May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June 2012
Factory workers in the DRC.
The Role of Trafficking in Continuing Instability
YOU may have heard of “conflict minerals.” They are valuable metals mined by armed groups to generate income for their troops and military operations. A global spotlight has been aimed at conflict minerals coming from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), popularly regarded as the deadliest spot in the poorest continent on Earth. Millions have died during the conflict between warring rebel militias and the national army.
What you may not know is that modern-day slavery is a major part of the problem. At stake in the DRC conflict is more than the nation’s vast mineral wealth. Also at stake is control of the slaves who are forced to work in the mines. Slave labor fuels the fighting and prevents Congo residents from building better lives.
Active military conflict makes things worse, when armed groups battle for control of lucrative mining sites. But the quest for illicit profits won’t end when the shooting finally does. Congolese communities need resources to avoid all forms of slavery and to develop alternative livelihoods that don’t rely so heavily on mining. Lasting peace and prosperity cannot take root in the DRC while villagers are trapped in slavery at mines.
May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June 2012
These men were not trafficked, but are local nationals serving in the Civil Service Corps in the village of Omar Khatab, Iraq.
Fraud, Manipulation and Indentured Servitude
HUMAN trafficking on US government contracts in the Central Command (‘CENTCOM”) sector is chronic, overt and unabated. The appalling fact that hundreds of thousands of men have been used as slave laborers to support “freedom” operations is not lost upon the victims.
Investigative journalists reporting of widespread human trafficking of laborers on US government contracts in CENTCOM date back to 2004. The New York Times reported the too common fraudulent recruiting scheme that began in 2003 when contractors first started trafficking men to perform services on government contracts. The Chicago Tribune also covered human trafficking in 2005, calling out the use of US tax dollars to provide slave labor during wartime. Articles in USA Today have reported labor trafficking abuses of Asian workers in Saudi Arabia as well as forced labor of Thai workers in the United States, considered “the nations biggest human trafficking operation”.
May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June 2012
Laborers in transit, asleep in chairs, waiting at Dhaka airport, Bangladesh.
USAID’s ACT Program in Bangladesh
THE opportunity was too good to pass up. Shantos was 20 years old when a group of men came to his village in Bangladesh. They promised him a job in India, a little less than $100 for 50 days of work as a mason. He believed them. It was only after leaving home that he realized what was going on. He came back scared and desperate, but wiser, after 28 months in an Indian jail, arrested after he could not produce his passport to a local police officer.
For Sonaly, who was only 16 when she was sold to a brothel, there was no place to come home to.
Fatema, at 22, was locked up in a room and tortured for 14 days before she found the courage to escape.
With USAID’s help, Shantos, Sonaly, and Fatema, three victims of human trafficking, have found new lives. Human trafficking is today the third most profitable crime in the world after illicit drug and arms trafficking, resulting in an estimated $30 billion to $32 billion in profits worldwide each year. Since 2005, USAID and the Government of Bangladesh have collaborated to address human trafficking on two fronts: by preventing it and by alleviating the suffering of its victims.
May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June 2012
Expatriate workers slaving away under the burning Maldivian afternoon sun in Male', Maldives.
Addressing Slavery & Slavery Like Practices in Defense & Defense Contracting Industries
AS the last ten years of U.S. Government Trafficking in Persons Reports have illustrated, human trafficking is a complex issue. Around the world, millions of people continue to be trafficked into and trapped in modern day forms of slavery. From forced labor to commercial sexual exploitation to child soldiering to organ trafficking, governments struggle to identify and rescue victims, and to put in place legislation, policies, and practices that address the problem. In the U.S., the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (and the Reauthorizations in 2033, 2005, and 2008) has become a model for a comprehensive two-pronged approach that punishes the perpetrators and protects and assists the victims. The law created the first government infrastructure for inter-agency collaboration in its President’s Interagency Task Force on Trafficking. It insures that each U.S. government agency that plays a vital role in combating human trafficking develops a strategic plan and coordinates with other U.S agencies.
May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June 2012
Bangladeshi migrant workers, listening to the instructions and orientations in Bangladesh.
Policing Labor Supply Chains
THE PROBLEM: Inadequate oversight of the recruitment and management of migrant workers, combined with exploitative practices of labor brokers in the developing world, continue to result in human trafficking, debt bondage, forced labor and other systematic labor abuses among TCN personnel employed by US (and other) contractors. The U.S. State Department Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report has consistently highlighted the widespread manifestations of illegal and unethical recruitment, including charging fees for employment, misrepresentation of the terms and conditions of engagement, withholding wages, the confiscation of passports and other personal documents and the intimidation, coercion, physical abuse and, in extreme cases, killing of workers and their families.
Most migrant workers from developing countries have been recruited through a corrupt network of agents and fixers. Such workers are routinely required to pay large fees (often as much as a year’s wages) to labor brokers in their country of origin. As many of them are unable to pay such large amounts of money, they take out loans, usually at usurious rates of interest, from the manpower agents. This debt is used as leverage to exploit recruits for years to come. As a result, the recruits arrive at the project location already demoralized, knowing that they face years of hard work, not to benefit their families, but to deliver huge illicit profits to the manpower companies and their agents.
May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June 2012
Fishing boats at Island Bay, Wellington, New Zealand.
A conversation with E. Benjamin Skinner
E. BENJAMIN SKINNER is a Senior Fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism at Brandeis University and the author of A Crime So Monstrous: Face to Face with Modern-day Slavery.
JIPO: Having devoted much of your professional life reporting on human and labor trafficking across the globe, what do you see as the current trend – is the problem of trafficking lessening or worsening?
Skinner: There are no concrete statistics on what the numbers are doing. That should be the first response to that question. These are not people who stand in line, raise their hands, and wait to be counted. They’re in many cases victims that are convinced that their very survival relies on keeping their victimization hidden. It is a very hard population to measure. That said, I think there have been some positive trends, like the fact that in the last 12 years, really since I’ve been working on this issue, there have been more than 100 countries that have passed laws against human trafficking. Now all but, I believe, one American state has state-level laws against human trafficking. There is a general consensus that this is a real phenomenon globally. There is a general consensus that slavery is a crime against humanity and must be resisted. That’s something that of course has been happening over the past 150 years.
May 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 6 – May-June, 2012
U.S. Congress
Translating Policy Initiatives in to Successful Compliance
THE U.S. Congress’s new found interest in addressing the problem of labor trafficking is certainly welcome, given that the issue has long plagued U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Although hardly a new problem by any means, the issue may have been lost in the midst of so many other more immediate mission-related crises. Some well thought-out laws and regulations already on the books have been under-enforced for years by the governmental entities running the missions. Nevertheless, in the current enthusiasm to address labor trafficking, we should always keep in mind that international employees are gaining opportunities for well-paying jobs and careers, otherwise beyond their reach. More to the point, they bring enormous efficiencies, skills and capabilities to stability operations around the world – resources that we should not hamstring.
Apr 252012
Op-Ed, April 2012
Afghan workers hoist up a worker from a collapsed karez on Shindand Air Base in Herat province.
Jobs, not bullets alone, can defeat terrorism
Afghanistan may be back in the American conscience, but this is hardly good news. If anything, President Obama’s much-needed focus on the campaign against the Taliban has outlined just how difficult the fight has become. Frustrated with what many are calling a quagmire, American commentators either advocate for withdrawing from Afghanistan or engaging in a more intense military campaign. These are both understandable responses, but even so, they are far from a complete remedy.
The war in Afghanistan is not being waged on the battlefield alone: If we are to emerge as a strong and independent democracy, the campaign for Afghanistan’s economy must stand on equal footing with the counterinsurgency campaign. In fact, they are one and the same.
We can’t build schools during firefights; but without schools, the firefights will continue. Yet a disproportionate amount of international resources – about 80% of aid provided by each contributing country – have been devoted to military operations at the cost of job creation and long-term economic development. But it is more jobs – not just more bullets – that will persuade militias to lay down their weapons.
Mar 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 5 – March-April 2012
Student reading during a lesson at Nad e Ali Central School in Helmand, Afghanistan.
Improving Government Legitimacy by Embracing Local Development Initiatives
DESPITE billions of dollars spent over the past decade in Afghanistan, the capacity of the Afghan government to deliver basic services has remained limited, according to a November 2011 World Bank report. In more remote areas the government’s presence is sporadic and levels of trust in the post-Taliban state remain mixed. In the first six months of 2010, insurgents had killed approximately 175 people with links to the government. As a result, government offices in places like Kandahar and Helmand are having a difficult time recruiting and retaining staff. For instance, in 2010, the local government in Kandahar registered 600 vacant positions.
Moreover, accountability concerns within the Afghan government have led many foreign donors to divert the vast majority of their funds outside of the state’s coffers. However, in light of the ongoing transition process, the international community has pledged to channel at least half of its development assistance through the Afghan government’s budget. As a result, the Afghan government will be responsible for undertaking more development projects and spending more aid money despite its current limited capacity. Doing so may prove particularly difficult in those areas where insecurity is the greatest. The government will thus need to find a way to foster development within its current capabilities and without dramatically expanding its physical footprint. Experts have noted that the expansion of the National Solidarity Program (NSP) in Afghanistan could be one potential way of overcoming this complex challenge.
Mar 012012
Journal of International Peace Operations
Volume 7, Number 5 – March-April 2012
Camp in Haiti housing 3,000 victims of the 2010 Earthquake.
Unbalanced and Unrealized
HAITI suffered an earthquake on 12 January 2010 that registered 7.3 on the ricketier scale. The earthquake’s epicenter was near Haiti’s largest city, Port-au-Prince, where over 3.5 million Haitians reside representing almost half of the overall Haiti population. The devastation resulted in an estimated 250,000 deaths, over 300,000 Haitians injured, over $11 billion dollars in damage to Haiti’s infrastructure and a 5.1 percent shrinkage of the country’s GDP. The Government of Haiti (GoH) and the international community responded both collectively and unilaterally calling for an immediate assistance program to begin the monumental recovery effort and to help mitigate the potential for additional deaths, sickness, and disease.
The Interim Haiti Recovery Commission (IHRC) was established by the GoH to help facilitate the recovery effort. This piece focuses on the IHRC and the extent to which its mandate has been carried out. This review was commenced during early July 2011 and is the work of a small team supported by the National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians (NOAH), together with contributions by members and associates of the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA).
