2007 Trafficking in Persons Report - Center for Women Policy Studies

I N T R O D U C T I O N
Confiscation of
Travel and Identity
Documents: A
Trafficking TOOL
Trafficking crimes involve force, fraud, or
coercion to exploit a person. Traffickers
often rely on the confiscation of travel
documents—passports, identity cards and
airline tickets—as a means of gaining and
exercising control over a victim. Without
these vital documents, migrants are
vulnerable to arrest, punishment, and/or
deportation. The threat of these punishments
is used by traffickers or exploitative
employers as a form of legal coercion or
abuse of the legal system. Recognizing this
form of coercion, U.S. federal law makes it
illegal to seize documents in order to force
others to work. Foreign governments are
encouraged to criminalize the confiscation or
withholding of travel documents of migrants
as a means to confine the migrant or keep
him or her in a form of work or service. l
Some abuses of contracts and difficult conditions
of employment do not in themselves constitute
involuntary servitude, though use or threat of
physical force or restraint to compel a worker to
enter into or continue labor or service may convert
a situation into one of forced labor. Costs imposed
on laborers for the “privilege” of working abroad
can place laborers in a situation highly vulnerable
to debt bondage. However, these costs alone do not
constitute debt bondage or involuntary servitude.
When combined with exploitation by unscrupulous
labor agents or employers in the destination
country, these costs or debts, when excessive, can
become a form of debt bondage.
Involuntary Domestic Servitude
Domestic workers may be trapped in servitude
through the use of force or coercion, such as
physical (including sexual) or emotional abuse.
Children are particularly vulnerable. Domestic
servitude is particularly difficult to detect because
it occurs in private homes, which are often
unregulated by public authorities. For example,
there is great demand in some wealthier countries
MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING
BETWEEN
THE GOVERNMENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF INDONESIA
AND THE GOVERNMENT OF MALAYSIA
ON THE RECRUITMENT AND PLACEMENT OF
INDONESIAN DOMESTIC WORKERS
May 13, 2006
. . . . xii. The Employer shall be responsible for the safe keeping of the Domestic
Worker’s passport and to surrender such passport to the Indonesian Mission in the
event of abscondment or death of the Domestic Worker.
Bad Practice: A 2006 Memorandum of Understanding between the
Malaysian and Indonesian governments gives Malaysian employers the
right to withhold the passports of Indonesian domestic workers.
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