[ Human Trafficking, Country-by-Country ]

LIBYA (Special Case) – Extracted in part from the U.S. State Dept 2023 TIP Report

Libya is a Special Case for the eighth consecutive year. The Libyan Government of National Unity (GNU), established through a UN-facilitated process in March 2021, did not effectively govern large swaths of Libyan territory, as it did not exercise control in several parts of the country. The judicial system was not fully functioning, as courts in major cities throughout the country have not been operational since 2014. Although the government and non-state actors largely upheld the October 2020 ceasefire agreement, isolated violence throughout the country and political strife between militias aligned with the Tripoli-based GNU and rival eastern institutions, including the self-styled Libyan National Army (LNA) and the House of Representatives-appointed Government of National Stability, complicated efforts to bring about unified institutions and national stability during the reporting period. Financial or military contributions from other states in the region and beyond continued to destabilize the country, although some military support abated following the ceasefire. Extra-legal armed groups, including foreign mercenaries, continued to fill a security vacuum across the country; such groups varied widely in their make-up and the extent to which they were under the direction of state authorities. These disparate armed groups committed various human rights abuses, including unlawful killings, abuse of migrants and refugees, forcible recruitment, forced labor, and sex trafficking. Impunity by those committing abuses against civilians was a pervasive problem. There were continued reports that criminal networks, militia groups, government officials, and private employers exploited migrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers in sex and labor trafficking. Endemic corruption and militias’ influence over government ministries contributed to the GNU’s inability to effectively address human trafficking.

Trafficking Profile

As reported over the past five years, human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Libya. Instability, conflict, and lack of government oversight and capacity in Libya continued to allow for human trafficking crimes to persist and be highly profitable for traffickers. Trafficking victims – both adults and children – are highly vulnerable to extreme violence and human rights abuses in Libya by governmental and non-state armed groups, including physical, sexual, and verbal assault; abduction for ransom; extortion; arbitrary killings; inhumane detention; and child soldiering. During the reporting period, an NGO reported armed groups that operated under the government provided support to and coordinated with factions of the Syrian National Army, a non-state armed group that recruited and used Syrian children as child soldiers in Libya. Observers also reported the LNA also recruited or used child soldiers during the reporting period. Credible reports since 2013 indicate some armed groups and militias, some of which are used as combat forces or security enforcement by the government, recruited and used children. During previous reporting periods, an international organization verified former Government of National Accord (GNA), LNA, GNA-affiliated armed groups, and LNA-affiliated armed groups all recruited and used child soldiers. In 2018, an international organization documented incidents in which local armed groups forcibly recruited boys 13-15 years old. Sources reported Chadian mercenary groups recruited children as young as 13 years old as combatants in 2019. Uncorroborated media reports in 2018 also claimed that ISIS trained and used children to carry out suicide attacks, to fire weapons, and to make improvised explosive devices. Children associated with armed groups in Libya are also reportedly exposed to sexual violence. IDPs, including both Libyans and foreigners, are vulnerable to both labor and sex trafficking. As of August 2022, there were an estimated 134,787 IDPs in Libya, of whom 94 percent were displaced due to the deterioration of security conditions in the country in 2019.

Migrants in Libya are extremely vulnerable to sex and labor trafficking, including those seeking employment in Libya or transiting Libya en route to Europe. An international organization reported indicators of exploitation and abuse amounting to trafficking are experienced by 76 percent of men, 67 percent of women, and 77 percent of children and youth transiting Libya. Migrants living in Libya are vulnerable to exploitation by state and non-state actors, including employers who refuse to pay laborers’ wages. As of October 2022, international organizations estimated there were at least 667,440 migrants, of whom 43,000 are registered refugees and asylum-seekers, in Libya. Migrant workers in Libya predominately come from Sub-Saharan and Sahel states. Informal recruitment agencies recruit undocumented migrants to work in the agriculture, construction, and domestic work sectors; the lack of government oversight and workers’ undocumented status increases migrants’ vulnerability to trafficking. The country continues to serve as a departure point for migrants, including unaccompanied children, crossing the Mediterranean to Europe from North Africa; the number of sea departures from Libya to Europe increased in 2022 by over 13 percent from 2021, in part due to decreased economic opportunities in Libya and the region. Elements of the LCG reportedly work with armed groups and other criminals, including traffickers, to exploit migrants for profit. There are financial incentives for smugglers and traffickers to prevent the disembarkation of migrants transiting the Mediterranean and to return migrants to Libya for detention and further exploitation. In 2022, an international organization reported cases of traffickers compelling migrant boys to drive boats to Europe who were then detained in Italy on the grounds of facilitating migrant smuggling. An international organization reports the LCG intercepted and returned 24,684 refugees and migrants to Libya in 2021, a decrease of 24 percent compared to 32,425 in 2021. Since 2017, due to violence and localized conflict, as well as pandemic-related border closures and movement restrictions, traditional smuggling and trafficking routes became more clandestine, creating greater risks and dangers for migrants; an international organization reported increased incidences of forced labor in smuggling hubs of Sebha, Brak al-Shati, Shwayrif, and Bani Walid since 2017.

Various armed groups, criminal gangs and networks, tribal groups, smugglers, and traffickers, cooperate and compete in the smuggling and trafficking of migrants to and through Libya, while carrying out serious human rights abuses and violations against migrants, including torture, sexual abuse and exploitation, rape, extortion, ransom, theft, and forced labor. International organizations report smugglers and traffickers trade migrants and refugees within illicit networks, while holding them in inhumane conditions. Highly organized trafficking networks subject migrants to forced labor and sex trafficking through fraudulent recruitment, confiscation of identity and travel documents, withholding or non-payment of wages, debt-based coercion, and verbal, physical, and sexual abuse. In some cases, migrants reportedly pay smuggling fees to reach Tripoli, but once they cross the Libyan border they are sometimes abandoned in southern cities or the desert where they are susceptible to severe forms of abuse, including human trafficking.

Several credible sources continue to report that migrants held in detention centers controlled by both the DCIM and non-state armed groups and militias were subject to severe abuse, rampant sexual violence, and forced labor. An unknown number of migrants are also held in criminal prisons affiliated with the MOJ, MOI, and MOD. Private employers and DCIM officials use detained migrants for forced labor in domestic work, garbage collection, construction, road paving, and agriculture. According to international observers, detention center operators also force migrants to provide ancillary services to armed groups, such as offloading and transporting weapons, cooking food, cleaning, and clearing unexploded ordnance; armed groups also forcibly recruit detained migrants. Once the work is completed, employers and detention center officials return the migrants to detention. In some cases, detained migrants are forced to work or exploited in sex trafficking in exchange for basic necessities or their release from prison. An international organization reported most detained migrants are Sub-Saharan Africans and that they are treated in a harsher manner than other nationalities, suggesting discriminatory treatment. In 2021, there were reports Chadian mercenary groups in Libya fraudulently recruited and “sold” newly recruited fighters between Chadian and Libyan armed groups, mostly affiliated with the LNA; some recruits reported being forced to engage in criminal activities. In November 2020, an NGO reported a UAE-based private security firm fraudulently recruited more than 390 Sudanese nationals to fight in Libya for the LNA and guard oil facilities in Ras Lanuf; the Sudanese recruits believed they would be working as security guards in the UAE.

There is reportedly a high prevalence of sexual assault and other forms of sexual violence and exploitation of female migrants along the migration routes to Libya and in DCIM-run and militia-run detention facilities in Libya; perpetrators of sexual violence against female migrants include various armed groups, smugglers, traffickers, and MOI officials. International NGOs also report migrant men and boys are increasingly vulnerable to rape and other forms of sexual abuse. Commercial sex rings reportedly subject Sub-Saharan women and girls to sex trafficking in brothels, particularly in the towns of Ubari, Sebha, and Murzuq in southern Libya; Nigerian women and girls are at increased risk of sex trafficking in Libya. According to a European NGO, Nigerian gangs recruit Nigerian girls from rural regions of the country and facilitate the transportation of the girls through Libya for sex trafficking in Italy and other European countries.