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In India, a devadasi is a female artist who is dedicated to the worship and service of a deity or a temple for the rest of her life. The dedication takes place in a ceremony that is somewhat similar to a marriage ceremony. In addition to taking care of the temple and performing rituals, these women also learn and practice classical Indian dances such as Bharatanatyam, Mohiniyattam, Kuchipudi, and Odissi. Their status as dancers, musicians and consorts were an essential part of temple worship.
Child prostitution is prostitution involving a child, and it is a form of commercial sexual exploitation of children. The term normally refers to prostitution of a minor, or person under the legal age of consent. In most jurisdictions, child prostitution is illegal as part of general prohibition on prostitution.
Sex trafficking is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation. It has been called a form of modern slavery because of the way victims are forced into sexual acts non-consensually, in a form of sexual slavery. Perpetrators of the crime are called sex traffickers or pimps—people who manipulate victims to engage in various forms of commercial sex with paying customers. Sex traffickers use force, fraud, and coercion as they recruit, transport, and provide their victims as prostitutes. Sometimes victims are brought into a situation of dependency on their trafficker(s), financially or emotionally. Every aspect of sex trafficking is considered a crime, from acquisition to transportation and exploitation of victims. This includes any sexual exploitation of adults or minors, including child sex tourism (CST) and domestic minor sex trafficking (DMST).
Ritual servitude is a practice in Ghana, Togo, and Benin where traditional religious shrines take human beings, usually young virgin girls, in payment for services or in religious atonement for alleged misdeeds of a family member. In Ghana and in Togo, it is practiced by the Ewe people in the Volta region; in Benin, it is practiced by the Fon.
Forced prostitution, also known as involuntary prostitution or compulsory prostitution, is prostitution or sexual slavery that takes place as a result of coercion by a third party. The terms "forced prostitution" or "enforced prostitution" appear in international and humanitarian conventions, such as the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, but have been inconsistently applied. "Forced prostitution" refers to conditions of control over a person who is coerced by another to engage in sexual activity..
Maiti Nepal is a non-profit organization in Nepal dedicated to helping the victims of human trafficking. Currently, it operates a rehabilitation home in Kathmandu, transit homes at the Indo-Nepal border towns, preventive homes in the countryside, and an academy in Kathmandu.
Senegal is a source, transit, and destination country for children and women trafficked for the purposes of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Trafficking within the country is more prevalent than trans-border trafficking and the majority of victims are children. Within Senegal some boys called "talibes" are victims of trafficking, by promising to educate them, but subjecting them instead to forced begging and physical abuse. A 2007 study done by UNICEF, the ILO, and the World Bank found that 6,480 talibe were forced to beg in Dakar alone. Women and girls are trafficked for domestic servitude and sexual exploitation, including for sex tourism, within Senegal. Transnationally, boys are trafficked to Senegal from The Gambia, Mali, Guinea-Bissau, and Guinea for forced begging by religious teachers. Senegalese women and girls are trafficked to neighboring countries, the Middle East, and Europe for domestic servitude and possibly for sexual exploitation. Women and girls from other West African countries, particularly Liberia, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and Nigeria may be trafficked to Senegal for sexual exploitation, including for sex tourism.
Human trafficking in India, although illegal under Indian law, remains a significant problem. People are frequently illegally trafficked through India for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and forced/bonded labour. Although no reliable study of forced and bonded labour has been completed, NGOs estimate this problem affects 20 to 65 million Indians. Men, women and children are trafficked in India for diverse reasons. Women and girls are trafficked within the country for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and forced marriage, especially in those areas where the sex ratio is highly skewed in favour of men. Men and boys are trafficked for the purposes of labour, and may be sexually exploited by traffickers to serve as gigolos, massage experts, escorts, etc. A significant portion of children are subjected to forced labour as factory workers, domestic servants, beggars, and agriculture workers, and have been used as armed combatants by some terrorist and insurgent groups.
Indonesia is a source, transit, and destination country for women, children, and men trafficked for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor. The greatest threat of trafficking facing Indonesian men and women is that posed by conditions of forced labor and debt bondage in more developed Asian countries and the Middle East.
India has a very high volume of child trafficking. As many as one child disappears every eight minutes, according to the National Crime Records Bureau. In some cases, children are taken from their homes to be bought and sold in the market. In other cases, children are tricked into the hands of traffickers by being presented an opportunity for a job, when in reality, upon arrival they become enslaved. In India, there are many children trafficked for various reasons such as labor, begging, and sexual exploitation. Because of the nature of this crime; it is hard to track; and due to the poor enforcement of laws, it is difficult to prevent. Due to the nature of this crime, it is only possible to have estimates of figures regarding the issue. India is a prime area for child trafficking to occur, as many of those trafficked are from, travel through or destined to go to India. Though most of the trafficking occurs within the country, there is also a significant number of children trafficked from Nepal and Bangladesh. There are many different causes that lead to child trafficking, with the primary reasons being poverty, weak law enforcement, and a lack of good quality public education. The traffickers that take advantage of children can be from another area in India, or could even know the child personally. Children who return home after being trafficked often face shame in their communities, rather than being welcomed home.
Sex trafficking in Thailand is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and slavery that occurs in the Kingdom of Thailand. Thailand is a country of origin, destination, and transit for sex trafficking. The sexual exploitation of children in Thailand is a problem. In Thailand, close to 40,000 children under the age of 16 are believed to be in the sex trade, working in clubs, bars, and brothels.
Pakistan is a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labour and prostitution. The largest human trafficking problem is bonded labour, concentrated in the Sindh and Punjab provinces in agriculture and brick making, and to a lesser extent in mining and carpet-making. Estimates of bonded labour victims, including men, women, and children, vary widely, but are likely well over one million. In extreme scenarios, when labourers speak publicly against abuse, landowners have kidnapped labourers and their family members. U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 2 Watchlist" in 2017.
Papua New Guinea is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced prostitution and forced labor. Women and children are subjected to commercial sexual exploitation and involuntary domestic servitude; trafficked men are forced to provide labor in logging and mining camps. Children, especially young girls from tribal areas, are most vulnerable to being pushed into commercial sexual exploitation or forced labor by members of their immediate family or tribe. Families traditionally sell girls into forced marriages to settle their debts, leaving them vulnerable to involuntary domestic servitude, and tribal leaders trade the exploitative labor and service of girls and women for guns and political advantage. Young girls sold into marriage are often forced into domestic servitude for the husband’s extended family. In more urban areas, some children from poorer families are prostituted by their parents or sold to brothels. Migrant women and teenage girls from Malaysia, Thailand, China, and the Philippines are subjected to forced prostitution, and men from China are transported to the country for forced labor.
Human trafficking in Nepal is a growing criminal industry affecting multiple other countries beyond Nepal, primarily across Asia and the Middle East. Nepal is mainly a source country for men, women and children subjected to the forced labor and sex trafficking. U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 2" in 2017.
Iraq is both a source and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced prostitution and forced labor. Iraqi women and girls, some as young as 11 years old, are subjected to conditions of human trafficking within the country and in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Iran, and possibly Yemen for forced prostitution and sexual exploitation within households.
Lesotho is a source and transit country for women and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of forced labor and forced prostitution, and for men in forced labor. Women and children are subjected within Lesotho to involuntary domestic servitude and children, to a lesser extent, to commercial sexual exploitation. Basotho victims of transnational trafficking are most often taken to South Africa. Long-distance truck drivers offer to transport women and girls looking for legitimate employment in South Africa. En route, some of these women and girls are raped by the truck drivers, then later prostituted by the driver or an associate. Many men who migrate voluntarily to South Africa to work illegally in agriculture and mining become victims of labor trafficking. Victims work for weeks or months for no pay; just before their promised "pay day" the employers turn them over to authorities to be deported for immigration violations. Women and children are exploited in South Africa in involuntary domestic servitude and commercial sex, and some girls may still be brought to South Africa for forced marriages in remote villages. Some Basotho women who voluntarily migrate to South Africa seeking work in domestic service become victims of traffickers, who detain them in prison-like conditions and force them to engage in prostitution. Most internal and transnational traffickers operate through informal, loose associations and acquire victims from their families and neighbors. Chinese and reportedly Nigerian organized crime units, however, acquire some Basotho victims while transporting foreign victims through Lesotho to Johannesburg, where they "distribute" victims locally or move them overseas. Bathoso children who have lost at least one parent to HIV/AIDS are more vulnerable to traffickers' manipulations; older children trying to feed their siblings are most likely to be lured by a trafficker's fraudulent job offer.
Egypt is a source, transit, and destination country for women and children who are subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution.
Sex trafficking is defined as the transportation of persons by means of coercion, deception and/or forced into exploitative and slavery-like conditions and is commonly associated with organized crime.
The trafficking of persons is the fastest growing and most profitable criminal activity after drug and arms trafficking. According to the United Nations Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, human trafficking is defined as follows: “Trafficking in persons shall mean the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labor or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs.”
Prostitution in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is legal but related activities are prohibited. The Congolese penal code punishes pimping, running a bawdy house or brothel, the exploitation of debauchery or prostitution, as well as forced prostitution. Activities that incite minors or promote the prostitution of others have been criminalised. The government does little to enforce the law. During the colonial era and the years that followed independence, the Ministry of Health issued calling cards identifying professional sex workers and provided them with medical health checks. However, this system was abandoned in the 1980s. Public order laws are sometimes used against sex workers. Street prostitutes report harassment, violence and extortion from the police. UNAIDS estimated there are 2.9 million sex workers in the country.
References
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 Global Press institute:Women Sacrificed to Gods Struggle to Rehabilitate, deuki Tradition Wanes in Nepal
- 1 2 Anti-Slavery Society: Child Hierodulic Servitude in India and Nepal Archived 2011-07-07 at the Wayback Machine
- 1 2 Whisnant, Rebecca; Stark, Christine (2004). Not for sale: feminists resisting prostitution and pornography. North Melbourne, Victoria: Spinifex Press. ISBN 9781876756499.
- ↑ Carolyn M. Elliott (2008). Global Empowerment of Women: Responses to Globalization and Politicized Religions. Routledge, New York, NY.
- 1 2 Kathmandu Press: Tiny Hands On Offer Archived 2014-11-12 at the Wayback Machine
- ↑ Robynne A. Locke "Rescued, Rehabilitated, Returned: Institutional Approaches to the Rehabilitation of Survivors of Sex Trafficking in India and Nepal 2010. Dissertation.
- ↑ Himalayan Times: Bill to End Bias, Violence Against Women on Anvil