies in the last two
months for irregularities in manpower business and involvement in human
trafficking. The licenses were
cancelled after law-enforcing agencies in an investigation found the agencies
illegally sending manpower abroad, which in most cases led to trafficking of
women and children, meeting sources said.
Police and the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) are at present
investigating the activities of some other agencies and their licenses could
also be revoked on the same grounds, the meeting was told. 3,000 Bangladeshis
in www.traffickingproject.org/2008/04/bangladeshi-victims-of-trafficking-in.html [accessed 18 April
2012] According to a
reliable Bangladeshi source who asked to remain anonymous, “the
"brokers" take US $4,000 for each Bangladeshi worker and give them
hope of good jobs and salaries,” he said. “However, they mostly find
themselves working as cleaners at restaurants and companies or construction
workers.” The source said that there
are currently at least 3,000 illegal Bangladeshi workers in Yemen who end up
taking menial jobs because they have no other choice. They receive between US
$100-130 per month, or approximately three dollars per day. Human Trafficking -
A Security Concern for Bangladesh Summer Joy,
Bangladesh Institute of Peace and Security Studies, Issue Brief 9, August
2011 www.academia.edu/22023432/Issue_9?email_work_card=thumbnail [accessed 16
February 2022] In Bangladesh, human trafficking has gone to an acute condition. Governments, though endowed huge effort, failed evidently to control the trafficking in persons in the country. Activities of the NGOs and Multilateral agencies are also limited to the function of awareness building and advocacy. The complicity of the government with the trafficking nexus has added much doubt whether the government is abundantly willing to address the issue. Combating
Trafficking for Forced Labor Purposes in the OSCE Region 2001-2009.state.gov/g/tip/rls/rm/07/93496.htm [accessed 28 May
2017] For example, a
contract labor agency in Human trafficking
on rise across bordering districts RU Correspondent,
The Daily Star, October 16, 2006 At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 4
September 2011] Speakers at a
view-exchange meeting yesterday said that the incidents of human trafficking
are on the rise across the bordering districts. The meeting revealed that between June 15,
2004 and September 2006, 488 victims were rescued, 379 traffickers were
detained and 444 victims were handed over to their legal guardian. The rest of the victims are taking shelter
in different shelter homes in the country. 21 points in border
areas vulnerable The New Nation, 23
Jul 2006 n-cat.blogspot.com/2006/07/human-trafficking-21-points-in-border.html [accessed 21 January
2011] Human trafficking
is the third most profitable business after drugs and gunrunning in the South
Asian region and twenty-one points in the border have been identified as
vulnerable areas in Prof Shamim said that representatives from the SAARC countries
recommended widening of the scope of SAARC Convention to exceed beyond
prostitution to include many types of exploitations, including forced and
indentured labour, camel jockeys and organ
transplantation. Deutsche Presse-Agentur (German Press Agency) DPA, At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 4
September 2011] The women and
children, some as young as five-years-old, were brought by the traffickers
from four neighbourhood districts with false
promises of lucrative jobs in But they are mostly
forced into prostitution as they illegally enter India, said Adhikar, a local non-government charity for children from
poor families. Maria Mackay,
Christian Today, September 8, 2005 www.christiantoday.com/article/church.mission.society.drive.against.sex.trade.in.bangladesh/3895.htm [accessed 21 January
2011] Women particularly
at risk are those living in areas where HIV is still relatively uncommon,
with most of the trafficked women are sold in to Mumbhai,
Rajasthan and Bihar in Bangla prostitution racket busted [PDF] Source: -- Retrieved from
www.goacom.org/news/getStory.php?ID=1732 on September 8, 2006 www.unescobkk.org/fileadmin/user_upload/arsh/Country_Profiles/Bangladesh/Chapter_3.pdf [accessed 21 January
2011] [page 12] A prostitution racket with links in David Gollust, Voice of At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 4
September 2011] He said several
countries listed in the bottom category last year, including Child camel jockeys
find hope Lucy Williamson, BBC
News, newswww.bbc.net.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4236123.stm [accessed 21 January
2011] Children from
Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sudan are still being smuggled to the United Arab Emirates
to work as camel jockeys, despite a law passed two years ago banning their
use. It is not uncommon for child
jockeys to fall off and be injured while racing, and their illegal status
means race track owners are often reluctant to take them to hospital. Instead, says Ansar
Burney, the boys often arrive with broken hands or broken legs. And many, he
says, have been sodomized. Four Nations Move
Against Trafficking in Response to U.S. Report Bureau of
International Information Programs, iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/texttrans/2004/09/20040910174056cmretrop0.6162226.html#axzz3BcSBZV3F [accessed 27 August 2014] The United States
issued a warning of sorts in June when it released its annual survey of human
trafficking activities worldwide. These four nations were cast in the lowest
ranking, reflecting their inaction in lawmaking and law enforcement to
control human trafficking through their borders. Sexual Slavery in February 9, 2004 –
Source: www.scientology.org/news-media/news/2004/040209.html groups.yahoo.com/group/Shetubondhon/message/7981?l=1 [accessed 21 January
2011] She was a teenage
girl from an impoverished village in NetCent Communications --
Data Source: US Department of State Bureau of Consular Affairs www.ncbuy.com/reference/country/humanrights.html?code=in&sec=6f [accessed 21 January
2011] TRAFFICKING IN
PERSONS
- In Ground-breaking
surveys expose plight of Bangladesh's working children International Labour Organization ILO, www.ilo.org/public/english/region/asro/bangkok/public/releases/yr2004/pr04_15.htm At one time this
article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible [here] The most detailed picture
ever compiled of the conditions endured by Bangladesh’s most disadvantaged
children - those working in what are classified as the worst forms of child labour – has revealed that many are working 10 hours a
day, 6 days a week, sometimes for only food and a bed. Despite these gruelling hours the vast majority receive little or even
no wages. Youngsters recharging and filling batteries averaged Tk.313 (US$
5.30) a month while street children – who earn by collecting old paper,
street selling, shining shoes, portering or begging
- averaged just Tk.288 (US$4.85) a
month. Those in the transport sector
did best, averaging Tk.1,417 (US$24) a month.
Yet even these low earnings figures paint a misleading picture of the
children’s welfare. For example, while the average monthly wages of those in
auto workshops is TK. 470 (US$ 8), 40 per cent of these children said they
received no wages, just food and lodging. Help Us Liberate
The World's Slaves Keith Skillicorn, 2006 www.webspawner.com/users/liberateslaves/ [accessed 21 January
2011] During my 31 years
of Community Service in India and Bangladesh, mainly involved in Community
Development, Rural Education, Leprosy Control and the support of Widows and
Orphans, I was stunned by another major problem, thought by many to no longer
exist in this 21st. Century - SLAVERY - SLAVERY's MAIN VICTIMS ARE WOMEN -
SPARE THEM A KIND THOUGHT During my 31 years
spent in India and Bangladesh, particularly during two periods of famine, I
saw hundreds of people enslaved as "Bonded Labourers",
most being forced to work in such places as biri
(cigarette) / carpet factories and brick kilns with females also forced into
prostitution (sexual slavery). Combating
Trafficking Of Women And Children In Staff and consultants
of the Asian Development Bank, April 2003 www.adb.org/Documents/Books/Combating_Trafficking/Regional_Synthesis_Paper.pdf [accessed 21 January 2011] www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/30364/combating-trafficking-south-asia-paper.pdf [accessed 23 April 2020] [page
89] 4.5.2 ENFORCEMENT OF LAWS AGAINST
TRAFFICKING
- The Government of Bangladesh itself acknowledges serious problems in the
enforcement of laws against trafficking, including the 2000 Act. In its 1997
report to the CEDAW Committee, the Government noted that implementation of
the laws was weak, in part because members of law enforcement were often
themselves involved in trafficking activities, and that the laws were
sometimes misapplied with the result that victims were charged with immoral
behavior and put in jail. In general, the Government noted that the judicial
system is difficult for women to access, since court proceedings are lengthy
and court officials are often hostile or unsympathetic to them. The
Government acknowledged that law enforcement authorities and the judiciary
need to be better sensitized, and that the repatriation of Bangladeshi women
who have been trafficked to other countries also needs to be facilitated. Child Traffickers
Prey on Somini Sengupta,
The New York Times, www.nytimes.com/2002/04/29/world/child-traffickers-prey-on-bangladesh.html [accessed 23 April 2020] Nuru Miah's hands show
the hazards of his vocation: a small scar on the back of his right palm marks
where a camel once sunk its teeth. Nuru, now around 10, spent two years as a camel jockey in
the Dubai desert. How his parents were
persuaded to send him to the Persian Gulf is unclear, though promises of a
better life, perhaps a little money, are the conventional sales pitches. What
is known is that he was sent from his home, a village south of here, when he
was about 7. Once he arrived in
Dubai, his meals were rationed to make sure he did not gain much weight. He
was whipped when he was disagreeable. Still, he was luckier than many of his
peers. Other little boys with whom he worked, he recalled, tumbled from the
camels and broke their bones. Nuru, the son of landless peasants, is among an untold
number of children who are taken out of this country each year by
traffickers. Some are kidnapped, others are sold. Factbook on Global
Sexual Exploitation - Bangladesh Coalition Against
Trafficking in Women, Factbook on Global Sexual Exploitation www.uri.edu/artsci/wms/hughes/banglad.htm [accessed 21 January
2011] TRAFFICKING - Police estimate
more than 15,000 women and children are smuggled out of Child Labour Persists Around The World: More Than 13 Percent Of
Children 10-14 Are Employed International Labour Organisation (ILO) News,
www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/press-and-media-centre/news/WCMS_008058/lang--en/index.htm [accessed 9
September 2011] www.scribd.com/document/366840945/Child-Labour-Persists-Around-the-World [accessed 30 January
2019] "Today's child
worker will be tomorrow's uneducated and untrained adult, forever trapped in
grinding poverty. No effort should be spared to break that vicious
circle", says ILO Director-General Michel Hansenne. Among the countries
with a high percentage of their children from 10-14 years in the work force
are: Mali, 54.5 percent; Burkina Faso, 51; Niger and Uganda, both 45; Kenya,
41.3; Senegal, 31.4; Bangladesh, 30.1;
Nigeria, 25.8; Haiti, 25; Turkey, 24; Côte d'Ivoire, 20.5; Pakistan, 17.7;
Brazil, 16.1; India, 14.4; China, 11.6; and Egypt, 11.2. Concluding Observations
of the Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) UN Convention on the
Rights of the Child, 30 September 2003 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/bangladesh2003.html [accessed 21 January
2011] [73] The Committee
is deeply concerned at the high incidence of trafficking in children for
purposes of prostitution, domestic service and to serve as camel jockeys and
at the lack of long‑term, concentrated efforts on the part of the State
party to combat this phenomenon. Human Rights
Overview Human Rights Watch [accessed 21 January
2011] ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** The Department of Labor’s 2004 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/tda2004/bangladesh.htm [accessed 21 January
2011] Note:: Also check out this country’s report in the more recent edition DOL
Worst Forms of Child Labor INCIDENCE
AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - Children are trafficked internally, externally, and
through Bangladesh for purposes of domestic service, marriage, sale of
organs, bonded labor, and sexual exploitation. The problem of child trafficking is
compounded by the low rate of birth registration, since children without legal
documents have no proof that they are underage, and the lack of enforcement
at the borders. 2017 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, 20 April 2018 www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2017/sca/277277.htm [accessed 16 March
2019] www.state.gov/reports/2017-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/bangladesh/ [accessed 16 March
2019] PROHIBITION OF
FORCED OR COMPULSORY LABOR The law prohibits all forms of forced or compulsory labor. Penalties for forced or bonded labor offenses are five to 12 years’ imprisonment and a fine of not less than 50,000 taka ($625). Inspection mechanisms that enforce laws against forced labor did not function effectively. Resources, inspections, and remediation efforts were inadequate. The law also provides that victims of forced labor have access to shelter and other protective services afforded to trafficking victims. Some individuals recruited to work overseas with fraudulent employment offers subsequently were exploited abroad under conditions of forced labor or debt bondage. Many migrant workers assume debt to pay high recruitment fees, imposed legally by recruitment agencies belonging to the Bangladesh Association of International Recruiting Agencies and illegally by unlicensed subagents. Some instances of bonded labor and domestic service were reported, predominately in rural areas. Children and adults were forced into domestic servitude and bonded labor that involved restricted movement, nonpayment of wages, threats, and physical or sexual abuse. PROHIBITION OF CHILD
LABOR AND MINIMUM AGE FOR EMPLOYMENT Children were engaged in the worst forms of child labor, primarily in dangerous activities in agriculture. Children working in agriculture risked using dangerous tools, carrying heavy loads, and applying harmful pesticides. Children frequently worked long hours, were exposed to extreme temperatures, and suffered high rates of injury from sharp tools. Children also worked in such hazardous activities as stone and brick breaking, dyeing operations, blacksmith assistance, and construction. Forced child labor was present in the fish-drying industry, where children were exposed to harmful chemicals, dangerous machines, and long hours of work. In urban areas street children worked pulling rickshaws, garbage picking, recycling, vending, begging, repairing automobiles, and working in hotels and restaurants. These children were vulnerable to exploitation, for example, in forced begging or being used to smuggle or sell drugs. Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau
of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, March 8, 2006 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61705.htm [accessed 6 February 2020] TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS
– There was extensive trafficking in both women and children, primarily to According to
government sources, law enforcement personnel recovered 139 victims of
trafficking during the year. A cooperative effort between NGOs, the
government, and the UAE, resulted in the repatriation of 164 camel jockeys,
159 of whom were reunited with their biological parents. The other five
remained in NGO shelters at year's end, receiving social and vocation skills
training while the NGO attempted to locate their families. BNWLA rescued 314
trafficking victims from within the country and repatriated 32 others from
the UAE and The exact number of
women and children trafficked was unknown. Most trafficked persons were lured
by promises of good jobs or marriage, and some were forced into involuntary
servitude outside of and within the country. Parents sometimes willingly sent
their children away to escape poverty. Unwed mothers, orphans, and others
outside of the normal family support system were also susceptible.
Traffickers living abroad often arrived in a village to marry a woman, only
to dispose of her upon arrival in the destination country, where women were
sold into bonded labor, menial jobs, or prostitution. Criminal gangs
conducted some of the trafficking. The border with All
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