Syria is a destination and transit country for women and children trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor. A significant number of women and children in the large and expanding Iraqi refugee community in Syria are reportedly forced into commercial sexual exploitation by Iraqi gangs or, in some cases, their families. Similarly, women from Somalia and Eastern Europe are trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation. Foreign women recruited for work in Syria as cabaret dancers are not permitted to leave their work premises without permission, and they have their passports withheld—indicators of involuntary servitude. Some of these women may also be forced into prostitution. Anecdotal evidence suggests that Syria may be a destination for sex tourism from other countries in the region. In addition, women from Indonesia, the Philippines, Ethiopia, and Sierra Leone are recruited for work in Syria as domestic servants, but some face conditions of involuntary servitude, including long hours, non-payment of wages, withholding of passports, restrictions on movement, threats, and physical or sexual abuse. Syria may also be a transit point for Iraqi women and girls trafficked to Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.), and Lebanon for forced prostitution. The Government of Syria does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so. Syria again failed to report any law enforcement efforts to punish trafficking offenses over the last year. In addition, the government did not offer protection services to victims of trafficking and may have arrested, prosecuted, or deported some victims for prostitution or immigration violations.
It is likely that several thousands of people are trafficked in Yemen every year, often to Saudi Arabia.
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.
Lebanon is a destination for Asian and African women trafficked for the purpose of domestic servitude, and for Eastern European and Syrian women trafficked for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation. Lebanese children are trafficked within the country for the purpose of commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor in the metal works, construction, and agriculture sectors. Women from Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Ethiopia migrate to Lebanon legally, but often find themselves in conditions of forced labor, through unlawful withholding of passports, non-payment of wages, restrictions on movement, threats, and physical or sexual assault. During the armed conflict in July 2006, Sri Lankan domestic workers reported being restricted from leaving the country by their employers. Eastern European and Syrian women come to Lebanon on "artiste" visas, but some become victims of trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation when they are subjected to coercive acts such as unlawful withholding of passports, restrictions on movement, threats, and physical assault. Since the refugee crisis in Syria, the sex trade and trafficking of Syrian girls and women has increased in Lebanon.
Libya is a transit and destination country for men and women from sub-Saharan Africa and Asia trafficked for the purposes of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation. While most foreigners in Libya are economic migrants, in some cases large smuggling debts of $500–$2,000 and illegal status leave them vulnerable to various forms of coercion, resulting in cases of forced prostitution and forced labor.
Bangladesh is a source and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. A significant share of Bangladesh's trafficking victims are men recruited for work overseas with fraudulent employment offers who are subsequently exploited under conditions of forced labor or debt bondage. It also includes the trafficking of children – both boys and girls – within Bangladesh for commercial sexual exploitation, bonded labor, and forced labor. Some children are sold into bondage by their parents, while others are induced into labor or commercial sexual exploitation through fraud and physical coercion. Women and children from Bangladesh are also trafficked.
Belgium is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. Victims originate in Eastern Europe, Africa, East Asia, as well as Brazil and India. Some victims are smuggled through Belgium to other European countries, where they are subjected to forced labor and forced prostitution. Male victims are subjected to forced labor and exploitation in restaurants, bars, sweatshops, horticulture sites, fruit farms, construction sites, and retail shops. There were reportedly seven Belgian women subjected to forced prostitution in Luxembourg in 2009. According to a 2009 ECPAT Report, the majority of girls and children subjected to forced prostitution in Belgium originate from Balkan and CIS countries, Eastern Europe, Asia and West Africa ; some young foreign boys are exploited in prostitution in major cities in the country. Local observers also report that a large portion of children trafficked in Belgium are unaccompanied, vulnerable asylum seekers and refugees. Criminal organizations from Thailand use Thai massage parlors in Belgium, which are run by Belgian managers, to sexually exploit young Thai women. These networks are involved in human smuggling and trafficking to exploit victims economically and sexually. Belgium is not only a destination country, but also a transit country for children to be transported to other European country destinations.
Tunisia is a source, destination, and possible transit country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. In 2009, one Tunisian female was rescued from forced prostitution in Lebanon. In 2008, two women were rescued from forced prostitution in Jordan and three men from forced labor in Italy. Based on limited available data, some Tunisian girls may be trafficked within the country for involuntary domestic servitude. In 2009 a Tunisian academic published a study on Tunisian domestic workers. The study, conducted in 2008, surveyed 130 domestic workers in the Greater Tunis region and found that 52 percent were under the age of 16; twenty-three percent claimed to be victims of physical violence, and 11 percent of sexual violence. Ninety-nine percent indicated they had no work contracts and the majority received salaries below the minimum wage. These conditions are indicators of possible forced labor.
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.
Peru is a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. Several thousand persons are estimated to be subjected to conditions of forced labor within Peru, mainly in mining, logging, agriculture, brick making, and domestic servitude. Many trafficking victims are women and girls from impoverished rural regions of the Amazon, recruited and coerced into prostitution in urban nightclubs, bars, and brothels, often through false employment offers or promises of education. Indigenous persons are particularly vulnerable to debt bondage. Forced child labor remains a problem, particularly in informal gold mines, cocaine production, and transportation. There were reports the terrorist group Sendero Luminoso, or Shining Path, recruited children as soldiers and drug mules. To a lesser extent, Peruvians are subjected to forced prostitution in Ecuador, Spain, Italy, Japan, and the United States, and forced labor in Argentina, Chile, and Brazil. Peru also is a destination country for some Ecuadorian and Bolivian females in forced prostitution, and some Bolivian citizens in conditions of forced labor. Child sex tourism is present in Iquitos, Madre de Dios, and Cuzco. Traffickers reportedly operate with impunity in certain regions where there is little or no government presence.
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.
North Macedonia is a source, transit, and destination country for women and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced prostitution and forced labor. Macedonian women and children are trafficked internally within the country. Women and girls from Albania, Bulgaria and Kosovo were reportedly subjected to forced prostitution or forced labor in Macedonia in 2009. Macedonian victims and victims transiting through Macedonia are subjected to forced prostitution or forced labor in South Central and Western Europe. Children, primarily ethnic Roma, are subjected to forced begging by their parents or other relatives. Girls were subjected to conditions of forced labor in Macedonian bars and nightclubs. A small number of Macedonian men were allegedly subjected to forced labor in Azerbaijan. Traffickers continued to operate in more hidden, private sectors in an attempt to conceal their exploitation of victims from law enforcement.
Human trafficking in Mauritania is considered to be a controversial human rights issue. Mauritania is a suspected source and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Supposedly, some women, men, and children from traditional slave castes are subjected to slavery-related practices, rooted in ancestral master-slave relationships, which continue to exist in a limited fashion in both rural and urban settings. These individuals, held for generations by slave-holding families, may be forced to work without pay as cattle herders and household help. Mauritanian and West African boys – referred to as talibes – are recruited to study at Koranic schools, but are sometimes subsequently subjected to forced begging within the country by religious teachers known as marabouts. Girls have been trafficked internally and from neighboring West African countries such as Mali, Senegal, and Gambia for involuntary domestic servitude. Mauritanian girls have been married off to wealthy men from the Middle East and taken there in some cases for forced prostitution. Mauritanian women are forced into prostitution within the country, as well as in the Arab States of the Persian Gulf.
Morocco is a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children who are subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. Children are trafficked within the country from rural areas to urban centers to work as maids or laborers, or for commercial sexual exploitation. Moroccan men, women, and children are exploited for forced labor and prostitution in European and Middle Eastern countries. Young Moroccan girls from rural areas are recruited to work as child maids in cities, but often experience non-payment of wages, threats, and physical or sexual abuse, and sometimes face restrictions on movement. These practices indicate that these girls are subjected to involuntary servitude. Moroccan boys experience forced labor as apprentices in the artisan and construction industries and in mechanic shops. A few Moroccan men and boys are lured to Europe by fraudulent job offers, and are subsequently forced to sell drugs. In addition, men and women from sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and the Philippines enter Morocco voluntarily but illegally with the assistance of smugglers; once in Morocco, some of the women are coerced into prostitution or, less frequently, forced into domestic service. Nigerian gangs, who engage in a variety of criminal activities like human smuggling and drug trafficking, compete to control the trafficking of sub-Saharan Africans in Morocco.
Human trafficking in Brazil is an ongoing problem. Brazil is a source country for men, women, girls, and boys subjected to human trafficking, specifically forced prostitution within the country and abroad, as well as a source country for men and boys in forced labor within the country. The United States Department of Homeland Security, describes human trafficking as "the use of force, fraud, or coercion to obtain some type of labor or commercial sex act."
Burundi is a source country for children and possibly women subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of involuntary domestic servitude and forced prostitution. Children and young adults may also be coerced into forced labor on plantations or small farms in southern Burundi, or to conduct informal commerce in the streets. Child labor is very common in agricultural fields where major exports, like tea and coffee, are harvested. Forced labour of children and adults is also very common in mines due to a large market for valuable stones and ores. Many trafficking victims can be found in mines in the northern area of Burundi, especially around Cibitoke. Some traffickers may be family or acquaintances of victims who, under the pretext of assisting underprivileged children with education or with false promises of lucrative jobs, subject them to forced labor, most commonly as domestic servants. While there is little evidence of large-scale child prostitution, “benevolent” older females offer vulnerable younger girls room and board within their homes, and in some cases eventually push them into prostitution to pay for living expenses; extended family members also financially profit from the commercial sexual exploitation of young relatives residing with them. It is most common for the trafficking of victims to remain internal within the country or to extend only to the surrounding countries. Male tourists from Oman and the United Arab Emirates exploit Burundian girls in prostitution. Businessmen recruit Burundian girls for commercial sexual exploitation in Rwanda, Kenya, and Uganda, and recruit boys and girls for exploitation in various types of forced labor in Tanzania. Unlike in past years, there were no reports of forced or voluntary recruitment of children into government armed forces or rebel groups during the reporting period. If the trafficking of Burundians does extend externally, it is most common for them to be sent to locations in the Middle East and Western Europe.
Victims of human trafficking in Ecuador are generally women and children trafficked within the country from border and central highland areas to urban centers for commercial sexual exploitation, as well as for involuntary domestic servitude, forced begging, and forced labor in mines and other hazardous work. Ecuador prohibits human trafficking in its penal code, and penalties are commensurate with other serious crimes. Despite robust law enforcement efforts to combat trafficking, conviction rates remain low. The Ecuadorian government has ensured trafficking victims' access to legal, medical, psychological, and shelter services, in large part through its partnership with a network of NGOs. The government has also undertaken advertising campaigns against human trafficking, particularly child labor and child sex tourism. U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 2" in 2017.
Equatorial Guinea is principally a destination for children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of forced labor and possibly commercial sexual exploitation. Children are believed to be recruited and transported from nearby countries, primarily Nigeria, Benin, Cameroon, and Gabon, and forced to work in domestic servitude, market labor, ambulant vending, and other forms of forced labor, such as carrying water and washing laundry. Most victims are believed to be exploited in Malabo and Bata, where a burgeoning oil industry creates demand for labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Women may also have been recruited and transported to Equatorial Guinea from Cameroon, Benin, other neighboring countries, and from China for forced labor or forced prostitution. In October 2009, the vessel Sharon was detained in Gabon with 285 immigrants aboard, including 34 children identified as trafficking victims destined for Equatorial Guinea. Reports that women of Equatoguinean extraction were trafficked to Iceland for commercial sexual exploitation during the last reporting period have not reappeared.
Ethiopia is a source country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of forced labor and forced prostitution. Girls from Ethiopia's rural areas are forced into domestic servitude and, less frequently, commercial sexual exploitation, while boys are subjected to forced labor in traditional weaving, gold mining, agriculture, herding, and street vending. Small numbers of Ethiopian girls are forced into domestic servitude outside Ethiopia, primarily in Djibouti and Sudan. While Ethiopian boys are subjected to forced labor in Djibouti as shop assistants and errand boys.
Prostitution in Djibouti is illegal but tolerated. UNAIDS estimate there are 2,900 prostitutes in the country. Many work from bars and nightclubs. There is a red-light district in Djibouti City.
