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/Syria.htm
Syria is principally
a destination country for women and children trafficked for the purposes of
domestic servitude and commercial sexual exploitation. Women from Iraq,
Eastern Europe, former Soviet states, Somalia, and Morocco are recruited as
cabaret dancers and subsequently forced into prostitution after their
employers confiscate their passports and confine them to their work premises.
A significant number of women and children in the large Iraqi refugee
community in Syria are forced into sexual exploitation by criminal gangs or,
in some cases, their families. Some desperate Iraqi families reportedly
abandon their girls at the border with the expectation that traffickers on
the Syrian side would arrange forged documents for the children and “work” in
a nightclub or brothel. Iraqi families arrange for young girls to work in
clubs and to be "married," often multiple times, to men for the
sole purpose of prostitution. Some Iraqi women and girls who turn to
prostitution out of economic desperation are trafficked back into Syria after
they are arrested and deported. - U.S. State Dept
Trafficking in Persons Report, June, 2009 Check out a later country report here
and possibly a full TIP Report here |
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CAUTION: The following links
have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in 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 *** Iraqi children
forced into prostitution in Syria Business Travellers against
Human Trafficking, Global news on human trafficking, 6/24/2005 businesstravellers-org.web26.winsvr.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryID/987/Default.aspx [accessed 28
December 2010] prezi.com/7wxivqfyhudt/human-rights/ [accessed 11
September 2014] [scroll down] There is growing
evidence of Iraqi children being used as prostitutes in The Fight Against
Human Trafficking In Syria Maddey Bussmann,
The Borgen Project, 24 November 2020 borgenproject.org/human-trafficking-in-syria/ [accessed 3 March
2021] The Syrian
government has not held anyone accountable for these crimes. In fact, the
government is often complicit in trafficking. Traffickers often force
children displaced within Syria’s borders into combat as child soldiers. On
the battlefield, regime soldiers use children as human shields or suicide
bombers. The regime soldiers also trap women and young girls into marriage or
force them into prostitution. Due to the size of
refugee populations, surrounding countries have reduced the number of visas
they grant, leaving refugees with no choice but to cross borders illegally.
Doing so means their fate is in the hands of smugglers. But, staying in Syria
would mean having to survive unconscionable levels of violence and struggling
to attain even the most basic resources. ***
ARCHIVES *** U.S. human
trafficking report: China, Iran, N. Korea worst offenders Nicholas Sakelaris,
United Press International UPI, 20 June 2019 [accessed 20 June
2019] U.S. Secretary of
State Mike Pompeo said Thursday human trafficking is a strain on humanity
that violates basic human rights. He named China, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela and Cuba among the
worst offenders. Those countries all
scored the lowest on the 2019 Trafficking in Person report released by the
U.S. State Department. 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Syria 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/syria/
[accessed 27 June
2021] PROHIBITION OF
FORCED OR COMPULSORY LABOR Terrorist groups,
including ISIS and the HTS, reportedly forced, coerced, or fraudulently
recruited some foreigners, including migrants from Central Asia, children,
and Western women, to join them. Thousands of Yezidi women and girl captives
of ISIS remained missing and were presumed to have been victims of sex
trafficking and subjected to domestic servitude (see section 1.g.). PROHIBITION OF CHILD
LABOR AND MINIMUM AGE FOR EMPLOYMENT Child labor
occurred in the country in both informal sectors,
including begging, domestic work, and agriculture, as well as in positions
related to the conflict, such as lookouts, spies, and informants.
Conflict-related work subjected children to significant dangers of
retaliation and violence. Various forces,
particularly terrorist groups and regime-aligned groups, continued to recruit
and use child soldiers (see section 1.g.). Organized begging
rings continued to subject children displaced within the country to forced
labor. Freedom House
Country Report 2020 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/syria/freedom-world/2020 [accessed 5 May 2020] G4. DO INDIVIDUALS
ENJOY EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY AND FREEDOM FROM ECONOMIC EXPLOITATION? Many armed groups
engage in forced conscription or the use of child soldiers. Displaced people
are especially vulnerable to labor exploitation and human trafficking, and
there is little equality of opportunity even in relatively stable
government-controlled areas, as access to employment and investment is often
dependent on personal, political, or communal affiliations. UN urged to
investigate ISIS's bloody trade in human organs after Iraqi ambassador
reveals doctors are being executed for not harvesting body parts John Hall for MailOnline, The Daily Mail, 18 February
2015 [accessed 18
February 2015] The al-Monitor
report also claims the terror organisation has even set up a specialist
organ-smuggling division whose sole responsibility is to sell human hearts,
livers and kidneys on the lucrative international black market. '[Al-Mosuli] said
that lately he noticed unusual movement within medical facilities in Mosul
Arab and foreign surgeons were hired, but prohibited from mixing with local
doctors,' the report's author wrote. 'Information then leaked about organ
selling.' The report went on:
'Surgeries take place within a hospital and organs are quickly transported
through networks specialized in trafficking human organs. Mosuli said that the organs come from
fallen fighters who were quickly transported to the hospital, injured people
who were abandoned or individuals who were kidnapped.' Most of the organs
are then smuggled out of Syria and Iraq into neighboring countries like Saudi
Arabia or Turkey where criminal gangs sell them on to shady buyers across the
globe, the Assyrian International News Agency reported. Iraq-Syria-United
Arab Emirates: Sex traffickers target women in war-torn Iraq U.N. Integrated Regional
Information Networks IRIN, Dubai, 26
October 2006 www.irinnews.org/report/61903/iraq-syria-sex-traffickers-target-women-in-war-torn-iraq [accessed 9 March
2015] TRAFFICKED TO Authorities tackle
issue of human trafficking U.N. Integrated
Regional Information Networks IRIN, 13 September 2005 www.irinnews.org/report/25472/syria-authorities-tackle-issue-of-human-trafficking [accessed 9 March
2015] A workshop in Commercial sexual exploitation
of children is not present in Syria Arabic News,
1/9/2002 www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/020109/2002010936.html [accessed 28
December 2010] Al-Sheikh added
that in his presentation to the Congress he pointed out that the problem of
commercial sexual exploitation of children is not present in Arabic News,
3/10/2001 www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/010310/2001031042.html [accessed 28
December 2010] There is no law
prohibiting forced or compulsory labor, including that performed by children.
There were no reports of forced labor involving children or foreign or
domestic workers. Human Rights
Overview Human Rights Watch www.hrw.org/middle-eastn-africa/syria [accessed 5 May
2020] Warring parties in
the Syrian conflict continue to disregard human rights and humanitarian law
protections. Over 400,000 have died since 2011. The Syrian government, with
the support of its allies, raced to secure territories, using prohibited
chemical weapons, unlawful indiscriminate attacks, and withholding
humanitarian aid, while anti-government groups indiscriminately attacked
government-held areas and prevented civilians fleeing. Both groups carried
out arbitrary detentions, kidnappings and torture. While the battle against
ISIS is winding down, civilian casualties from US-led coalition airstrikes
increased, and their Kurdish-led allies continued to restrict the movement of
those displaced from ISIS areas. As
active conflict decreased, Russia and Syria called for refugees to return and
Syria passed laws to facilitate reconstruction even as it continued to
violate human rights. ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61699.htm [accessed 11
February 2020] TRAFFICKING
IN PERSONS
– There were reports by NGOs and the press that indicate Iraqi women may be
subjected to sexual exploitation in prostitution by Iraqi criminal networks
in the country, but those reports were not confirmed. A 2003 IOM study
indicated that some individuals brought into the country to work as domestic
workers suffered conditions that constituted involuntary servitude, including
physical and sexual abuse, threats of expulsion, denial or delayed payment of
wages, withholding of passports, and restriction of movement. The IOM study
documented cases in which manpower agencies in the country that hired foreign
domestic workers lured some victims through fraudulent or deceptive offers of
employment, despite the fact that such manpower agencies are banned. 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 - |
