Torture in [Indonesia] [other countries]Human Trafficking in [Indonesia Street Children in [Indonesia] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [Indonesia] [other countries] |
Human Trafficking & Modern-day Slavery In the early
years of the 21st Century gvnet.com/humantrafficking/Indonesia.htm
Indonesia is a major source of women,
children, and men trafficked for the purposes of forced labor and commercial
sexual exploitation. To a far lesser extent, it is a destination and transit
country for foreign trafficking victims. The greatest threat of trafficking
facing Indonesian men and women is that posed by conditions of forced labor
and debt bondage in more developed Asian countries – particularly Malaysia,
Singapore, and Japan -- and the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia,
according to IOM data. Indonesia women and girls are also trafficked to
Malaysia and Singapore for forced prostitution and throughout Indonesia for
both forced prostitution and forced labor. - 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 ARTICLES *** Human Trafficking, Migrant Labor Often Linked
in News Blaze, June 11, 2007 -- Source: newsblaze.com/story/20070611155549tsop.nb/topstory.html [accessed 13 February 2011] More than 2.5
million Indonesians from poorer regions support their families every year by
traveling overseas seeking work as domestic servants and laborers. Most work
in Malaysia and Saudi Arabia, but hundreds of thousands of others also can be
found in Singapore, Japan, Syria, Kuwait, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Some of these
individuals find work through officially sanctioned recruiting agencies. But Susilo estimates that more than half of would-be migrant
workers bypass these programs for the deceptive ease of working through less
reputable recruiters who, like traffickers the world over, confiscate
passports, trap would-be workers with exorbitant loans to travel abroad and
force them into laboring in dangerous and abusive work environments in a
futile effort to repay their unmanageable debts before sending money home to
their families. Indonesia's Footwear Workers Too Thin For
Aerobics Charles Wallace, At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] Suyatmi, a shy, 20-year old
factory worker, is too poor to know much about sneakers. She's never heard of
Bo Jackson and is too skinny to care about aerobics.
Her world consists of a rented, 5-foot sqaure room in a shantytown where she sits on the
concrete floor with three other young women.
Every day a t 7 a.m., Suyatmi
begins work at P.T. Hardaya Aneka Shoes Industry,
one of six companies in Indonesia making shoes for Nike Inc., the spectacurly successful U.S. sporting goods company. Her
production "line" of 30 workers produces 350 pairs of Nike's glitzy
footwear a day. Suyatmi
and her co-workers earn a base salary of 1,900 Indonesian rupiahs a day, the
equivalent of $1.15. Working a six-day week, with a least two hours of
overtime each day, she takes home about $17 per week. The company also gives
her lunch and a bus ride to work. "Some
days it's hard," she said. "But I'm just happy to have a job." ***
ARCHIVES *** The Department of Labor’s 2004 Findings on
the Worst Forms of Child Labor www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/tda2004/indonesia.htm [accessed 13 February 2011] INCIDENCE
AND NATURE OF CHILD LABOR - The December 26
tsunami left thousands of children in Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61609.htm [accessed 13 February 2011] TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS
– The Singkawang District of West Kalimantan
remained well known as an area from which poor, ethnic Chinese women and
teenage girls between the ages of 14 and 20 were recruited as "mail
order" brides for men, primarily in In many cases
traffickers recruited girls and women under false pretenses. One tactic was
to offer young women in rural areas jobs as waitresses or hotel employees in
distant regions, including island resorts. After the new recruits arrived and
incurred debts to their recruiters, they learned that they had been hired as
prostitutes. In October Many victims became
vulnerable to trafficking during the process of becoming migrant workers. Many
unauthorized recruiting agents operated throughout the country and were
involved in trafficking to various degrees, and some government-licensed
recruiting agents also were implicated in trafficking. Recruiting agents
often charged exorbitant fees leading to debt bondage and recruited persons
to work illegally overseas, which increased the workers' vulnerability to
trafficking and other abuses Concluding Observations of the Committee on
the Rights of the Child (CRC) UN Convention on the Rights of the Child,
30 January 2004 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/indonesia2004.html [accessed 13 February 2011] [51] The Committee
is concerned that the current adoption legislation discriminates between groups
of different ethnic origins, does not provide sufficient safeguards against
abusive practices, including trafficking of children, and does not take
sufficiently into account the principle of the best interest of the child. [87] The Committee
welcomes the endorsement by the State party of relevant international and
regional agreements such as the Regional Commitment and Action Plan of the [88] The Committee
is nonetheless concerned at the lack of awareness in the State party on this
phenomenon, at the insufficient legal protection for victims of trafficking,
and that few measures have been taken to prevent and protect children from
sale, trafficking and abduction. Human Trafficking Escalates as World
Economy Plunges Judy Lin for UCLA Today, 6/5/2009 www.international.ucla.edu/article.asp?parentid=109082 [accessed 13 February 2011] A native of a tiny
Indonesian agricultural village, Ima and her family
were among that country's estimated 116 million citizens who subsist on less
than $2 a day. As a teen, she regularly traveled two hours to the city of
Surabaya to bring in a little money cleaning houses. During one such trip,
she got an offer she couldn't refuse.
"A woman came to me and said she had a cousin in L.A. who needed
a nanny," Ima recalled. "Would I go to
the It was 1997, and
she was 17 when she excitedly arrived in L.A., only to have her
"employer" — an affluent Indonesian woman — confiscate Ima's passport, tell her that she would receive her
salary in a lump sum after two years; work her 10-to-18 hours a day, seven
days a week, as nanny and housekeeper; and beat her – hitting her in the face
and slamming her into walls. Yet Ima was one of the lucky ones. She wasn't raped, fed a
meal of rice once a day or made to sleep in the doghouse – as other victims
have recounted. Human trafficking victims suffer from
mental distress Panca Nugraha,
The www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/02/04/human-trafficking-victims-suffer-mental-distress.html [accessed 13 February 2011] As many as 57 human
trafficking victims in West Nusa Tenggara have suffered from mental distress
and at one point were treated at Selagalas Mental
Hospital in Mataram, said the head of a group
concerned with the issue. "Some
of them are still being treated and the condition of the others is improving,
but they are still receiving outpatient treatment," Endang
Susilowati, director of the Mataram
Panca Karsa Foundation
(PPK Mataram), told The Jakarta Post on
Tuesday. Endang
said the 57 victims were among the 317 human trafficking victims under the
care of PPK Mataram during 2008, 80 percent of whom
are women and 40 percent of them children under the age of 18. Endang said the
victims were believed to have suffered severe trauma after being cheated,
exploited and abused during their ordeal, as well as being ashamed to return
to their home villages. Police discover new mode of human
trafficking ANTARA News, www.indonezia.ro/crnews_jan09/dv01_012409.html [accessed 23 April 2012] Police have
discovered a new mode of human trafficking, eration
by kidnapping and drugging, National Police spokesman Insp
Gen Abubakar Nataprawira
said here on Friday. "In the
past, human trafficking was carried out by flattery and offering the victims
a job, but now the perpetrators get their victims by kidnapping and
drugging," Abubakar Nataprawira
said. He made the statement
commenting on human trafficking from Indonesia to Malaysia through border
crossing point of Entikong, West Kalimantan. Church slams daily human trafficking and
authorities’ complicity Mathias Hariyadi,
AsiaNews, 09/19/2007 www.asianews.it/index.php?l=en&art=10342&size=A [accessed 13 February 2011] Migrant women
abducted by criminal gangs, drugged and then put to work in prostitution
rings under false identities, often with complicity of corrupt local
officials and police officers is but one typical aspect of human trafficking
in Indonesia. Human Trafficking, Migrant Labor Often
Linked in News Blaze, June 11, 2007 -- Source: newsblaze.com/story/20070611155549tsop.nb/topstory.html [accessed 13 February 2011] More than 2.5
million Indonesians from poorer regions support their families every year by
traveling overseas seeking work as domestic servants and laborers. Most work
in Malaysia and Saudi Arabia, but hundreds of thousands of others also can be
found in Singapore, Japan, Syria, Kuwait, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Some of these
individuals find work through officially sanctioned recruiting agencies. But Susilo estimates that more than half of would-be migrant
workers bypass these programs for the deceptive ease of working through less
reputable recruiters who, like traffickers the world over, confiscate
passports, trap would-be workers with exorbitant loans to travel abroad and
force them into laboring in dangerous and abusive work environments in a
futile effort to repay their unmanageable debts before sending money home to
their families. Indonesian Police Arrest 15 For Alleged
Human Trafficking Malaysian National News Agency, May 30,
2007 findarticles.com/p/news-articles/bernama-malaysian-national-news-agency/mi_8082/is_20070530/indonesian-police-arrest-15-alleged/ai_n51556237/ [accessed 21 November 2010] Indonesian police
have arrested 15 people for alleged trafficking of women and girls to Human Trafficking Rate in Ninin Damayanti,
Tempo Interactive, www.tempointeractive.com/hg/nasional/2007/01/15/brk,20070115-91270,uk.html [accessed 13 February 2011] The commitment of
the Indonesian government in handling human trafficking is still considered
to be low. This can be seen from the
amount of human trafficking victims that keep increasing every year. Child trafficking on rise in Indonesia Australian Associated Press AAP, Dec 4 2006 news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=168485 [accessed 13 February 2011] Indonesian
authorities are battling a growing trade in child trafficking, including a
recent case where hundreds of babies were sold overseas, a report says. The report, by the Indonesian Ministry of
Women Empowerment, found that efforts to retrieve the children in baby
trafficking cases were flawed. The report said one
woman was caught in South Jakarta last year after having sold 880 babies
abroad. A further 25 babies were saved. Disasters Increase Risk of Human
Trafficking Rofiqi Hasan,
TEMPO Interactive, Denpasar, 08 November, 2006 | 18:10 WIB www.tempointeractive.com/hg/nasional/2006/11/08/brk,20061108-87306,uk.html [accessed 13 February 2011] The crimes are many
forms: distribution of 880 babies from North Sumatra to US Official Urges Indonesia to Crack Down
on Human Trafficking Voice of At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] On Saturday, at a
crisis center in Miller says
Indonesians are particularly vulnerable to human traffickers because of the
country's poverty, widespread slavery rings, and lack of law enforcement due
to corruption. Bangka Belitung fertile ground for human trafficking Antara News, Pangkalpinang, September 18, 2006 [accessed 13 February 2011] Bangka
Belitung province is a fertile ground for the operations of human trafficking
syndicates as the world`s biggest tin producing region is also full of ecoomic activities facilitating their illegal practices,
a local women rights protection activist said. "People from different areas in
Indonesia who fell victims of human trafficking were initially offered good
jobs with good salaries but in the end they were forced into prostitution in
pubs or red-light districts," woman rights` protection activist Radmidha Dawam said here
Monday. Govt still weak in
protecting women from human trafficking Antara News, 09/13/06 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] The Indonesian
government is still weak in preparing and implementing laws against human
trafficking which has been harming women, Executive Director of the Centre
for Development of Female Resources (PPSW) Endang Sulfiana, said here Wednesday. Human trafficking ring busted Deutsche Presse-Agentur
(German Press Agency) DPA, [accessed 13 February 2011] The victims, aged
14 to 17, were promised jobs in Jakarta as domestic workers, but were then
flown to West Kalimantan province on the Indonesian side of Borneo and taken
across the border into Malaysia, sometimes using false travel documents. Microsoft Partners with Asian NGOs to Help
in Fight Against Human Trafficking Xinhua News Agency- [accessed 13 February 2011] Microsoft Corp. has awarded over $ The Unlimited Potential grants to help combat human trafficking were distributed in Cambodia, India, Indonesia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand and will deliver IT skills through training that enhance the employment prospects and economic conditions of people most vulnerable to, or already victimised by, human traffickers. Guest Worker May Lose Digits, Toes After
Being Tied Up in Bathroom for a Month Hassan Adawi,
Arab News, Jeddah, 23 March 2005 archive.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=60876&d=23&m=3&y=2005&pix=kingdom.jpg&category=Kingdom [accessed 13 February 2011] A 25 year-old Indonesian guest worker will have several of
her fingers, toes and part of her right foot amputated because of gangrene
after being tied up for a month in a bathroom by her Saudi sponsor. The Indonesian Embassy noted that 2,000
housemaids have been repatriated to Sex Trafficking Growing in S.E. Asia Fayen Wong, Reuters, At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] Girls from the villages of Freedom House
Country Report - Political Rights: 2 Civil Liberties: 3 Status: Free 2009 Edition www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2009/indonesia [accessed 26 June 2012] Human Rights
Overview Human Rights Watch [accessed 13 February 2011] Library of Congress Call Number DS615 .I518
1993 lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/idtoc.html [accessed 13 February 2011] Bernard Hibbitts,
Jurist Legal News and Research Services, January 04, 2005 jurist.law.pitt.edu/paperchase/2005/01/indonesia-moves-to-preempt-child.php [accessed 13 February 2011] The government of
Indonesia, concerned over reports of human trafficking in children in the
wake of last week's tsunami disaster off the west coast of the country that
killed over 100,000 and left other hundreds of thousands homeless, has now
placed restrictions on the transport of youngsters out of the country and has
brought special guards into refugee camps, directing local police commanders
to be on watch against abduction or other exploitation of children. Tsunami orphans available for the right
price Mathias Hariyadi,
AsiaNews.it, 01/02/2005 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] Volunteers from the
Muslim-based Justice and Prosperity Party (PKS) claim that "human
lives" are being bought and sold in some of the refugee camps in North
Sumatra's provincial capital of Confirmed Child Trafficking in George Nishiyama,
Reuters, progressivetsunamihelp.blogspot.com/2005/01/confirmed-child-trafficking-in.html [accessed 13 February 2011] "An NGO has
reported seven trafficking cases in US issues guidelines to prevent human
trafficking in tsunami-hit Asia Agence France-Presse AFP, www.terradaily.com/2005/050105220937.7m5e36g6.html [accessed 23 April 2012] The US State
Department said Wednesday it was issuing guidelines to officials and
volunteers in tsunami-hit Call for legal reforms to protect children
in Indonesia At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] The report
highlights concerns about inconsistencies and gaps in the law, especially
with regard to the treatment and protection of children. For example, prostitution
is one of the main forms of commercial sexual exploitation of children in
Indonesia. But the law does not provide for children who are sexually
exploited in the streets and brothels to be treated as victims of a crime.
Instead, they are more likely to be treated as criminals. This is because the
Criminal Code contains no provisions relating to commercial sexual
transactions with a child even as it allows for punishment of children forced
into street prostitution, either for offences against public order or as
vagrants. Meanwhile, people who pay
for sex with a child and those who facilitate this action commonly escape
punishment due to the lack of explicit laws targeting people who buy sex with
children and weak enforcement of existing laws on pimping. Report On Laws And Legal Procedures Concerning The Commercial Sexual Exploitation Of Children In Indonesia [DOC] ECPAT International in collaboration with Antarini Arna, Director, Yayasan Pemantau Hak Anak, and Mattias Bryneson, Legal
Consultant, December 2004 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] This study finds
that in indahnesia.com blog!, blog.indahnesia.com/entry/200406090004/indonesia_s_shameful_export.php [accessed 13 February 2011] It is not something
any government likes to make public, but the figures say it all: UNICEF Urges Action On Child Trafficking ECPAT International, Online Newsdesk, 31 March 2004 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] The United Nations
Children's Fund (UNICEF) has called on Help Wanted: Abuses against Female Migrant
Domestic Workers in Indonesia and Malaysia Human Rights Watch Report, Vol. 16, No
9(C), July 2004 www.hrw.org/reports/2004/indonesia0704/3.htm [accessed 13 February 2011] I. SUMMARY - The agent came
to my house and promised me a job in a house in I worked for five
people, the children were grown up. I cleaned the house, the kitchen,
washed the floor, ironed, vacuumed, and cleaned the car. I worked from
5:00 a.m. to 2:00 a.m. every day. I never had a break; I was just
stealing time to get a break. I was paid just one time, 200 ringgit
[U.S.$52.63]. I just ate bread, there was no rice [for me]. I was
hungry. I slept in the kitchen on a mat. I was not allowed
outside of the house. ─
Interview with Nyatun Wulandari,
age twenty-three, returned domestic worker, Lombok, Indonesia, January 25,
2004. In Indonesia,
prospective migrant workers secure employment in Malaysia through both
licensed and unlicensed labor agents who often extort money, falsify travel
documents, and mislead women and girls about their work arrangements.
In both Indonesian training centers and in Malaysian workplaces, women
migrant domestic workers often suffer severe restrictions on their freedom of
movement; psychological and physical abuse, including sexual abuse; and
prohibitions on practicing their religion. Pervasive labor rights
abuses in the workplace include extremely long hours of work without overtime
pay, no rest days, and incomplete and irregular payment of wages. In
some cases, deceived about the conditions and type of work, confined at the
workplace, and receiving no salary at all, women are caught in situations of
trafficking and forced labor Asia Pacific, ABC Radio At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] There are claims
that the Indonesian military and police have been extorting bribes from
Acehnese asylum seekers and selling them into slavery. The claims have been
backed by refugee advocates working closely with the UN refugee agency in
Malaysia, where thousands of Acehnese are facing expulsion under a government
crackdown on illegal workers. Fighting sexual exploitation and
trafficking in Indonesia UNICEF, At a Glance: www.unicef.org/infobycountry/indonesia_23650.html [accessed 13 February 2011] Yani was 15 when her
boyfriend lured her away from home with false promises of a lucrative job and
a chance to continue her education. After a long journey by car to an unknown
destination, she was raped by a middle-aged Indonesian man who beat her
unconscious after she refused his advances. She was immediately sold to a
brothel where she was guarded day and night. RI to continue with battle against people
trafficking Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta, 13 June 2003 www.thejakartapost.com/news/2003/06/13/ri-continue-battle-against-people-trafficking.html [accessed 30 August 2012] An estimated
230,000 Indonesian women and children have been trafficked from their home
villages in Java, Sumatra, West Nusa Tenggara and Forced labour and exploitation of Indonesian
migrant workers Anti-Slavery International, the Indonesian
Migrant Workers' -- Submission to the United Nations
Commission on Human Rights, At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] Since the early
1980s, poverty, high unemployment and lack of educational opportunities have
been driving Indonesian migrants abroad in search of work, and by the late
1990s, they were among the fastest-growing migrant population in Slavery continues to plague Indonesian
migrant workers Allan Chernoff,
Jakarta Post, December 26, 2003 www.accessmylibrary.com/coms2/summary_0286-3485690_ITM [accessed 30 August 2012] How tragic and
terrible has been the violence against a great number of Indonesian women
employed overseas this year! Not only were they harassed, physically abused
or even raped but were also sent home without proper payment or traded from
one employer to another. Many women workers
who had just arrived home from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Malaysia and Singapore
said how they were insulted and beaten if they made mistakes in performing
their daily tasks, how they had to work overtime without extra pay, how they
were sexually harassed or raped by their male employers or their relatives
and how they were physically attacked by their female employers after they had been forced to have sex
with their male employers. Behind "the
success story" of most migrant workers, many have to endure brutality
and undergo a form of slavery to gain 600 riyal per month in Saudi Arabia, or
300 ringgit in Malaysia. ILO Cites Child Labour, Forced Prostitution
in acr.hrschool.org/mainfile.php/0136/175/ [accessed 13 February 2011] Children as young
as 13 are involved in the drug trade in Women Rescued from Sex Ring Muguntun Vanar,
“13 Indons rescued from forced prostitution,"
The Star, 1 February 2003 www.smc.org.ph/amnews/amn030215/southeast/indonesia030215.htm [accessed 13 February 2011] WOMEN RESCUED FROM
SEX RING
- Malaysian police and the staff of the Indonesian consulate have rescued 13
Indonesian women allegedly forced into the sex trade in the interior Keningau district. The rescue came a week after two of
them escaped from the hotel. The women, aged between 14 and 24, were
sent back to Indonesia through Tawau. The Keningau police are reportedly questioning the alleged
pimp and three of his assistants. Trafficking of Women and Children in
Indonesia www.solidaritycenter.org/content.asp?contentid=929 [accessed 13 February 2011] This 300-page report was published as part of a joint Solidarity
Center/ International Catholic Migration Committee countertrafficking
campaign in Indonesia, where hundreds of thousands of young girls are lured away
from their homes each year under false pretenses, sold into bondage,
physically and sexually abused, sent out into the streets as beggars, or
worse. Indonesia’s President Wahid joins ILO
Battle Against Child Labour International Labour Organisation (ILO)
News, At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] Union Network International UNI in Depth,
10/26/2000 [accessed 13 February 2011] Investigators
believe the children - aged between 6 and 17 - are among up to 1,000
separated from their parents at the height of violence in East Timor last
year and later from refugee camps in Child Labour on Indonesian Fishing
Platforms The Indonesian NGO, KKSP Foundation and
Anti-Slavery International -- Submission to the United Nations Commission on
Human Rights, Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights,
Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery, 25th Session, Geneva, 14-23
June 2000 At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] The Indonesian NGO,
KKSP Foundation and Anti-Slavery International have long been concerned about
the use of children on hundreds of rickety fishing platforms, known locally
as jermals, in the seas off the northeast coast of Children can fall
or be carried off by large waves during storms and there are no life jackets
on the platforms. The children suffer from fatigue because of the very long
hours they work and interrupted sleep patterns. In such a state it is easy to
lose concentration and fall from the platform or let a hand slip from the
winch. Charles Wallace, At one time this article had been archived
and may possibly still be accessible [here] [accessed 6 September 2011] Suyatmi, a shy, 20-year old
factory worker, is too poor to know much about sneakers. She's never heard of
Bo Jackson and is too skinny to care about aerobics.
Her world consists of a rented, 5-foot sqaure room in a shantytown where she sits on the
concrete floor with three other young women.
Every day a t 7 a.m., Suyatmi
begins work at P.T. Hardaya Aneka Shoes Industry,
one of six companies in Indonesia making shoes for Nike Inc., the spectacurly successful U.S. sporting goods company. Her
production "line" of 30 workers produces 350 pairs of Nike's glitzy
footwear a day. Suyatmi
and her co-workers earn a base salary of 1,900 Indonesian rupiahs a day, the
equivalent of $1.15. Working a six-day week, with a least two hours of
overtime each day, she takes home about $17 per week. The company also gives
her lunch and a bus ride to work. "Some
days it's hard," she said. "But I'm just happy to have a job." 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 [Indonesia] [other countries]Human Trafficking in [Indonesia Street Children in [Indonesia] [other countries]Child Prostitution in [Indonesia] [other countries]