An Introduction to Human Trafficking - United Nations Office on ...

AN INTRODUCTION TO HUMAN TRAFFICKING: VULNERABILITY, IMPACT AND ACTION
3. Facilities for migrants that protect them from abuse
While some trafficking victims are under the control of traffickers from the time they leave
home onwards, many others fall under their control later on, sometimes after arriving at
a destination where they intend <strong>to</strong> find work. For many decades, some countries have
made a range of facilities available <strong>to</strong> recently arrived migrants, in particular migrant
women and children, which have helped keep them out of the control of criminals who
would abuse them. These include safe accommodation and drop-in centres where recent
migrants can obtain advice and information, such as those established in Kunming, the
capital of China’s Yunnan Province. 34
4. Using the law <strong>to</strong> tackle demand for the labour or services of
trafficked persons
In the last few years there has been debate about what preventive action is effective in
reducing “demand” in places where trafficked people are exploited. This means implementing
measures that are likely <strong>to</strong> reduce demand for products made by trafficked persons
and services provided by them, which may subsequently result in fewer people being
trafficked.
In her 2006 report <strong>to</strong> the <strong>United</strong> <strong>Nations</strong> Commission on <strong>Human</strong> Rights, the then Special
Rapporteur on <strong>Trafficking</strong> in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Sigma Huda, examined
whether people who paid for the services of trafficking victims could be influenced
<strong>to</strong> reduce the numbers of trafficked persons. It is notable that the treatment of demand
as it relates <strong>to</strong> sex trafficking is somewhat different from that for other forms of exploitation
and the Special Rapporteur’s report focused on demand for commercial sex, concluding
that prostitution was inextricably linked <strong>to</strong> human trafficking and that demand for
commercial sex was tantamount <strong>to</strong> demand for the services of trafficked women and girls.
She recommended that prostitution not be legalized or decriminalized. 35 This contrasted
with comments by the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences,
Radhika Coomaraswamy, who in 2000 criticized efforts <strong>to</strong> abolish prostitution
by targeting and punishing third-party involvement. This Rapporteur noted that, although
targeting third parties such as men and boys who paid for sex appeared in theory <strong>to</strong> protect
women sex workers from being penalized, in practice women had suffered “the burden
of criminalization”, even when laws were intended primarily <strong>to</strong> target procurers, pimps
and men and boys who paid for sex. 36 While proponents on both sides of the debate hold
tenaciously <strong>to</strong> their convictions, there remains no conclusive link between legalization or
criminalization of prostitution and the existence of trafficking for sexual exploitation.
Further research is needed on this <strong>to</strong>pic.
34
International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) Task Team of the Yunnan Provincial
Statistics Bureau, The Mekong Challenge: <strong>An</strong>alysis Report of the Baseline Survey for the TICW Project Phase II in Yunnan
Province (Bangkok, International Labour <strong>Office</strong>, 2005).
35
E/CN.4/2006/62, chap. II. “Demand for commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking”.
36
E/CN.4/2000/68, para. 24.
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