Trafficking in human beings as a phenomenon

Trafficking from the country of origin to the country of destination

Nobody, wherever they may be in the world, leaves their home country without (a) reason(s).

The factors underlying the decision to leave home may be classified into two groups. Firstly, the role of the 'push' factors, in other words factors in the home country such as poverty, unemployment, repression, natural disasters and war, which should not be underestimated.

Secondly, there are 'pull' factors in Western countries that attract people, such as democracy, freedom and employment opportunities. Also not to be overlooked are the numerous success stories (true or otherwise) and photographs of compatriots who have preceded the potential migrant and images of the Western world.

Recruiting methods

It is not necessarily the most defenceless people who become victims of trafficking.

Rather, it is those who are looking for alternatives to their present living conditions. Generally, it is young people with a sense of initiative who do not wish to simply resign themselves to a socio-economic situation that offers them no prospects.

Often, such people make an error of judgement.

This group of people easily fall prey to the promise of an attractive job abroad. Sadly, in many cases prospective migrants are not told what kind of work they are being offered. And even if the nature of the work is made clear to them, they are misled about the remuneration, employment conditions and the nature of work relations.

Another way used especially for enticing girls to the West is the lover-boy method. Girls meet someone in a discotheque, after school, or even in their own neighbourhood. They start a relationship, and everything seems fine. After some time, the boy suggests that they go to the West together in order to embark on a happy and prosperous life there. At first, everything seems to be fine, but once they have arrived in the country of destination, it is made clear to the girl that she must earn money and is obliged to work in prostitution.

The most drastic method of forcing people to go abroad is by kidnapping them. This practice is particularly prevalent with regards to girls from Eastern Europe. The kidnapping usually leads to a situation of forced prostitution.

There are increasing rumours to the effect that street and unregistered children are taken away for illegal adoption or for use in the trade of human organs to Western countries.

In several countries of origin, travel and employment agencies have also been suspected of involvement in activities linked with human trafficking. They usually offer their customers assistance with obtaining a passport, a visa, if necessary, in making the appropriate travel arrangements (i.e. tickets and itinerary) and a job in one of the Western countries. These agencies generally make themselves known by placing advertisements in newspapers.

Documents

Migrants are subjected to a number of rules relating to both crossing borders and seeking employment in a foreign country. Travel documents and a valid visa are the basic items needed to enter a foreign country be it of transit or destination. Moreover, in order to work, migrants have to have a residence document and a work permit.

To comply with these rules, many traffickers in human beings seek to acquire for their victims a specious legal status by providing them with fake or forged documents, or by forcing them to enter into a fictitious marriage contract. In addition, the urge and desire to migrate and work abroad is so intense that victims are often prepared to set off even without the necessary documents despite all the risks involved.

Travel conditions

The type of travel documents held by victims of trafficking in human beings influence a great deal the conditions under which the movement takes place.

If the victims hold the necessary documents öwhether or not they are fake or have been forgedö they can make use of regular means of transport such as aircraft and trains.

This contrasts with the situation of those who travel with unreliable documents, or without any papers. This group of migrants has to avoid any checks while crossing borders into the country of transit and/or final destination. As a result, people are often transported as a ãcommodityä in trucks or ships. There is generally little to eat or drink, no sanitary arrangements and a shortage of air.

Another, frequently used method of border crossing is by foot across the ãGreen Boardersä (i.e. forest-covered mountain ranges or rivers).

Criminal network

During the journey, many victims become involved in transfers between smugglers and traffickers. Whether such transfers occur by means of actual buying and selling depends on the organisational form of the criminal network with which the voyage has been undertaken.

Within the spectrum of organised crime, we shall focus on two examples of criminal networks which operate on two opposite ends, one based on a strict hierarchical structure or the Pyramid Model, and the second, a loosely knit network.

Strict Hierarchical Structure

The first type of network relies extensively on a traditional, strictly hierarchical structure. Such structures of human traffickers operate at the highest level of criminal organisations. These are true mafia-like structures with international branches, generally involved in several forms of crime such as illegal arms dealing, drug trafficking and money laundering. They are networks that offer full ãtravel packagesä, which include false passports, transport and accommodation. In other words, one organisation has complete control from the country of origin, via transit countries through to the country of destination. The members of such organisations may, depending on their position within the organisation, be responsible for either the whole journey or just a part of it. With these networks, the fare for the journey is agreed on in advance, and thus no buying and selling of migrants takes place en route, even if (a) transfer(s) take(s) place. This hierarchical organisational structure is found, for example, among the Nigerian networks of trafficking in human beings.

Chinese networks of trafficking in human beings also operate as genuine mafia type structures in which the network usually guarantees the entire journey from China through to the desired country of destination. Payment for the journey can be made in two ways. In the first case, the person pays part of the debt to the criminal network upon arrival in the country of destination. This implies that the network itself has a place of employment where the person can earn money to pay off the remainder of the debt. Examples include Chinese restaurants and garment sweatshops.

In the second method of payment, the migrant or their family and friends pay for the journey in instalments. In concrete terms, this means that a first sum of money is paid to the network in order to get the migrant to a transit country, and when the person wishes to proceed with the journey a second sum has to be paid, and so on until they reach the final destination. If no money is paid, the person is left behind without further assistance. In this way, the criminal network is always sure of being paid. However, such an approach means that the migrant generally incurs a high level of indebtedness along with family and friends, as they take out loans from money-lenders.

Loosely Knit Network

Trafficking networks also operate in flexible structures bringing together different groups that enter into collaborative arrangements with one another in order to form a complete chain. Such structures are able to adapt quickly and effortlessly to unexpected changes in the environment. In chronological order, the people involved are recruiters, passport-suppliers, smugglers, accommodation providers and other smugglers in the countries of transit and/or of destination. These criminal organisations do not really operate in any well defined organised structure, and have little regard for the victims, due to the fact that they make their expected profit from the passage as the transfer of migrants is always accompanied by some form of sale, at an ever-increasing price.

Forms of exploitation in the country of destination

Upon arrival in the country of destination, most migrants appear to be highly vulnerable and fairly dependent on those who will have organised their journey, lacking documents and financial resources, deprived of all communication and given over to abuse and violence. Traffickers' activities involve putting victims in a position of dependency.

The accumulation of a supposed debt constitutes an important element here. This debt consists, among other things, of the cost of tickets, travel and residence documents and accommodation. The debt is fictitious, or at any rate many times higher than the actual costs incurred and sometimes increases over time.

The debt thus legitimises the financial exploitation of the victims vis-ˆ-vis their exploiters. Victims' earnings have to be handed over to their exploiters in whole or in part in order to pay off the accumulated debt.

To increase a victims' state of dependency and restrict their freedom of movement still further, their identity papers are frequently confiscated when they arrive at their final destination.

Secondly, attempts are made to prevent victims from seeking help. This is, for example, achieved by physically curtailing their freedom and by undermining their trust in others, so that they no longer dare to seek help. The exploiters look for workplaces where they can easily keep an eye on the victims and usually also restrict their freedom of movement outside working hours by reminding them of their illegal status or pointing out that they will be prosecuted for forgery if they are found to be in possession of false identification papers.

Sexual exploitation

Prostitution is the most familiar form of exploitation of victims of trafficking in human beings. Originally, it was standard practice to consider exploitation in terms of trafficking in women - purely victims of sexual exploitation - rather than trafficking in human beings.

In principle, the basic elements of this form of exploitation are common to every situation here, i.e., forced prostitution and being required to give up all or part of one's earnings to one's exploiter. However, depending on the woman's cultural background, this practice can take many different forms.

Thus it is striking that women who have to work for criminal networks from Eastern Europe, generally the Albanian or Romanian mafia, are watched constantly. The girls are accompanied to the place where they have to work as prostitutes and their exploiters try to ensure that the girls do not keep back any money or attempt to escape.

These kinds of practices are never found among African women. For example, Nigerian girls are seldom or never kept under such close watch by their 'madam'. Yet they give up their money without resistance. This is because usually, before they leave their country of origin, a sort of agreement is entered into between the 'madam', the girl and sometimes the girl's parents. An agreement of this kind is accompanied by a number of rituals, e.g., voodoo, which the girl has to undergo. These rituals involve her having to give up parts of herself öfingernails, hair, menstrual blood and the like, which are made into a package. She then has to swear that she will never tell anyone of who helped her to go to the West and is warned that if she does, the voodoo will destroy her and her family. There is widespread belief that those who do not keep their word die within three years.

One possible reaction to the extremely dependent position of victims vis-ˆ-vis their exploiters is the tendency of victims to protect their pimps/madams. This form of ãprotectionä is based on the hope that the original promises made by the exploiters will be kept as long as victims do what is required of them. This phenomenon is known as 'identification with the aggressor'. In other words, the victims try to protect themselves by placating as far as possible those in whose power they find themselves.

Victims of sexual exploitation are found in the various settings of prostitution: street and bar prostitution, shop-fronts, cabarets, massage parlours and private houses. The settings of prostitution that are least visible give the pimps the most opportunity to abuse the girls working for them.

Economic exploitation

Although sexual exploitation appears to be the most discussed form of trafficking in human beings, we should not overlook the reality of trafficking for economic exploitation. Because of the precarious administrative situation of the victims in the country of destination and the high levels of indebtedness, most victims are vulnerable targets of exploitation as cheap labour. This form of exploitation is not the preserve of any one type of work or employment sector; it is possible to exploit people in a way that deprives them of their dignity in any employment setting. Economic exploitation in the context of trafficking in human beings and illegal employment in general are closely connected with one another. Yet there is a noticeable difference in the circumstances in which the victims have to work and the way in which their vulnerable situations are abused. The various examples supplied in this document are obviously not exhaustive.

Domestic workers

Women, men and children who work as domestic workers may be subjected to degrading living and work conditions, which are equivalent to the conditions experienced by victims of modern slavery. Because this target group works in the privacy of the home, the abuse is usually ãinvisibleä, and often difficult to tackle. Most domestic staff work long hours, starting early in the morning and finishing late at night. They work seven days a week, all year round. Often, this is accompanied by abuse, humiliation and confinement. If a contract has been drawn up at all, its provisions are totally ignored.

Individuals with diplomatic status are able to import domestic staff based on their needs. In all cases, the domestic workers are obliged to comply with the wishes of their employer(s) given the fact that the latter can fall back on their diplomatic immunity. Even the Office of Protocol in the host country, which is responsible for issuing a special identity card to domestic staff employed by diplomats, finds it difficult to intervene in situations where staff are being exploited. This office may attempt to negotiate an amicable arrangement between the diplomat and the member of staff. If negotiation appears impossible, the only option available to the Office of Protocol is to declare the diplomat in question 'persona non grata'. In other words, the office declares that the diplomat in question may no longer enter the country. The risk is that such a decision could have a negative effect on the international relations between the host country and the diplomat's country. It goes without saying that not all diplomats exploit domestic workers.

  Sweatshops (garment and textiles sectors, etc.)

Both men and women are employed for a pittance in underground textile workshops. Particularly renowned for economic exploitation are the sweatshops where people sort clothes and pack them in large bales for grading. The victims of human trafficking employed in these sweatshops are usually men, due to the strenuous physical effort required.

There are also large garment manufacturing sweatshops, where men and women are stranded for many years so that they can repay the debt they incurred in travelling to the West, bit by bit.

Catering and services sector

Many victims of economic exploitation ömen, women and children alikeö are employed in the country of destination in restaurants, bakeries, snack bars, night shops, etc. A number of the people employed in these places are placed directly by the network and are supposed to repay their debt in this way. Others are trying to pay off their debt to their family, who will usually have borrowed large amounts from loan sharks.

We should not forget that some parents let their children go and work for families in good faith, but afterwards it turns out that the families' intention was to get cheap labour.

Begging and street peddling

Victims of trafficking for labour exploitation feature strongly in the informal sector performing a variety of activities such as street peddling and begging. Most victims work for long hours every day at busy intersections and well frequented places of business, such as shopping centres and cafŽs. There are indications that debt bondage by traffickers has led to victims being forced to work in all kinds of commerce, such as the sales of flowers, cigarettes, souvenirs, etc.

Sports

The trafficking of human beings in the sports sector is by no means uncommon, in particular in the field of football. In fact it has been discovered that some victims involved in this sector present similar characteristics to those in other sectors, such as prostitution. Young players from Africa, South America or Eastern Europe go wherever the 'market' offers the best conditions, usually via an agent. The contracts between broker and player are generally extremely dubious and are drawn up in a language the young player is not familiar with, meaning that he does not know what he is signing.

If an agent manages to sell just one player to a serious club, he will have already done very well. The worst aspect of the transaction is what happens to all the other players who are rejected after being given a test, either by the failure of agents to sell them or because they do not satisfy the requirements of the clubs. A test may consist of a couple of matches with the reserve team, but may equally last for weeks or even months, during which time the young player earns virtually nothing. The young players want to believe the agents promises because for them and their families, this opportunity represents a way out of poverty. However, the reality is that there are numerous complaints of exploitation, abuse of trust and demeaning treatment, for example, wretched housing, little or no sanitary arrangements and a minimum amount of food and clothing. Some of the players are simply dropped by the agent and others are taken on illegally by smaller clubs, who pay them a small wage 'off the record' that they are unable to live on. Even on this completely illegal circuit, clubs sometimes sell players on without the players in question having any say in the matter.

Instead of the imagined accomplishment as a footballer in Europe, the fate that generally awaits such players is a degrading round of begging for a contract. Usually, they dare not return home because they are unable to meet the financial obligations they have taken on vis-ˆ-vis their families.

Things only work out for a small number of players who are taken on by a club that offers them a proper contract. For some of them, a work permit and an employment card are taken care of by the club. Usually, they are only paid the minimum wage, although this is sometimes supplemented by bonuses or benefits in kind, such as accommodation.