Human Trafficking And Slavery Is Not Abolished!

Being dismayed by a report on the AlterNet site, “Human Slavery Is Thriving in the Shadows” by Mirela Xanthaki of IPS News, I decided to dig a bit deeper. Dismay became shock as I found article after article and video after video on the subject of modern day slavery. Here I have reproduced an article from Free The Slaves and embedded an 80-minute documentary by True Vision. There is much more.

It is currently estimated that 27 million people are held in some form of slavery. Most people’s images of slavery is the one of slave ships and plantations. But today’s slavery exists in a verydifferent form and transcends all types of labour. Slaves are no longer a long-term investment, they are merely disposable tools which are used to increase profits. Most slaves are forced to work in agriculture, mining, and prostitution. Often slaves work in factories that feed our global economy, like cocoa, cotton, oriental rugs, diamonds and silk.

It is important to realize that sweatshops and other exploitive labour is, although terrible, not slavery. Sweatshop workers and migrant labourers are exploited by being paid very little, forced to work long hours and often abused at their workplace. Slaves are subjected to all these conditions, but additionally they have lost their free will and they cannot walk away. Most slaves are paid nothing at all, and the physical and psychological violence used against them is so complete that they cannot escape their condition as a slave.

Slavery is illegal in every country although it exists in almost every country. The vast majority of the world’s slaves are in South Asia. Although, Africa and South America both have large numbers of slaves in some areas. The problem of increased trafficking into countries in North American, Europe, South East Asia, has left many of those countries with an increase of slavery. Slavery is universally seen as a violation to our basic human rights and yet it continues to exist.

True Vision of London produced this 80-minute documentary, inspired by Free the Slaves President Kevin Bales’ award-winning book Disposable People, exposes cases of slavery around the world. Film-makers Brian Edwards and Kate Blewett actually buy slaves in Africa and help free child slaves in India. The film exposes slavery in the rug-making sector of Northwest India, the cocoa plantations in the Ivory Coast, and even the home of a World Bank official in Washington, D.C. Small, personal stories of slavery are woven together to tell the larger story of slavery in the global economy.

What can we do as individuals to help stop the slavery? We could buy products that are certified to be slave-free like FairTrade and RugMark. Search the Internet for ethical suppliers and products. Join organizations like Free The Slaves, Amnesty International, Stop The Traffik and make a donation even if it’s small one. Write in blogs, forums, national and local newspapers. Please help make a difference to peoples lives.