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/Eritrea.htm
Eritrea is a source
country for men, women, and children trafficked for the purposes of forced
labor and commercial sexual exploitation. In connection with a national
service program in which men aged 18 to 54 and women aged 18 to 47 provide
military and non-military service, there have been repeated reports that some
Eritreans in military service are used as laborers on some commanding
officers’ personal properties, as well as in the construction and
agricultural sectors. - U.S. State Dept Trafficking in Persons Report,
June, 2009 Check out a later country report here or a full TIP Report here |
|||||||||||
|
CAUTION: The following links
have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in Eritrea. Some of these links may lead to websites that
present allegations that are unsubstantiated or even false. No attempt
has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content. 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 precursors of trafficking such as poverty and hunger. 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 ARTICLE *** Xan Rice in www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/16/eritrea-africa-human-rights-refugees [accessed 4 February
2011] Government's
policies on torture, conscription and mass detention creating refugee crisis,
Human Rights Watch says. There is no freedom
of speech, worship or movement in ***
ARCHIVES *** Freedom House
Country Report 2020 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/eritrea/freedom-world/2020 [accessed 23 July
2020] G4. DO INDIVIDUALS
ENJOY EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY AND FREEDOM FROM ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION? Eritrea’s
conscription system ties most able-bodied men and women—including those under
18 who are completing secondary school—to obligatory military service, which
can also entail compulsory, unpaid labor for enterprises controlled by the
political elite. National service is supposed to last 18 months but is
open-ended in practice. UN human rights experts have described this system as
enslavement. Following the peace deal with Ethiopia, the government announced
a review of the national service system with a view to reducing the number of
citizens in military uniform and boosting those engaged in development
activities. However, no changes were announced by year’s end. 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Eritrea 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/eritrea/
[accessed 6 June
2021] PROHIBITION OF FORCED
OR COMPULSORY LABOR Forced labor
occurred. Despite the 18-month legal limit on national service, the
government did not demobilize many conscripts from the military or from
civilian national service as scheduled and forced some to serve indefinitely
in national service under threats of detention, torture, or punishment of
their families. Persons performing national service could not resign,
generally received no promotions, and could rarely leave the country legally
because authorities denied them passports or exit visas. Those conscripted
into national service performed standard patrols and border monitoring in
addition to labor such as agricultural terracing, planting, road maintenance,
hotel work, teaching, construction, and laying power lines, as well as many
office jobs in government ministries, agencies, and state-owned enterprises.
There were reports that some conscripts were additionally required to perform
manual labor on national service projects unrelated to their assignment and
for which they received no overtime payment. Plaintiffs in a lawsuit filed in
Canada in 2014 alleged that, as conscripts in national service, they were
required to work 72-hour weeks in a mine for between 11 and 17 years before
fleeing the country. PROHIBITION OF CHILD
LABOR AND MINIMUM AGE FOR EMPLOYMENT Children in rural
areas commonly worked on family farms, fetched firewood or water, worked in
illegal mines, and herded livestock. In urban areas children worked as street
vendors. Children also worked in small-scale garages, bicycle repair shops,
metal workshops, and tea and coffee shops. They also transported grain or
other goods via donkey cart or bicycle. Child domestic service occurred, as
did begging by children. Migrants say
suffered torture, were sold on way to Italy Agenzia Nazionale
Stampa Associata (Italian news agency) ANSA, Rome,
29 August 2018 [accessed 3
September 2018] Many of the
Eritrean migrants rescued by coast guard ship Diciotti
have said they suffered torture and were sold several times during their
journeys to Italy, sources said Wednesday. They reportedly
suffered years of violence, while some were held underground in a warehouse,
and sold two or three times, and 16 children who died after four or five
months were born during the detention, they said. Sisi,
crack down on mass murder, torture in Sinai! Seth J. Frantzman, Jerusalem Post, 22 June 2014 www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Sisi-crack-down-on-mass-murder-torture-in-Sinai-360204 [accessed 22 June
2014] The accounts are so
shocking, the more one reads the more one becomes
numb. “The kidnappers would make me lie on my back and then they would get me
to ring my family to ask them to pay the ransom they wanted,” 17-year-old Lamlam from Eritrea
told the BBC in March last year. “As soon as one of my parents answered the
phone, the men would melt flaming plastic over my back and inner thighs and I
would scream and scream in pain.” Another man recalled, “They had about four
of five of us tied up together and they would pour water on the floor and
then electrocute the water so that all of us would get electrocuted at the
same time.” He saw 20 people die. These stories are the tip of the iceberg of
a torture and mass murder industry in the Sinai peninsula that is part of a
network that spans across the Sahara and into Sudan, in which Beduin and Somali smugglers lure Africans into camps and
torture them for ransoms of up to $30,000. Back in 2011, a
Physicians for Human Rights report found through interviews that 59 percent
of the Africans traversing the Sinai Peninsula had been chained or locked up,
52% had suffered abuse and 44% had witnessed violence and murder. A survivor
told Corriera Dela Serra
that “many of the women have been ferociously and repeatedly raped by Beduin who kept them in captivity in Sinai.” A
33-year-old man named Temesghen told doctors, “they
threatened us: ‘if you don’t pay we’re going to take your organs.’” People
were chained up for over six months; they were kept inside water tankers, in
the hot and boiling sun; the women among them raped everyday.
And many of them were murdered. Torture and rape
alleged by Lampedusa asylum seekers Big News Network, 9
November 2013 www.bignewsnetwork.com/index.php/sid/218287265 [accessed 11 Nov
2013] Italian police have
claimed that dozens of African migrants on a boat, which sank near Italy's
coast in October with the loss of 366 lives, were raped and tortured before
starting their journey. People traffickers
allegedly held a group of 130 migrants from Eritrea for ransom in a desert
area in southwest Libya before allowing them to travel further, even after
they had already paid for a boat journey. Survivors from the
boat-sinking said they had been forced by the traffickers to pay for their
freedom and their onward journey to the Libyan coast and then onto a boat to
Europe. Eritrean women and
girls were allegedly raped while men were tortured with various methods
including electric shocks and beatings. Eritrea rejects US
Country Report on Human Trafficking Embassy of www.ethiopianreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=13627 [accessed 16 July
2013] The Embassy of
Eritrea finds the US State Department’s Human Trafficking Report on Due to the covert
nature of the crime, accurate statistics on the nature and prevalence of
human trafficking are difficult to calculate and many cases of human
trafficking go undiscovered and unreported. Trafficking is often associated
with organized crime; therefore, gaining access to traffickers and
information about routes, key persons involved, and practices is severely
limited, if not impossible. When such crimes are discovered and reported, the
Government of Eritrea conducts full investigations and prosecutes
perpetrators when apprehended. US adds six African
countries to trafficking blacklist South African Press
Association SAPA and Agence France-Presse AFP, www.mg.co.za/article/2009-06-16-us-adds-six-african-countries-to-trafficking-blacklist [accessed 4 February
2011] The Rights &
Wrongs: Barack Obama, Eritrea, Child Soldiers and More Juliette Terzieff, WPR-World Politics Review, 01 May 2009 [partially accessed
4 February 2011 - access restricted] ERITREAN AUTHORITIES
ACCUSED OF MASS ABUSES:
Eritrean authorities have turned the small country in northeast Child Soldiers
Global Report 2004 - Eritrea Coalition to Stop
the Use of Child Soldiers, 2004 www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/4988065f2d.html [accessed 14 August
2012] CHILD RECRUITMENT
AND DEPLOYMENT
- In 2001 over 2,000 students were detained when they demanded reform of a
mandatory summer work program. Two students had reportedly died from the
harsh conditions on the program. In August 2003 over 200 students on the
program were allegedly beaten for possessing bibles, and 57 of them detained
in scorching conditions inside metal shipping containers without adequate
food or medical care. Six students were reportedly still held in solitary
confinement in underground cells in November 2003. Two former child
soldiers who fled The Protection
Project - Eritrea The www.protectionproject.org/human_rights_reports/report_documents/eritrea.doc [Last accessed 2009] www.protectionproject.org/country-reports/ [accessed 13
February 2019] A Human Rights
Report on Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children FORMS OF TRAFFICKING –- Most reported cases
of trafficking in persons in Eritrea concern the buying and selling of
children. There are credible reports that children between the ages of 14 and
18 have been used as soldiers, and it is widely acknowledged that
children fought during the war for independence from Human Rights
Overview Human Rights Watch [accessed 4 February
2011] ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** 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 17 April
2019] www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ILAB/child_labor_reports/tda2017/ChildLaborReportBook.pdf [accessed 27 April
2020] Note:: Also check out this country’s report in the more recent edition DOL
Worst Forms of Child Labor [page 397] The Ministry of
Education operates a national program, Maetot,
under which children from grades 9-12 who may be younger than 18 years are
required to engage in compulsory labor in public works projects during their
summer holidays. (14; 11) Some children may be required to work on roads,
dams, canals, and irrigation projects. (14) Previous reports
found that some students are forced to conduct agricultural activities on
government-owned farms, in addition to their military training, and girls may
be subject to forced domestic work in military training centers. (14) The
uncertain length of service, inability to earn higher wages in the private
sector, and notoriously harsh working conditions in the National Service
provoked a significant number of youth, including unaccompanied minors, to
flee Eritrea and may have also encouraged many to resort to the use of
international smuggling or human trafficking networks. (12; 13; 17; 18; 19;
11; 20; 3) Adolescent children who attempted to leave Eritrea were sometimes
detained or forced to undergo military training, despite being younger than
the minimum age of 18 for compulsory military recruitment. (13; 11; 21; 3). 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/af/276997.htm
accessed 22 March
2019] www.state.gov/reports/2017-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/eritrea/ accessed 26 June
2019] PROHIBITION OF
FORCED OR COMPULSORY LABOR Forced labor
occurred. Despite the 18-month legal limit on national service, the
government did not demobilize many conscripts from the military as scheduled
and forced some to serve indefinitely under threats of detention, torture, or
punishment of their families. Persons performing national service could not
resign or take other employment, generally received no promotions or salary
increases, and could rarely leave the country legally because authorities
denied them passports or exit visas. PROHIBITION OF CHILD
LABOR AND MINIMUM AGE FOR EMPLOYMENT Children in rural
areas commonly worked on family farms, fetched firewood or water, and herded
livestock. In urban areas children worked as street vendors of cigarettes,
newspapers, and chewing gum. Children also worked in small-scale garages,
bicycle repair shops, metal workshops, and tea and coffee shops. They also
transported grain or other goods via donkey cart or bicycle. Child domestic
service occurred. Begging by children occurred. Human Rights
Reports » 2008 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, February 25, 2009 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2008/af/119000.htm [accessed 8 February
2020] SECTION
6 WORKER RIGHTS
– [c] The government required all men between the ages of 18 and 50 and women
between the ages of 18 and 47 to participate in the national service program,
which included military training and civilian work programs. Increasing
reports indicate citizens were enlisted in the national service for many
years below minimum-wage rates with no prospective end date. The government
justifies its open-ended draft on the basis of the undemarcated
border with The Department of Labor’s 2006 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor [PDF] www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/tda/tda2006/eritrea.pdf [accessed 4 February
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 - In Eritrea, children work on the street, in the agricultural
sector, and as domestic servants.
Children living in rural areas often work in family businesses,
including subsistence farming, and engage in such activities as fetching
firewood and water, and herding livestock. Children are expected to work from
about age 5 by looking after livestock and working in the fields. For
children working in urban areas street vending is typical, however this is
not widely prevalent. Many underage apprentices work in shops and workshops
such as garages or metal workshops in towns.
Children are reportedly involved in prostitution. However, specific
data on the commercial sexual exploitation of children in 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 - |
