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Rise in Human Trafficking Tied to Poverty

Rise in human trafficking tied to poverty, international church conference participants say.

The increase in human trafficking is connected to poverty and an increase in women migrating under dangerous circumstances, said participants at an international conference. Torsten Moritz, project secretary for the Conference of European Churches' Commission for Migrants in Europe, said that "more and more people are migrating under increasingly dangerous circumstances because more and more rich countries are closing their borders."

"More women are migrating nowadays, and we know that for a variety of reasons women are those often most desperately affected by poverty and those most in danger when they migrate, becoming an easy target of the traffickers," said Moritz, whose organization represents Protestant, Anglican, Orthodox and Old Catholic churches.  Some 50 experts from 11 countries met in Vilnius to discuss "New Challenges in the Area of Human Trafficking: The Spread of Information." The conference was organized by the Commission for Migrants in Europe and included foreign experts, local governmental agencies and police, as well as representatives of Caritas Lithuania, the Catholic Church's charitable arm in the country.

Moritz said new challenges are emerging as new aspects of the human trafficking phenomenon are discovered. "Over the last decade we have been discussing the trafficking in human beings mainly for the purpose of sexual exploitation," he said. "However, what we are becoming more and more aware of is that trafficking is taking place in other areas as well ... men are forced on building sites, on ships, in agriculture and held like slaves; children are trafficked for pickpocketing or begging."

Moritz said that one of the responses to human trafficking is to spread information to consumers behind the demand for products made by victims of human trafficking and other forms of modern slavery.  For example, he said that Norwegian Church Aid, which is fighting labor exploitation in sweatshops by organizing an information campaign, asks the public, "Are you sure your T-shirt was not produced in slave-like conditions?"

Ivonne van de Kar, executive secretary of the Dutch Foundation of Religious Against Trafficking in Women, said people trying to support their families would raise money by other means if other means were available.  Easy targets keep coming from poverty-stricken countries -- the former communist East European countries and other countries outside Europe, she said.

Father Robertas Grigas, director of Caritas Lithuania, said it was a sign of hope that more than half the conference participants were representatives of the Catholic Church and other Christian organizations.  He called the Christian representation an "obvious sign that in Europe, this sphere, where a human being is humiliated and trampled, is the area of primary concern."

Father Grigas said that because of the efforts of Caritas and other nongovernmental organizations the problem of human trafficking currently is treated with a prompter response from governments and police.  Since 2001, Caritas Lithuania has been providing support for the victims of human trafficking, including direct help in crisis situations and a program of social integration, as well as medical and legal services. Support centers are functioning in the largest cities of Lithuania, while smaller centers with a network of social workers and volunteers operate in smaller towns and rural areas.

Adapted from: Ruta Tumenaite. "Rise in human trafficking tied to poverty, int’l church conference participants say." Catholic News Service. 23 October 2006