Human Trafficking in [Belarus Street Children in [Belarus] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [Belarus] [other countries] |
Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery In the early years of the 21st
Century - 2000 to 2010 gvnet.com/humantrafficking/Belarus.htm
Belarus is a source and transit country for
women, men, and children trafficked from Belarus and neighboring countries to
Russia, Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Latvia, Austria, the
Netherlands, Israel, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Turkey, Egypt, Ukraine,
and the Republic of Togo for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation
and forced labor. Authorities registered 591 trafficking victims of whom 458
were trafficked for sexual exploitation (including 96 minors) and 133 for
forced labor; 366 were female (including 42 minors) and 225 were male
(including 61 minors). - U.S.
State Dept Trafficking in Persons Report, June, 2009
[full
country report] |
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CAUTION: The following links have been culled
from the web to illuminate the situation in *** FEATURED
ARTICLE *** 500 human trafficking crimes exposed in ITAR-TASS News Agency of Russia, -- Source:
http://www.tass.ru/eng/level2.html?NewsID=10926716&PageNum=0 www.data.minsk.by/belarusnews/102006/250.html [accessed 22 January 2011] Some 500 crimes of human
trafficking were exposed in According to Belarussian
representatives, the problem of recruiting citizens for sexual or labor
exploitation abroad remains quite acute. According to an analysis of criminal
cases, Byelorussians are taken to 30 countries of the world for sexual or
labor exploitation The problem of labor exploitation
of Belarussians at construction sites in Russia has
also became topical recently. They are promised high pay, but, upon arriving
at the point of destination, Russian employers take away their passports and
force them to work 12 to 14 hours a day, using physical violence on those who
resist. ***
ARCHIVES *** Human Rights Reports » 2005
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61638.htm [accessed 22 January 2011] CHILDREN - Trafficking of children was a
problem. TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS – NGO
sources estimated that 10 thousand citizens became victims of trafficking
annually, primarily for sexual exploitation in other countries. The country
was both a country of origin and transit for women and girls trafficked to
the EU (particularly Traffickers used force, fraud, and
coercion to traffic persons, mostly from economically depressed areas, for
sexual exploitation or for physical or menial labor. Traffickers used offers
of foreign employment or marriage and travel agencies to recruit victims.
More than half of the women trafficked were promised jobs as dancers or
entertainers without any mention of prostitution or sex work. Traffickers
often withheld victims' documents and used physical and emotional abuse to
control them. Employment agencies particularly
travel and modeling agencies and persons with connections overseas were
primarily responsible for trafficking. Some traffickers reportedly had links
to organized crime and drug trafficking. Concluding Observations Of The Committee On The Rights Of
The Child (CRC) UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 7 June 2002 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/belarus2002.html [accessed 22 January 2011] [51] The Committee is concerned
about the information that Preventing, Fighting and Addressing the Social
Consequences of Trafficking in Human Beings in the European Union, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Children’s Fund
(UNICEF), 2009 www.trafik.by/en/about_the_project/general_information/ [accessed 22 January 2011] The joint project of the European
Union, the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) and the United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF)
“Preventing, Fighting and Addressing the Social Consequences of Trafficking
in Human Beings in the Republic of Belarus seeks to enhance the national
capacities of Belarus in fighting trafficking in human beings with preventive
measures and better protection and rehabilitation of victims of trafficking. In particular, the project aims
to:
Government of The National Legal Internet Portal of the news.belta.by/en/news/politics/?id=167181 [accessed 18 April 2012] The government of “The idea to open the centre
attests to the desire of the Belarusian government to share its rich
experience and best practices in the fight against trade in people and
illegal migration with specialists from all countries,” Mr. Brunson McKinley
said. 500 human trafficking crimes exposed in ITAR-TASS News Agency of Russia, -- Source: http://www.tass.ru/eng/level2.html?NewsID=10926716&PageNum=0 www.data.minsk.by/belarusnews/102006/250.html [accessed 22 January 2011] Some 500 crimes of human
trafficking were exposed in According to Belarussian
representatives, the problem of recruiting citizens for sexual or labor
exploitation abroad remains quite acute. According to an analysis of criminal
cases, Byelorussians are taken to 30 countries of the world for sexual or
labor exploitation The problem of labor exploitation
of Belarussians at construction sites in Russia has
also became topical recently. They are promised high pay, but, upon arriving
at the point of destination, Russian employers take away their passports and
force them to work 12 to 14 hours a day, using physical violence on those who
resist. IOM appraises The National Legal Internet Portal of the www.radiobelarus.tvr.by/eng/news.asp?type=cont&id=2044&date=26.10.2006 [accessed 18 April 2012] The International Organization for
Migration /IOM/ appraises Belarus’ efforts aimed to counteract human
trafficking, head of the counter-trafficking department of the IOM
headquarters in Geneva Richard Danziger told a
press conference in Minsk on October 25. He has noted that the work of the
government of Belarus in the field of fight against human trafficking meets
the world standards and is very efficient. According to Richard Danziger, Belarus has forged “a comprehensive regulatory
framework”, which takes into account the IOM recommendations and
international experience. Slavery and Anna Volk, Tech Central Station TCS Daily,, 08/23/2005 –
Source: www.techcentralstation.com/082305D.html www.data.minsk.by/belarusnews/082005/100.html [accessed 22 January 2011] Early in 2004, during a trip from his presidential palace to his residence, the Belarusian president, Alexander Lukashenko, decided there were too many faces of foreign women and girls on billboards. As a "preventive" step against human trafficking, he signed a decree that requires companies to use only Belarusian faces in their advertising. This is supposed to help more young Belarusian women get more modeling jobs in the country, instead of going abroad, where they may suffer an increased risk of being "trafficked". Committee On Elimination Of
Racial Discrimination Considers Report Of United Nations Press Release www.unhchr.ch/huricane/huricane.nsf/0/A16CB9C482F83315C1256EE80056DDF2?opendocument [accessed 22 January 2011] In connection with human trafficking, an Expert asked what
was being done to improve the situation of women and girls who were forced
into prostitution. The delegation said measures had been taken to ensure that
such activities were punished, as well as child prostitution. Efforts were
also taken to ensure that the victims were re-integrated into society. A
number of seminars had been conducted in both The Protection Project - The www.protectionproject.org/human_rights_reports/report_documents/belarus.doc [accessed 2009] FORMS OF TRAFFICKING - Women and girls are trafficked
from According to data from the
Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare, the average unemployed Belarusian is a
woman under the age of 30 with a general secondary education. Belarusian women are lured by newspaper
advertisements that promise legitimate work abroad; however, the women often
end up in prostitution and are kept against their will by threats of
violence. Several investigations
abroad have uncovered trafficking rings involving Belarusian women or girls.
In April 2004, police in Luxembourg raided a nightclub, smashing a ring that
had trafficked approximately 150 women, most of them from Belarus, Russia,
and Ukraine, to Luxembourg for forced prostitution. In May 2004, the gendarmerie of Upper
Austria reported that 150 young Belarusian women had been forced into
prostitution in that province after being lured there with false promises of
jobs in restaurants, bars, and nightclubs. There are no direct or indirect
statistics on trafficking in children from Belarus. Experts from
nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) know of individual cases and facts,
however, and they have confirmed that trafficking in children from Belarus
does exist. Those most at risk for child trafficking are children between the
ages of 11 to 18 who are from single-parent or dysfunctional families in
villages and small towns. Girls are more likely to be victims than boys.
Traffickers recruit children from youth clubs, at pubs, and in student
hostels with false promises of good earnings, though sometimes the victims
know they are being recruited for the sex industry. A widespread method is
for the trafficker to pretend that he has fallen in love with a girl in order
to gain her trust and then to sell her. Girls are used to provide sexual
services and for the production of pornography. Boys have been trafficked to
Russia for pornographic video production. Freedom House Country Report - Political Rights: 7 Civil Liberties: 6 Status: Not Free 2009 Edition www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?page=363&year=2009&country=7565 [accessed 22 January 2011] Human Rights Overview Human Rights Watch www.hrw.org/europecentral-asia/belarus [accessed 22 January 2011] Stop Violence Against Women – Country Page [accessed 22 January 2011] Library of Congress Call Number DK507.23 .B45 1995 lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/bytoc.html [accessed 22 January 2011] Human Rights in Foreign Affairs, At one time this article had been archived and may
possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 4 September 2011] BACKGROUND - Lukashenko
continues to repress those who are critical of the President and his
administration. Several prominent figures critical of the President have
disappeared including former Interior Minister Yury
Zakharanka, opposition leader Viktar
Hanchar, businessman Anatol
Krasousky, and Dmitry Zavadsky, a caeranman with
Russia's ORT television. Professor Yury Bandazhevsky, a fierce critic of the Belarusian
authorities' reaction to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, remains imprisoned
and is in poor health. However, journalists Viktor Ivashkevich,
Pavel Mazheyka, and Mikola Markevich, who had
previously been arrested and sentenced to hard labour for slander, were freed
in 2003. Belarus was classified as the only
"not free" country in Europe in a recent survey by New York based
NGO Freedom House. Efforts of the Government of www.belarusembassy.org/humanitarian/trafficking2.htm [access date unavailable] Currently there are five projects
against human trafficking being implemented in Out of 555 crimes registered
during 11 months of 2004 17 are qualified as human trade, 72 – recruiting
people for sexual exploitation, 307 – keeping brothels and pimping (including
91 for trafficking people abroad), 27 – dissemination of pornographic
materials, 128 – inducing youngsters into asocial behavior (including 78 involving
prostitution), and 4 – kidnapping with trafficking abroad. In all, 184 crimes
related to trafficking people abroad were uncovered. About 400 women were
identified as victims of trafficking. Action to End Modern-day Slavery - 2004 TIP Release Press
Statement Embassy of the United States of America, Minsk, Belarus,
2004 TIP Release Press Statement, June 14, 2004 At one time this article had been archived and may
possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 4 September 2011] "Criminals and criminal
networks are targeting some of the most vulnerable people in Some 10,000 Belarusians victims
of human trafficking annually www.charter97.org/eng/news/2004/03/02/some [accessed 22 January 2011] At one time this article had been archived and may
possibly also be accessible [here] Some 10,000 Belarusians
become victims of human trafficking annually, according to Raman Pawlyuchenka of the International Organization for
Migration (IOM). The total number of Belarusian victims may have reached
50,000, Mr Pawlyuchenka
said at a three-day workshop last week. A typical Belarusian victim is a
woman from a low-income problem family resident in a small provincial town,
IOM experts say. They suggest that instruction in measures against sex
slavery should be incorporated in Belarusian school curricula. Bosnia: The United Nations, human trafficking and
prostitution Tony Robson, World Socialist Web Site, 21 August 2002 www.wsws.org/articles/2002/aug2002/bosn-a21.shtml [accessed 22 January 2011] According to the International
Organisation for Migration (IOM) between 6,000 and 10,000 foreign women have
been coerced into prostitution in Many are lured by promises of
finding work in the West as waitresses or nannies. Once isolated from their
families, the sex traffickers take their passports and sell the women to
pimps for between $500 and $1,500. At some venues, like the nightclubs in Brcko, near the Bosnia-Serbia border, women are auctioned
like cattle to brothel owners. All material used herein
reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107 for noncommercial,
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Cite this webpage as: Patt, Prof. Martin, "Human Trafficking
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Human Trafficking in [Belarus Street Children in [Belarus] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [Belarus] [other countries]