Torture in [Brazil] [other countries]Human Trafficking in [Brazil Street Children in [Brazil] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [Brazil] [other countries] |
Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery In the early years of the 21st Century gvnet.com/humantrafficking/Brazil.htm
Brazil is a source country for men, women,
girls, and boys trafficked within the country and transnationally for the
purpose of commercial sexual exploitation, as well as a source country for
men and boys trafficked internally for forced labor. The Brazilian Federal
Police estimate that 250,000 to 400,000 children are exploited in domestic
prostitution, in resort and tourist areas, along highways, and in Amazonian
mining brothels. - 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 *** Forced Agence France-Presse AFP, www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0129-01.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] The group praised ***
ARCHIVES *** The Department of Labor’s 2004 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/tda2004/brazil.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] CURRENT
GOVERNMENT POLICIES AND PROGRAMS TO ELIMINATE THE WORST FORMS OF CHILD LABOR - The primary
program to assist child victims of commercial sexual exploitation is the
Sentinel Program, which establishes local reference centers to provide
victims with psychological, social, and legal services. In addition, the government’s Global
Program to Prevent Trafficking in Persons is working to establish a database
on trafficking in persons, including the trafficking of children and
adolescents, strengthen efforts to combat the practice, and develop pilot
programs to assist victims. [646] The program
is being implemented with the support of the United Nations Office on Drugs
and Crime (UNODC). Pilot programs are being launched in Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61718.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS
– Although comprehensive government statistics on the problem were unavailable,
authorities estimated that thousands of women and adolescents were
trafficked, both domestically and internationally, for commercial sexual
exploitation. NGOs estimated that 75 thousand women and girls, many of them
trafficked, were engaged in prostitution in neighboring South American
countries, the United States, and Western Europe. Women were trafficked from
all parts of the country. The government reported that trafficking routes
existed in all states and the Internal
trafficking of rural workers into forced labor schemes was a serious problem,
while trafficking from rural to urban areas occurred to a lesser extent.
Union leaders claimed that nearly all persons working as forced laborers had
been trafficked by labor recruiters (see section 6.c.). Labor inspectors
found a small number of persons from other countries trafficked to work in
urban sweatshops. Labor recruiters generally recruited laborers from small
municipalities in the North and Northeast and transported the recruits long
distances to ranches and plantations in remote areas in the central part of
the country. Most internally trafficked slave laborers originated from
Maranhao and Piaui states, while Concluding Observations of the Committee on
the Rights of the Child (CRC) - 2004 UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1
October 2004 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/brazil2004.html [accessed 24 January 2011] [46] The Committee
welcomes the ratification by the State party of the Hague Convention on
Protection of Children and Cooperation in Respect of Inter-country Adoption
of 1993. However, it regrets the lack of statistical data on domestic and
inter-country adoption and it expresses its concern that the State party does
not provide sufficient safeguards against trafficking and sale of children
for the purpose of, inter alia, adoption. [62] The Committee
welcomes the decision of the State party’s President, to make the fight
against child sexual exploitation a priority of his Government. However, the
Committee is deeply concerned by the wide occurrence of sexual exploitation
and related issues, as also noted in the report of the Special Rapporteur on
the sale of children, child prostitution, and child pornography following his
mission to Brazil in 2003 (E/CN.4/2004/9/Add.2). Organ trafficking: a fast-expanding black
market ISH Janes, 05 March 2008 www.janes.com/news/publicsafety/jid/jid080305_1_n.shtml [accessed 24 January 2011] Welcome to Augusto Zimmermann, L.L.B., L.L.M., Ph.D.
teaches constitutional law at This paper was presented at the Criminal
Law Workshop held by the John Fleming Centre for Advancement of Legal
Research at the Australian National University College of Law, 7-9 February
2008 www.brazzil.com/articles/188-february-2008/10042.html [accessed 24 January 2011] VIOLENCE AGAINST CHILDREN - A 2002 report from the
International Labor Organization (ILO) reveals that more than 3,000 girls
from the sparsely populated state of Rondônia are subject to conditions of
slavery and prostitution. Working children
are left vulnerable to all sorts of accidents in the workplace. There are
many reports of children illegally working in areas such as the charcoal,
sugarcane, and footwear industries. They have reportedly suffered accidents
and illness, including "dismemberment, gastrointestinal disease,
lacerations, blindness, and burns caused by applying pesticides with
inadequate protection." The Protection Project - The www.protectionproject.org/human_rights_reports/report_documents/brazil.doc [last accessed 2009] FACTORS THAT
CONTRIBUTE TO THE TRAFFICKING INFRASTRUCTURE - Organized crime plays a
significant role in trafficking in women into and out of PORTUGAL-BRAZIL: Human Trafficking and
Marriages - Another Link Mario de Queiroz, Inter Press Service News
Agency IPS, www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=35071 [accessed 24 January 2011] Today it is also
the main source of victims of human trafficking to Portugal, women who fall
into prostitution and sexual exploitation networks, as well as a source of
large numbers of women who marry Portuguese men. Brazil is the favourite country for
traffickers who form part of the prostitution networks that have mushroomed
in Portugal, which is a springboard to wealthier European Union destinations,
according to studies presented at a seminar organised Monday and Tuesday by
the governmental Portuguese Youth Institute (IPJ). Xinhua News Agency, June 29, 2006 english.people.com.cn/200606/29/eng20060629_278431.html [accessed 24 January 2011] Brazilians are the
major victims of international human trafficking, according to the United
Nations. Most victims are women aged between 18 and 30 with a low educational
background. These women want to leave for Europe and believe they will have a
better job and life there but end up being sexually exploited. Jen Ross, Women's eNews, June 19, 2005 www.womensenews.org/story/prostitution-and-trafficking/050619/brazil-tries-stem-tide-sex-slavery [accessed 24 January 2011] There's a good
reason for the widespread interest in human trafficking in Spanish Police Arrest 14 in Crackdown on
Immigrant Prostitution Ring Associated Press AP, 2005-06-06 www.libertadlatina.org/eur_spain_police_arrest_14_free_54_enslaved_brazilian_women_05-06-2005.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] The group recruited
hundreds of women coming mainly from The Price of a Slave in Bernardete Toneto, [originally in
Portuguese in the newspaper Brasil de Fato], February 2004 www.brazzil.com/component/content/article/74-february-2004/1662.html [accessed 17 April 2012] Forced Child Prostitution in Gilberto Dimenstein, Adapted from his book
"Meninas da Noite", Translation: NACLA Report on the www.libertadlatina.org/LA_Child_Sex_Auctions_Fortaleza_Brazil.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] Twelve girls--among
them, Ana Meire Lima da Silva, age 15, and Miriam Ferreira dos The girls are
attracted by the promise of licit employment, but then are sent to work in
night clubs in these faraway, inaccessible places, and kept captive like
prisoners. Even the more experienced girls, who are not new to prostitution,
are tricked. By contrast with the more naive girls, they know that they are
going to sell their bodies, but they have little idea of the regime of
slavery that awaits them. Everything rests
upon the debt--a bottomless pit. From the moment the girl arrives at the
club, she is told that she owes money: her plane or boat ticket, which can be
as much as $100. She cannot leave until this debt is paid off. The debt grows
with the purchase of clothes, perfumes, medicine and food furnished by the
club owner at an arbitrary price. Without the girls
realizing it, the owner keeps track of their expenditures using as a base the
value of a gram of gold. The debt snowballs, especially when the girls fall
sick--a common occurrence in this region ravaged by malaria. During the time
they cannot "work," the debt piles up. Money from clients does not
pass through the girls' hands; it goes, instead, directly to the cashbox. "Foreigners in Our Own Country":
Indigenous Peoples in Amnesty International, Index Number: AMR
19/002/2005, Date Published: 28 March 2005 www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR19/002/2005 [accessed 24 January 2011] 1. INTRODUCTION - Amnesty
International has documented and campaigned against human rights violations
committed against indigenous peoples in 4. IMPUNITY AND
INSECURITY
- Impunity for human rights violations in Forced Agence France-Presse AFP, www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0129-01.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] The group praised Associated Press AP, www.planet-love.com/smf/index.php?topic=10169.0;wap2 [accessed 18 February 2013] At least 1,700
women from Latin America and the Caribbean are lured each year into sexual
slavery in He said a typical
trafficking scenario is that of Irene Oblitas, a Peruvian who told her story
last year to her country's media. She said that in 1998 she boarded a plane
with three Japanese businessmen who had promised her a job in a plastics
factory. When she arrived she was
raped by all three men and sold to a Yakuza organized crime boss, who branded
her across the chest with a 6-inch (15-centimeter) rose tattoo. He forced her
to provide sexual services to up to 40 clients a day, she said. Freedom House
Country Report - Political Rights: 2 Civil Liberties: 2 Status: Free 2009 Edition www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2009/brazil [accessed 26 June 2012] Human Rights
Overview by Human
Rights Watch – Defending Human Rights Worldwide [accessed 24 January 2011] Library of Congress Call Number F2508 .B846
1998 lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/brtoc.html [accessed 24 January 2011] BBC News, 29 January, 2004 news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3440615.stm [accessed 24 January 2011] Three Brazilian officials
were shot dead while investigating allegations that farm workers were used as
slave labour, the Labour Ministry has said.
A spokesman said the officials and their driver were ambushed in the
state of Minais Gerais. But he said it
was not clear whether the murders had anything to do with the investigations. SURPRISE RAIDS - Most are in
isolated parts of the country, far from the capital, where powerful farmers
hold sway. Labour Ministry inspectors
travel around Between 250,000 and 2 million children
forced into prostitution in Brazil LibertadLatina, Short quotes and Links www.libertadlatina.org/LA_Brazils_Child_Prostitution_Crisis.htm [accessed 24 January 2011] Coalition Against Trafficking in Women www.catwinternational.org/factbook/UK.php [accessed 24 January 2011] 100 women were
trafficked for prostitution from remote villages in Essential Background: Overview of Human
Rights Issues in Human Rights Watch, January 1, 2004 www.hrw.org/legacy/english/docs/2003/12/31/brazil6998.htm#5 [accessed 18
February 2013] FORCED
LABOR
- The use of forced labor in New era of slavery exposed in Gabriella Gamini, Scotsman, February 22,
2004 www.ecoearth.info/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=29640 [accessed 24 January 2011] A skeletal Geraldo
da Silva was found sleeping under plastic sheets in a jungle camp with no
running water or toilets, the deep bloody cuts on his hands and feet evidence
that he had spent months clearing thick jungle vegetation. Armed vigilantes watched over him as he
worked and had threatened to kill him if he tried to flee. Silva was among 32
slaves found by Brazilian labour ministry inspectors during a recent raid on remote
cattle ranch in the Amazon owned by a right-wing senator - a find which has
brought to the attention of the wider world an appalling violation of human
rights. More than 2,000 slaves have
been freed in raids over the past year, and there are now thought to be more
than 25,000 people living in inhumane conditions and working for nothing on
cattle ranches, coffee farms and sugar cane fields across Brazil. The African American Desk Reference,
Schomburg Center for research in Black Culture, Copyright 1999 The Stonesong
Press Inc. and The New York Public Library, John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Pub.
-- ISBN 0-471-23924-0 www.aaregistry.org/historic_events/view/brazil-abolishes-slavery [accessed 24 January 2011] Most forced labor
takes place on large estates called Fazendas. In its present-day version,
slavery begins with labor contractors called Gatos, or cats. They lure
uneducated workers, largely from the northeast, with the promise of decent
wages. Once the laborers arrive, however, they find they have already run up
un-payable debts to their employers for food, medicine, and lodging, even the
use of tools. In many cases they work long hours in the hot sun in exchange
for food or wages as low as 10 cents and hour. Armed guards patrol work areas
to ensure nobody escapes until debts are paid. Dozens of slaves freed in BBC World Service, 21 May, 2004 news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3736207.stm [accessed 24 January 2011] They said the
sugar-cane cutters had been lured from the poor north-eastern region of A Victim's Story Source:
www.iabolish.org/slavery_today/country_reports/br.html At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 24 January 2011] [scroll down to Jobless and hungry,
the Rocha family followed the promise of the gato (recruiter) and traveled by
truck to the Minas Gerais region hoping for a better life. After arriving at
the batteria (work camp), the gato informed the Rochas - at gunpoint - that
they would be charged for travel, tools, food, and shelter. The family suddenly
found itself trapped in forced labor, working 18-hour days to pay off an
ever-accruing debt. While at the batteria, Marta Rocha, eight years old,
inhaled smoke on a regular basis. She began to cough blood and now can no
longer work. The Rochas are underfed and their debt continues to amass with
no end in sight. Marta's medical needs further increase the debt, and without
her work, the debt climbs even higher. Hundreds of miles from their native
village, the Rochas are isolated and enslaved in their own country. 'Slaves' found on Brazilian ranch BBC News, 13 February, 2004 news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3486657.stm [accessed 24 January 2011] Officials said they
discovered 32 slave-workers on the ranch of right-wing Senator Joao Ribeiro
in the northern state of Trapped: Modern-Day Slavery in the
Brazilian Amazon Binka Le Breton, Trapped: Modern-day slavery in the Brazilian Amazon, Latin
America Bureau, 24 April 2003 www.antislavery.org/archive/press/pressRelease2003-Brazil.htm At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here]
“Despite the clammy heat, I feel a cold
shiver down my back as I sense something of Albertino's pain and terror.
Lured into the jungle by false promises, treated with casual brutality, he
was worked to the limits of endurance, forcibly held prisoner, and discarded
as one might stamp on a cockroach” - from Trapped:
Modern-day slavery in the Brazilian Amazon, by Binka Le Breton Larry Rohter, New York Times, query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C04E7DE153BF936A15750C0A9649C8B63 [accessed 24 January 2011] The recruiters
gather at the bus station here in this grimy Amazon frontier town, waiting
for the weary and the desperate to disembark. When they spot a target, they
promise him a steady job, good pay, free housing and plenty of food. A quick
handshake seals the deal. But for thousands
of peasants, that handshake ensures a slide into slavery. No sooner do they board
the battered trucks that take them to work felling trees and tending cattle
deep in the jungle than they find themselves mired in debt, under armed guard
and unable to leave their new workplace. ''It was 12 years
before I was finally able to escape and make my way back home,'' said
Bernardo Gomes da Silva, 42. ''We were forced to start work at 6 in the
morning and to continue sometimes until 11 at night, but I was never paid
during that entire time because they always claimed that I owed them money.'' Mother courage New Internationalist 337 August 2001 -- Interview conducted by Mario Osava/
Inter Press Service News Agency IPS www.newint.org/features/2001/08/05/wanted/#mother [accessed 24 January 2011] Loyola lives in the
town 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] "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. All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this webpage as: Patt,
Prof. Martin, "Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery - |
Torture in [Brazil] [other countries]Human Trafficking in [Brazil Street Children in [Brazil] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [Brazil] [other countries]