news spring 2009

Clinton and Obama honour former slave

Mar 11 – US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton and First Lady Michelle Obama have honoured 24-year-old Hadijatou Mani with an International Women of Courage Award in Washington DC.

Hadijatou was nominated after successfully suing the state of Niger for failing to protect her from slavery. Hadijatou was one of only eight women to receive the award.

Hilary Clinton said: “Hadijatou is such an inspiring person. She never gave up on herself or on her deep reservoir of human dignity. For her inspiring courage in successfully challenging an entrenched system of caste-based slavery, and securing a legal precedent that will help countless others seek freedom and justice, we honour and salute her.”

Hadijatou said: “I used to dream that one day I would be free, but I never dreamt that I would one day travel to America and be honored in this way. Meeting two such important women made me very nervous but it was very inspiring for me. I know now that women can achieve a lot. I told them about the women I left behind and that I need their help to free them.”

Romana Cacchioli, Anti-Slavery International’s Africa Programme Co-ordinator, worked alongside Hadijatou to bring the case to the regional ECOWAS court. Romana said: “This award serves to remind governments across the world that their highest duty is to protect the human rights of their citizens.”

UPDATE: On 31 March, Hadijatou’s former master, Elhadji Souleymane Naroua, was found guilty of slavery and sentenced in absentia to 12 months in prison. He was also fined the equivalent of $1,000 and was ordered to pay $2,000 in damages to Hadijatou. A warrant has been issued for his arrest.

In April the Government of Niger also paid Hadijatou 10 million Francs CFA ($20,000) in damages for failing to protect her from slavery.

Governments failing victims of trafficking

12 Feb - Nearly 99 per cent of trafficking victims are not identified, the first United Nations global report on human trafficking has found.

The report also criticises governments for failing to prosecute traffickers and exposes the role women play in the trafficking of other women into the sex industry.

The report by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), which includes data from 155 countries, found less than 22,000 of the 2 million people estimated to be trafficked globally each year are identified by the authorities.

Speaking at the launch of the report, Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of UNODC, said of the findings: “We only see the monster’s tail. How many hundreds of thousands are slaving away in sweat shops, fields, mines, factories, or trapped in domestic servitude?”

The report criticised many governments for failing to prosecute traffickers, with nearly 40 per cent of the countries examined not recording a single conviction.

The report also revealed that the majority of traffickers in almost one third of these countries are female. Women accounted for more than 60 per cent of human trafficking convictions in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

Klara Skrivankova, Anti-Slavery International’s Trafficking Programme Co-ordinator, said: “It is a double tragedy when sometimes in an attempt to secure their own release from slavery, women are forced to act as recruiters and trap others into the same horrendous circumstances.”

The report found 80 per cent are trafficked into the sex industry, followed by 18 per cent trafficked into0 forced labour.

Mr Costa also raised concerns that the credit crunch was likely to result in an increase in the trafficking of vulnerable people.

Compensation for trafficked women

19 Feb – Four Moldovan women trafficked into forced prostitution in the UK were awarded more than £600,000 in damages by the High Court. This is the first time a British court has awarded compensation to trafficking victims.

The women were all in their twenties and were tricked into leaving Moldova with the promise of finding work as dancers. Each borrowed £20,000 upfront from the criminal gang for pay for the journey to Britain.

The women were kept captive and forced to work in brothels across London. They were forced to have sex with up to 40 men daily, fed just one meal a day, and fined for refusing to have unprotected sex.

The women also paid £300 a day in ‘rent’ and were even charged for using cutlery. The women never saw a penny of their earnings.

Anti-Slavery International is calling for compensation to become a mainstream part of all criminal proceedings in trafficking cases.

Fairtrade Cadbury Dairy Milk good news for child labour in Ghana

4 Mar - Cadbury has announced that their Dairy Milk chocolate bar will be Fairtrade certified in the UK and Ireland by the summer of 2009.

All certified products have to meet strict conditions, including assurances that no forced or illegal child labour has been used.

However, the issue still blights the West African cocoa industry, particularly in Cote D’Ivoire, which is the world’s biggest producer of cocoa.

Aidan McQuade, Director of Anti-Slavery International, said: “It is time for the chocolate industry, worth a massive $75 million, to put its money where its mouth is and ensure that any investment is adequate enough to live up to the demands set by their own voluntary protocol to eradicate forced and child labour from the supply chain.”

Congolese warlord faces first ICC trial

6 Jan - A Congolese militia leader accused of recruiting child soldiers is being tried in the first case of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.

Thomas Lubanga, the former leader of the Union of Congolese Patriots (UPC) militia, is charged with enlisting and conscripting children under the age of 15 as soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo between September 2002 and August 2003.

Chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo, told the court: “The children still suffer the consequence of Lubanga’s crimes. They cannot forget what they suffered, what they saw, what they did.”

More than 30,000 children were recruited during the fighting, which saw some 60,000 people lose their lives. The prosecution claims that children were abducted as they walked to school and suffered beatings and other abuses.

More than 90 former child soldiers under Lubanga’s command will give evidence at the trial.