Apr. 02, 2005 - 18:01 MST

THE WONDERING JEW

Times

It is always there, always. There is an Article in the Rocky Mountain News March 31st by Swanee Hunt, of the Scripps Howard News Service which illuminates things a bit.

Trafficking in humans a huge, tragic industry

"Neighbors, I'm sure, thought I was family and had no idea I'd been sold for $2,500 to be a servant," Micheline, a trafficking survivor, told a crowd at the International Institute of Boston."

"Micheline, who lost her parents as a young child, was 14 when her extended family told her she was moving to the United States. She was eager and hopeful but her world crumbled when she found herself molested, abused and forced to look after three young children day and night."

"While Micheline's life is despairing enough, that it happened in affluent Darien, Conn. is remarkable. Her story helps illuminate a grim and dire situation that many think of as a problem of the "underworld," but in reality affects every section of the globe."

"Chicago police investigating prostitution houses are increasingly finding women from foreign countries, often without passports or visas. They are stumbling upon women trafficked through the illegal sex trade market. The Pacific Northwewst is a major hub for smuggling women from East Asian countries into the United States. The "land of the free" is as guilty as any other country, importing tens of thousands of victims every year."

"In Israel, 5,000 women, most smuggled from the former Soviet Union and beaten and raped during the journey, have been sold as prostitutes at auctions during the past four years. But trafficking isn't limited to women or sex. Boys and girls are trafficked into domestic servitude, forced marriage, and bonded sweatshop labor."

"More than 800,000 women and children are smuggled across borders each year. All told, trafficking is a $9 billion industry, ranking third behind drug and weapon smuggling but quickly catching up. The evdence is out there and tangible -- every pop-up ad featuring mail-order brides or every spam e-mail soliciting sex is a tell-tale sign that the trafficking industry is alive and flourishing.

Feeding on poverty and crisis, and wielding false hopes, traffickers are opportunists. Illegal adopotion rings flocked to the area in Asia hit hardest by the tsunami as more that 50,000 children lost one or both parents. In a region already booming with syndicates, these traumatized and vulnerable orphans are being trafficked for child labor and militias. As if that region didn't have enough to worry about."

"A form of slavery, trafficking preys on and affronts human dignity, often with extreme brutality and violence. Sexual trafficking incorporates a huge toll on public health, given the spread of HIV/AIDS. Eliminating trafficking should be of vital concern to all governments."

"Fortunately, some are taking notice. Hailed as a milestone in Asia"s battle against this scourge, a Thai court recently sentenced a Cambodian woman to 50 years in jail for trafficking eight women. Many such successes are due to pressure by John MIller, director of the State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons."

"Miller has added force to American policy and stoked the world's conscience."

"With better public awareness will come increased pressure from international governing bodies and local governments to curb and cure this worldwide pandemic. Only then will Micheline be able to wake from her nightmare and discover that it was only a distant dream."

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As much or little as I know, trafficking in humans has been with the world since before recorded history, tales passed on down by word of mouth remark on that very same situation.

Of course maybe the world has improved a bit. It used to be that the conquerors of a nation took the hale, healthy and beautiful people of the conquered into slavery. In recent years that hasn't happened too much, (that we know of) but the smell of money has overcome the ethics of many of the worlds money wielders who don't give a tinker's damn, people sell for so much a head.

One way or another money comes in to play, whether it is to pay a coyote to bring people in from south of the border or whether it is to buy people or con them into being the suckers they are and force them into prostitution and servitude they sell to the highest bidders no matter who they are.

There have been public figures in our country who employed illegals, payed them small wages, (if any) and threatened them with the INS if they dared try to get away. Sweat shops hold many people pretty much hostage, slaving too many hours a day having have meager meals and poor living accomodations.

The big problem as I see it is, of course, money. The traffickers have it and are making more by the hour, those of us who wish trafficking stopped cannot come up with enough money to accomplish the clean up and apparently our government is unwilling to devote enough money to put a stop to it.

I don't know exactly where the figures come from that Swanee Hunt quotes, but I tend to believe that they probably are the most accurate around. Swanee Hunt can be easily Googled, I think she was an ambassador once.

From the mists of prehistory, human trafficking in one form or another has been with us up to these Times . . . . . . . . .

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