Human Trafficking Essay

Turkessa Merriweather
Criminal Justice205
2/17/15
Joe Hartzog

The Burmese government has committed serious abuses and blocked humanitarian aid to tens of thousands of displaced civilians since June 2011, in fighting in Burma's northern Kachin State, Human Rights Watch said. Some 75,000 ethnic Kachin displaced persons and refugees are in desperate need of food, medicine, and shelter, Human Rights Watch said. In Burma, the Burmese army have been attacking villages, razed homes, pillaged properties, and forcing the displacement of tens of thousands of people. The soldiers have threatened and also tortured civilians during interrogations and raped women. They also are forcing people even children as young as 14 years old to work in the mines. The Kachin civilians say that they are also forcing them to work on the front lines for the Burmese army, enduring torture, and being fired upon by the soldier.
Human Rights Watch traces the women and girls' cross-border transport and their confinement in illegal brothels throughout Thailand where they are forced to work off their debt, often with 100 percent interest, through what amounts to sexual servitude. In addition to debt bondage, the women and girls face a wide range of abuses, including illegal confinement; forced labor; rape; physical abuse; exposure to HIV/AIDS; and, in some cases, murder. The Burmese women and girls work ten to eighteen hours a day, twenty-five days a month with anywhere from 5-15 clients a day. Health care and birth control information are minimal. Most of the women and girls are interviewed were virgins when they entered Thailand; fifty to seventy percent of them were HIV positive when they left. Escape for the Burmese women and girls is virtually impossible. If they step outside the brothel, they risk physical punishment, retribution against their parents or other relatives for defaulting on a debt and/or arrest as an illegal immigrant-by the same police who are often the brothel's best clients. Thai NGOs estimate that over 20,000 Burmese women and girls are currently in Thai brothels, with 10,000 new recruits each year.
It is estimated that there are approximately 27 million slaves around the world.
Trafficking primarily involves exploitation which comes in many forms, including:
Forcing victims into prostitution subjecting victims to slavery or involuntary servitude
Compelling victims to commit sex acts for the purpose of creating pornography
Misleading victims into debt bondage.
According to some estimates, approximately 80% of trafficking involves sexual exploitation, and 19% involves labor exploitation.
It is estimated that there are approximately 27 million slaves around the world.
68% of female sex trafficking victims meet the clinical criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder.
Around half of trafficking victims in the world are under the age of 18.
More than 2/3 of sex trafficked children suffer additional abuse at the hands of their traffickers.
Trafficked children are significantly more likely to develop mental health problems, abuse substances, engage in prostitution as adults, and either commit or be victimized by violent crimes later in life.
Women who have been trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation experience a significantly higher rate of HIV and other STDs, tuberculosis, and permanent damage to their reproductive systems.
There is only one shelter in the U.S. designed specifically to meet the needs of trafficking victims, and it currently only houses a total of seven to nine victims.
Trafficking victims normally don't get help because they think that they or their families will be hurt by their traffickers, or that they will be deported
In addition, the sex tourism business—that is, the practice of traveling or vacationing for the specific purpose of having sex—is a billion dollar industry that encourages the sexual exploitation of women and girls. Many sex tours explicitly feature young girls because the tours are

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