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Response to African Angle....international pedophile ring smashed

Human trafficking is growing because we fail to act or re-act. It’s the Government's responsibility to fight organized crime. How much more are we going to talk about this? When are we going to take measures? I mean real measures, measures that will stop (not reduce) human trafficking?

When more individuals, governments and law agencies insist, perhaps we will see more news like the news that came from the Netherlands today.

 http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-world/20110316/EU.Netherlands.Pedophile.Ring/

... international pedophile ring smashed

By MIKE CORDER, AP
4 hours ago
Must Read?Yes     136

From left, Grant Edwards, Australian Federal Police, and Peter Davies, of th...

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THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Police said Wednesday they have smashed a huge international pedophile ring, rescuing 230 children from abuse and arresting 184 suspects — including teachers and police officers....

Human Trafficking, The African Angle

By Ifeanyi Onwumere

Human trafficking is the modern day slavery. I’m sure we’ve all heard it before, but until we find a way to purge it from among us, it bears repeating. Just as slavery proved an extremely cruel, yet profitable business venture in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, modern-day slavery (human trafficking) provides enormous profits with little risk to the trafficker. Today, for every 20,000 persons trafficked, only 1 trafficker is imprisoned. It’s no wonder that this form of human brutality has defied all governmental efforts to eradicate it.

Impoverished or distressed victims place their faith in those who promise a better life somewhere far away. By the time reality reveals the lies contained within the promise, it’s too late. Someone owns them and they are the property of masters, who treat them worse than animals by caging them, tying them up, burning them for infractions, and imprisoning them within the confines of the pimp's twisted world.

There are many facets to human trafficking. In this writing, I speak of human sex trafficking--the most lucrative business when compared to other forms of modern slavery.

Wikipedia defines Sex trafficking as: “The recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for the purpose of a commercial sex act in which a commercial sex act is induced by force….”

In parts of Nigeria, Togo, Cameroon, Liberia, many third world countries, and in Eastern Europe and Asia, it’s often the parents, who for a small profit, lead their daughters into this unethical venture.

Poverty and ignorance on the part of parents who can’t afford food for a family and the lack the financial capacity to train their daughters in school, tempt parents to hand their children over to men and women in this business hoping to receive financial returns in the future. The patrons or madams as they are called promise to take the girls to Western Europe where “a job is waiting for them.”  Upon reaching Europe, especially Western Europe, these girls will find that there is no job. Their madam or patron forces them to into prostitution by demanding the girl repay the money spent on her travels. At times, the parents are threatened with death unless their child pays the full amount, which in most cases, is triple the amount the trafficker spent.

The most painful aspect of the whole profession remains that these pimps strip away a girl’s freedom by placing her under constant surveillance. Many girls have no access to a telephone, or if they do, calls are carefully monitored to ensure they speak only with clients. In most cases, a telephone does them little good as they are somewhere strange and don’t know the language.

Some girls never make it as far as Europe. Like the slave trade in years past, they die en-route under perilous conditions.

To buttress my point, follow this link to an article that appeared in Sahara, an online news outlet based in the United State of America but edited by a Nigerian.

http://www.saharareporters.com/report/nigerian-prostitutes-languish-mali-after-failed-rescue-mission-pmnews?page=3

Conclusion: “ Charity they say begins a’ home”. Parents, I must say, must share the blame of these ugly and horrible trends. They should know to whom they hand over their child. Poverty is not an excuse to encourage a child into prostitution. Of course, some of these parents know that their daughters are going into prostitution and encourage them. But what they often fail to comprehend is the hazardous nature of the business and its after effect and life long trauma. All national governments in collaboration with international agencies as well as the immigration officials must place all hands on deck to eradicate this ugly monster that has reared its head into African society. Stiff penalties which are not easily recovered from must be melted out to those directly or indirectly involved and serve as a deterrent to participants in this modern sex slave industry.

Trading in humans is not acceptable, no matter how impoverished the nation, people group or family. Only when education and spiritual/family ties override greed and poverty will we see a decrease in human trafficking and sexual slavery.

Early Trafficked Victims-Bucharest 1997

by Pam Pyne

     By 1997, I had lived in Romania for four years. Each week I, along with a group of people from the church I attended, took food and clothing to the street where children lived under the manhole covers huddling around the sewer pipes to keep warm.

      This is where I first witnessed the men who showed up and took the children away. These children and youth could be gone for weeks, months, or forever.

     The disturbing sight of children and teens negotiating with men and then disappearing into cars right out in the open etched itself into my memory. Today, I struggle to know exactly what to do with these images.  I witnessed the abduction of some of East Europe's modern day trafficked sex-slaves after communism fell and the borders opened, bringing in pedophiles from all nations and providing a way to take children out of the country. It did no good to protest or to cry out to these men. They were bigger than me and they didn't care what I thought or said or what anyone in our group had to say about their behavior. 

     The police, at the time, were all too happy to have someone take a child from the street. Fewer children living in the street meant fewer problems for police officers to deal with. It also meant fewer kids to round up and put into the basement of the city jail when foreign dignitaries came to town and the mayor instructed police to round up all the street kids and incarcerate them for a few days. 

      The following poem describes what I saw.

Their World

Under manhole covers

Near Bucharest’s train station,

Lie children in holes

Huddled around sewer pipes.

Gray skies, gray skin,

Gray wounds on bare feet.

We enter their hole

Upon invitation—

Their home.

Their world.

Urine puddles

Under the ladder.

My LL Bean

Hiking Boots

Sink in.

I want to take wipes-a-lot

I want to wipe it all down.

In the end,

All I can do is wipe

A wound or two

And apply band-aids.

Children shriek,

Big men ride

small children

I use wipes-a-lot

And apply band-aids

Over and over

 with each band-aid I pray,

"Balm of Gilead,

 cover these wounds

with your healing power."

Romanian Sex Trade CNN

Taking It With You by Joy Morris.....

Message to Victims II

So I’ve dipped into this issue of human trafficking a lot deeper. One thing I’ve realized is how hard it is for the victims to move forward in life after being a part of this vicious cycle. They take the pain with them. What saddens my soul is the fact that these people who make you a victim end up winning in the end, when you allow your life to stop. I can’t say that I know exactly how you feel because I have not been a victim of trafficking. But I can say that I’ve been a victim of so many other things that were pretty bad. At first I allowed it to take over my life and I didn’t even care to want to go on in life. My life spiraled out of control and there was only one way to go…. Down. I didn’t want to hit rock bottom and I knew that I had to change things. I had to change things for the better to not only help myself but to help those around me. You see when I allowed others to take over my life it didn’t just affect me…..it affected everyone around me that was close to me….my daughter, my mom and dad, etc…. I know that you do not want those around you hurt by your pain. You really have to step outside of the box and take a clear look at your life. What is best for you? Is it giving up and giving in? Or is it using your story as a testimony to others? I know that by using my testimony as an inspiration to others, that I have reached others and helped them make changes too! And so can you! So take some time this week and really think about what’s happened and how YOU can come out on top. In the end you can count on your story being an inspiration to others and YOUR story making an impact in the lives of others.

New Year's Lesson From Trafficked Victims

Ingredients For A Happy New Year

 by Iana Matei with Pam Pyne

              I say it all the time, "I wish you a happy New Year."  But what exactly does that mean? The girls from the shelter and I made some discoveries during this Christmas season that stand a good chance to move us forward into more happiness in the coming year.

            As Christmas approached, the mood in the shelter turned from one of relative calm to bickering and backbiting.  It went something like this:

            “It’s not my turn to clean the bathroom and I don’t want to.” 

            “Iana, she keeps borrowing my clothes…”

            “You have all these rules for us because you don’t want us to have any fun…”

            “At least when we were with the pimps we got to drink beer and wine and go to the clubs…”

            “She keeps putting my things somewhere and I can’t find them…”

            They went on and on throughout the afternoon. Their voices rose and the complaining and fighting intensified.

            Finally, I’d had all I could take. “STOP IT!” My voice rose above the others. “Just because you’ve been hurt, doesn’t make you the center of the universe.”  I lowered my voice slightly. “Come here, I want to show you something.”

            I brought an envelope out of my pocket.

            “What is she doing? Why is she showing us her mail? Like we care?”

            I opened it and pulled out a picture of several attractive girls surrounding a large bin of clothing. Each girl held up an item and smiled at the camera. Their eyes shined, as if they were happy.

            “Who are they?” Andrea asked.

            “They’re girls from the US.”

            “So, what do they have to do with us, why are you showing us that picture?”

            “I’m showing you their picture because they collected a lot of stylish clothing that they’re sending to all of you.”

Iana

            “Do they know us?”

            “No, they don’t know you.”

            “Then why did they do it?”

            “They did it because they heard about you and they wanted to share.”

            “Why would they want to share with us if they don’t even know us?”

            “The way you’ve been acting, I have no idea.” I turned and left them with the social workers for the rest of the day.

            When I arrived the next morning, the house was clean and the girls were sorting through some clothes that had come for them some time back but were put away because they were too big. One girl brought boxes from the closet under the staircase another sorted out the nicest items, yet another girl ironed and a couple of girls neatly folded and placed the clothing into bundles according to size.

            I shook my head. “What are you doing?”

            “We’ve called the home where the elder people stay. We’re going there tomorrow to take these clothes. The lady on the phone sounded happy that we’re coming.”

            I walked toward the back of the house past the living room and on into the kitchen. “What are you baking and where did you get the flour?” I asked the girls as they placed dough onto the baking sheets. I knew we were nearly out when I had left the day before.

            “We used our cigarette money. We’re baking sweets and taking them to the orphanage.”

            I nearly choked. “What happened to you?”

“We saw the pictures of the American girls and said, ‘If those girls who don't know us and live so far away can do something nice for us, then surely, we can do something for the people we live around.  Once we started, it became fun.” Alina smiled up at me and winked. “After all, we’re not the center of the universe, you know.”

As she turned her back to me and placed more dough on the baking sheet, I recognized this moment as one that offered us secure passage into a Happy New Year.