Selangor Moves To End Human Trafficking

By Boo Su-Lyn

SHAH ALAM, Jan 10 — Selangor has set up a taskforce to tackle human trafficking, state executive councillor Rodziah Ismail said today.

“I am proud that Selangor is the first state, not just to state our commitment to end human trafficking, but to also create the structure to fight human trafficking,” said Rodziah, who will chair the newly-launched Selangor Anti-Trafficking in Persons Council (Mapmas).

Mapmas will review local laws to clamp down on the trade, set up a hotline, and build a shelter for trafficked victims, she said at the launch of the council this morning.

“We will also work together with other agencies involved in preventing human trafficking, such as Immigration, Customs, local authorities and non-governmental groups that help trafficked victims,” she added.

Selangor Mentri Besar Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim also pointed out that human trafficking was a lucrative trade.

Read the full article here at The Malaysian Insider

 

Interview with Mary Burke on Human Trafficking

About Human Trafficking

What is Human Trafficking?

Human trafficking is what slavery, as a business, looks like in the 21st century. It describes the procurement of people against their will through force or deception, to be transported, sold and exploited for:

• Sex and forced prostitution
• Forced labour in sweatshops, farms and construction sites
• Slavery or domestic servitude
• Illegal international adoption
• Forced marriage or child brides
• Child soldiers
• Forced begging
• Sale of human organs
• Sacrificial worship
• Sports (e.g. child camel jockeys or football players)

Trafficking victims are stripped of their basic human rights and treated as commodity.

A single victim can be bought and sold many times.

Human Trafficking – Some Key Facts

• Human trafficking is the fastest-growing criminal industry in the world^[1].
• Its total annual revenue is estimated at between US$5 billion to US$9 billion^[2].
• Rough estimates suggest that between 700,000 to 2 million women are trafficked across international borders annually^[3]—more than one person per minute.
• Approximately 80 per cent of those trafficked are women and girls^[4].
• An estimated 1.2 million children are trafficked every year^[5].
• Those trafficked often come from poorer areas, ethnic minorities, or are displaced persons such as runaways or refugees.
• The most common destination countries are Thailand, Japan, Israel, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Turkey and the US^[6]

What’s the difference between Human Trafficking and People Smuggling?

• A smuggled person voluntarily pays a fee to the smuggler to be transported (illegally) to another country, and is usually freed upon arrival.
• A trafficking victim is exploited and enslaved, often for purposes of forced labour and prostitution.
• Trafficking can happen both internally and across borders, whereas smuggling is always transnational.
• Smuggling and trafficking may at times overlap, such as when an initially smuggled person is later threatened and forced to work for extraordinarily low wages to pay for the transportation.

What’s life like for trafficking victims?

Victims face many risks and are often without access to legal assistance or medical help. Every day, they may face:

• Physical and sexual violence
• Appalling living conditions
• Unsafe workplaces
• Long working hours and no holidays
• Poverty due to wage deprivation
• Social alienation
• Risk of STDs, HIV/AIDS

Where does The Pixel Project fit in in the fight against Human Trafficking?

Glad you asked! Find out more about what we are attempting to do here via the campaign and in the context of the Violence Against Women cause.

Would you like to know more about Human Trafficking?

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it is a start. If you would like to find out more, go here.

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The entire article was published on http://www.thepixelproject.net/vaw-facts/about-human-trafficking/

 

 

Human traffickers disguise themselves as benefactors

Human traffickers have made the job of stamping out their trade more difficult by posing as their victims’ benefactors, a children’s advocate says.

Cruel actions have been replaced with good relationships. The traffickers make their victims trust them and ally with them, said Chakkrid Chansang, Regional Advocacy Coordinator of Save the Children.

 

“It makes our work more difficult, as the victims themselves do not want to leave the traffickers,” he said.

“Police and my team were surprised when they cracked down on a brothel and we accompanied them to help the victims there. One told us before we took her from the brothel that she wanted to say goodbye to the brothel owner. She looked intimate with him.”

Chakkrid said many women he had taken from brothels told him they wanted to go back to work there.

“I had to persuade them not to go back. I told them it was illegal and they would get better work opportunities. We had to monitor them closely to prevent them going back.”

Read the full article here at The Nation.

1.2 Million Children

a short animated film by Effie Pappa. The film depicts a third world child pursuing the dream of freedom but falls victim to exploitation.

New look at security needed

4 November 2010

PETALING JAYA: Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein said that in an increasingly borderless world, human trafficking, terrorism and money-laundering are inter-linked with drugs and arms smuggling as well as cyber crime.

In his address to the UK Trade and Investment Defence and Security Organisation symposium in Britain yesterday, he said these crimes were related to the movement of people including tourists, students and merchants.

“Globalisation acts as a fulcrum holding these bonds and the international community needs to formulate a new perspective to appreciate these linkages,” he said, adding that the different strands needed to be seen as “a single causal chain and not as exclusively distinct”.

In his address “Meeting the Security Challenge: A Malaysian Perspective”, he said human trafficking was a travesty of immense transnational proportions.

“It victimises the very citizens the state is meant to protect – specifically, the weak, the destitute and the defenceless, all for exploitative purposes.

“We note with great alarm that a third of all trafficking in women and children is in South-East Asia.

“Broad estimates suggest that annual cross-border trafficking incidents are as high as four million, with half originating in South Asia and South-East Asia,” he said, adding that it was caused by heartless profiteering.

Malaysia’s efforts against money-laundering and terrorism-financing, he added, would help identify organised criminals, block their illicit assets, weaken their organisation and neutralise threats to national security.

Hishammuddin also said that South Asia and South-East Asia were home to some of the “most notoriously radical religious fanatics”, adding that the threats were local and regional in character.

He spoke about the recent arrest of two suspected terrorists: an Indonesian who tried to smuggle 7,000 detonators from the southern Philippines through Malaysia to Medan, and a Malaysian believed to have links with Jemaah Islamiah Aceh with suspected links to al-Qaeda.

He welcomed closer cooperation with British authorities, including fostering more joint operations and strengthening collaborative research on transnational crime.

Full article here.

Nine arrested under ISA

KUALA LUMPUR (Oct 13, 2010): Seven immigration officers and two Indonesian men were arrested under the Internal Security Act (ISA) for allegedly being involved with human trafficking syndicates and activities.

In a press conference at Bukit Aman today, Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Ismail Omar said the nine men, seven of whom are officers from the Immigration Department, were detained on Monday and Tuesday.

He said the men, who are suspected of aiding the trafficking of foreigners into Malaysia, were held for further investigations into their alleged involvement in the syndicates and for investigators to gather information to penetrate the international network of the human traffickers.

“We view this issue very seriously as it has raised questions to the security of the country. Such illegal activities can also be a regional threat if these syndicates use such means of seeking entry for criminal, terrorist activities, drugs and firearms smuggling.” he said.

He said the latest operation by police was in line of the government’s goal to prove that Malaysia is committed in fighting human trafficking and to thwart any attempt by such syndicates in using the country as a transit point for their activities.

Get the full story from Sun2Surf, here.

Some 5,000 foreign workers in Malaysia protest against employer

August 16, 2010

Some 5,000 foreign workers from a computer hardware plant in Tebrau, a sub-division of the Johor Bahru district, held a protest against their employer Monday.

The protesters not only went on strike at their hostel, but also demolished a guard post and threw items including glass bottles, water bottles, iron cabinet, shoes and chairs onto the roads.

They even used fire extinguishers to spray the building, shocking people in the vicinity as they thought either fire was set on the building or tear gas was fired to disperse the crowd.

Meanwhile, the workers, mainly from Nepal, Myanmar, Vietnam, India and Bangladesh, also set up blockade at the main entrance of the hostel to prevent outsiders from entering the building.

At noon, several high-level officers from the factory were seen discussing the matter with several police officers while tens of the foreign workers approached the main building of the factory, believed to be talking to representatives of the employer.

Read the full article here on Frontlines of Revolutionary Struggle.

Posters Spotted Around The Country. Call 999.

Malaysian Charged with Exploiting 63 Indonesians in Massive Human Trafficking Case

Kuala Lumpur. A Malaysian court charged a man with exploiting 63 Indonesian women who claimed they were lured to Malaysia and forced to work as house cleaners with little or no pay, a lawyer said on Tuesday.

Lee In Chiew, a 49-year-old businessman, was charged in a district court in northern Perlis state Monday with multiple counts of human trafficking, his lawyer K. Kumarathiraviam said.

If found guilty, he could face up to 20 years in prison on some of the counts.

Kumarathiraviam said he believed it was the biggest case of alleged human trafficking brought into Malaysian courts so far. No plea was recorded, and the next court date is Oct. 13, he said.

Authorities rescued the 63 women, together with eight others who have already returned to Indonesia, from Lee’s house in July after three managed to flee and called help.

The women, promised work as maids for 500 ringgit ($160) a month, claimed they were forced to work long hours as cleaners at various houses, mostly without pay, for at least two years. The youngest rescued woman is 17 years old.

Malaysia employs nearly 2 million foreigners, mostly from poorer regional countries, in its construction, plantation, manufacturing and service industries. Many complain of overwork, unpaid salaries and sometimes even physical abuse, but prosecutions have been rare.

This article was reported in the Jakarta Globe on 7 September 2010