What’s in the news?

• The U.S. State Department has released its annual Trafficking in Persons report.

Highlights of the Report

• The pandemic resulted in an increase in vulnerability to human trafficking and interrupted existing anti-traffic efforts. 
• On India, the report says that while it did not meet the minimum standards to eliminate trafficking, the government was making significant efforts, although these were inadequate, especially when it came to bonded labour.
• The concurrence of the increased number of individuals at risk, traffickers’ ability to capitalise on competing crises, and the diversion of resources to pandemic response efforts has resulted in an ideal environment for human trafficking to flourish and evolve.
• Twelve governments were determined, by the State Department, to have a policy or pattern of human trafficking resulting in their countries being assigned a ‘Tier 3’ rating in the report. Afghanistan, Burma, China, Cuba, Eritrea, North Korea, Iran, Russia, South Sudan, Syria and Turkmenistan were on this list.
• The report said that the Chinese government engaged in widespread forced labour, including through the continued mass arbitrary detention of more than one million Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, ethnic Kyrgyz, and other Muslims in Xinjiang.

Reference:

1. https://www.thehindu.com/news/international/pandemic-increased-vulnerability-to-human-trafficking-us-report/article35090118.ece