Former Ambassador Pamela Hyde Smith Speeches

Ambassador Pamela Hyde Smith's OP-ED "Trafficking in human beings - a global problem"

February 27, 2003

Mercy escaped her slavers last year. Like many Nigerian women smuggled or lured into Italy with the promise of jobs, Mercy was forced into prostitution to earn her freedom. But escape did not end her nightmare. Three weeks after speaking publicly to human rights groups about her experience, her sister was reported dead in Florence, true to the threats made by her former captors.

Some pay to be smuggled into Europe, but end up as victims. In one smuggling run to Italy via Morocco, seventeen Nigerian girls died when their boat capsized on the Mediterranean Sea. Forty died after reaching their destination in Italy: brothels where women and girls are forced to pay off a $50,000 debt by servicing a dozen men per night.

This trade in human beings is a global problem of staggering human dimensions. As many as four million people are trafficked worldwide each year as victims of forced labor or commercial sexual exploitation, leaving a trail of devastated lives. Too many are women and children forced into pornography or prostitution.

This is modern day slavery. From Nigeria to Italy, from Albania to Moldova, from countries in Asia to Western Europe to the United States, no nation is untouched and every country is linked in a chain of greed, corruption, exploitation, and violence. It is everybody's problem.

The solution requires action and close coordination from the international community. Success comes when government officials work with non-governmental actors on the frontlines with victims, border guards with local policemen on the streets, social workers with doctors and nurses in clinics and educators with children in the classroom.

In the spirit of this cooperation, the United States Department of State is proud to host a three-day conference, Pathbreaking Strategies in the Global Fight Against Sex Trafficking, that opened February 23 in Washington, D.C. The conference brings together law enforcement and government officials, international organizations, and NGOs that have made great strides in fighting this growing menace.

Together, they will develop a practical set of tools drawn from successful strategies already carried out across the globe.

The stakes couldn't be higher. While more and more of the world's people enjoy the fruits of free markets and democracy, others are seeing transnational crime and corruption take root and grow. Sex slavery in Central and Eastern Europe has grown explosively since the end of the Cold War and the opening of western borders. The organized crime syndicates who prosper from this trade - and the corruption and violence that are necessary to sustain it - form a malignancy on these young democracies.

The United States is not immune. An estimated 50,000 trafficked people, many of them victims of labor exploitation or forced prostitution, reach our shores each year. Our job will not be done until this enslavement is ended and those responsible brought to justice.

Sex-traffickers promise normal jobs with high wages, foreign adventure, even marriage. Their victims, often eager to escape dire situations at home, fall easily into their trap through trickery, coercion or outright abduction. Once abroad, they may be stripped of travel documents and kept isolated in slave-like conditions, moved from place to place, bartered and sold like guns and narcotics. They can be used almost endlessly, working in ghastly conditions in brothels or private homes and apartments. They face a world of fear: fear of arrest, fear of retribution against their families, fear of HIV/AIDS, of rape, of beatings. In some areas, meanwhile, known traffickers live lavishly without fear of prosecution while their victims suffer miserably.

The anti-trafficking conference in Washington highlights the work of governments, NGOs, and international organizations that have courageously taken on the sex-slave trade. Many have worked with the United States on programs to address the myriad of economic, political, and social conditions that underlie the problem. Some of these projects include job training, education programs, training of law enforcement and health care workers, guidance on anti-trafficking legislation, media and public awareness programs, victims shelters, safe houses, and reintegration assistance.

With the international community, the United States is committed to ending this incarnation of one of history's most dreadful crimes against humanity. In the coming months, the Administration hopes to submit to the U.S. Senate the United Nations Protocol on Trafficking in Persons.

Most importantly perhaps, practical action on the ground is essential. In source countries, vulnerable people need to know the dangers they face. Transit countries must tighten border controls. Destination countries must develop the legal mechanisms to prosecute traffickers and protect their victims. Police must talk to each other across international borders and domestic jurisdictions. Much can be done and there is much left to do to restore freedom, dignity and hope to millions of lives. We hope this "pathbreaking" conference will help participants plot a common course of action, and provide real strategies to address this very real human tragedy