Revisiting the Trafficking of Women:
Challenges since Beijing

by Aurora Javate-de Dios

Perhaps one of the most important issues to have received strong endorsement and action by the Beijing Conference is the issue of trafficking in women and children. Largely because of the lobbying efforts of women's groups in the last decade, trafficking has emerged at the centre of the agenda of national governments and the international community.

From the sheer number of conferences, workshops and seminars held on trafficking from Europe and Eastern Europe, to Africa, Asia, and Latin America, one can generalise that it is one issue about which there seems to be a strong international consensus.1

Trafficking: a Global Human Rights Crisis
Although the international community had declared since a hundred years ago that trafficking for sexual exploitation is unacceptable and to be condemned, it seems that trafficking has re-emerged today even much stronger and more pernicious than in the past. The causes of trafficking are complex. But the main contributing factors to trafficking include the unequal economic development of countries and the adverse impact of the globalisation processes on less-developed countries that aggravate widespread poverty and inequality as well as discrimination and gender-based violence perpetrated by patriarchal institutions in societies. Facilitated by the mobility of peoples in search of better employment and a better life, by the spread of new information technologies, and by the integration of the sex industry in mainstream economies, trafficking for sexual exploitation has become pervasive in every major region of the world. Controlled by organised crime and syndicates with multilayered intermediaries at the local and international levels, the trade in women and children has reached global proportions with devastating impact on the well-being of women and girls.

The magnitude, reach, and variety of forms of trafficking today are more alarming than ever. This "modern-day slavery" outstrips the slave trade of the past. It has become associated with other criminal activities, such as drug trafficking and arms trafficking. Estimates of the number of trafficking activities vary greatly because of the difficulty of data collection for this clandestine activity. Trafficking occurs within countries as well as across national boundaries. It is estimated that 30 million women and children have been trafficked for sexual exploitation in the past 30 years, in Asia alone.2 An estimated (1999) 45,000 to 50,000 women and children are trafficked yearly to the United States from Southeast Asia, Latin America and, increasingly, from the New Independent States as well as Central and Eastern Europe.3 These numbers are even moderate computations. A study suggests that several ways of monitoring potential trafficking movements can be done by checking increased visa applications for women as entertainers and for marriage that may indicate a pattern of organised movement orchestrated by syndicates.4 Asia is a major locus of trafficking as a source, transit and destination region, particularly the countries in the Mekong subregion.5

New source and destination countries fueled by the feminisation of poverty, especially in Eastern European transition economies, the continuing conflict situations in politically volatile areas, and ecological disasters-all these aggravate the vulnerability of women and girls which make them targets of traffickers. The active and facilitating role of intermediary agents, such as recruitment organisations, travel agencies, friendship clubs, and mail-order bride systems also facilitate the trafficking of women.

Old and New Forms of Sexual Exploitation

Sex trafficking has become a global megabusiness that has been characterised as high profit and low risk. The trafficking industry ranges from small rings to complex organised criminal enterprises requiring a chain of actors at various stages of the trafficking process. In many countries, there are no severe punishments for traffickers of human beings akin to the punishments for gun smuggling and drug trading. A sexually exploited woman or girl-child can be used and abused many times for greater profits, with impunity. Trafficking, at present, is characterised by diverse and sophisticated methods of recruitment utilising local and community networks that are linked with recruitment and trafficking networks overseas.

In the past, women were trafficked mainly for prostitution. Now, there is a variety of forms and methods of sexually exploiting women and children-for brothel prostitution, sex tourism, mail-order bride arrangements, pornography, cybersex, and the like. Many of these activities are no longer hidden, and in many countries, have become open and integral to mainstream economies.

What makes trafficking of women and children then and now dramatically different from each other is the use of new information technologies. About 70% of materials about sex in the internet present demeaning, degrading, exploitative, and pornographic images of women. The core messages of pornographic websites are increasingly sexist, violent and racist, particularly against women from Asia and Eastern Europe who are portrayed to be willing and submissive sex objects.6 It is also estimated that one in five internet users under 17 years of age logs onto sexually explicit sites. Dotadult.co.uk, a search engine that finds sex-related sites, says that 40% of all searches were conducted from the office. Six percent of employees use their work computer for sexual purposes, for about 1 to 10 hours in a week, with 70% of all adult internet traffic occuring during the 9-to-5 working day. Adult-content sites are the fourth most-visited category while at work.7 Prevalence of pornographic information in the internet, especially those presenting the female as a sex object, has resulted in the massive and global mass marketing of women and children as such. Women are marketed in a variety of ways-from nannies, to brides, to willing sex slaves enjoying torture and bondage-all for a price. This is unprecedented in history. Sexual exploitation and abuse can now be perpetrated discreetly in private cyberchat lines that are protected by privacy laws.

Before, women were scarcely free to travel, much more to work, unless they migrated with their husbands and families. At present, women are part of a massive movement and the mobility of peoples for a variety of reasons, such as work, family reunification, and refugee movement. Compelled by poverty and dwindling incomes at home, women seek better work opportunities abroad, often ending up in gender-segregated occupations, such as in domestic service, nursing professions, and in some countries, for entertainment. Traffickers are able to fully exploit the cracks in the migratory processes and channels so as to entrap women and girls in trafficking.

While international sex trafficking has caught international attention only in the last decade or so, sex trafficking internally in most countries has been there for an extended time through various historical and cultural antecedents. In many countries in Asia, prostitution systems have long been institutionalised, such as in Japan through the kuruwa or public brothel system. And there were the so-called "comfort women stations" where thousands of young women and girls were trafficked and made sexual slaves of Japanese troops from the 1930s to the 1940s. This happened in many countries like Korea, China (North and South), the Philippines, Indonesia, East Timor, Malaysia, and Singapore. The Japanese Imperial Government, at that time, officially sanctioned the comfort women stations. Nowadays, instead of Japanese tourists traveling for sex tours as what happened in the early 1970s, thousands of Asian, Latin American, and East European women are imported to cater to the Japanese corporate sarariman (income-earners) in bars, massage parlours, Turkish baths, and love hotels in the entertainment sections of Japan's major cities. In India, there are such practices like the devadasi prostitution that offers young girls to the gods in the temple, eventually becoming public property of prominent leaders or persons in the community.8

Many countries in Asia, like the Philippines, Korea, Thailand, and Japan, have the infrastructure for military prostitution that services U.S. military personnel through basing rights and visiting forces agreements. Historically, the largest brothels, for instance in South Asia (like in Dhaka and Bombay), were those used by British troops in the past.

International Community Takes Action
Before the 1995 "Fourth World Conference on Women", the main document that addressed trafficking in women was the 1949 "Convention for the Suppression of the Traffic in Persons and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others." Signed and ratified by 72 countries, the Convention expressly condemned trafficking for the purpose of prostitution, and focused on the punishment of the perpetrators and persons exploiting the prostitution of others. The Convention did not create a mechanism but simply called on States Parties in its Article 21 to communicate laws and regulations as well as measures taken in implementing the Convention. Information related to the Convention has been received, thus far, by the Working Group on Contemporary Forms of Slavery of the Subcommission on the Prevention and Discrimination and Protection of Minorities of the Commission of Human Rights, in response to the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Resolution 1983/20 on the Suppression of Traffic in Persons.

The "Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW)", entered into force in 1981 and has been ratified by 180 countries, is a significant legal instrument and is widely supported by women's groups everywhere. Moreover, with the ratification of CEDAW's "Optional Protocol", individual women can now take their cases against states, after determination by the CEDAW Committee of the merits of the case and after exhausting local remedies without relief. Thus, the CEDAW Committee is another important body that is taking up the issue of trafficking of women. Under Article 6 of CEDAW, countries are enjoined to take measures to address trafficking, the developments of which they then have to include in their CEDAW progress report to the Committee every four years (Article 18).

Prior to the 1995 Beijing conference, trafficking of women and girls was taken up by the UN Commission on the Status of Women (UNCSW) through a resolution filed by the Philippine government. From 1994 to 2004, the Philippines led in articulating the issues on trafficking through this resolution, which received broad support from different government delegations. By annually filing the resolution through the UNCSW and the UN Commission on Human Rights, and later at the UN General Assembly, the Philippines helped to make the trafficking issue visible at the UN level. This has not only called attention to a growing global problem but, more importantly, created a momentum for governments to commit themselves to eliminating trafficking.

Conference after conference confirmed how widespread the problem had become, and gave the realisation that, if left unchecked, trafficking can impact on development efforts, migration concerns, and security of countries. Governments have realised that criminal operations, usually from developing countries and countries in transition, preying on women and girls are at the forefront of trafficking and can pose serious threats to the rule of law everywhere. Thereby, the hard-won equality of women and men will be eroded.9

The Beijing conference, with over 40,000 women and men participants, is perhaps one of the most important UN conferences of the twentieth century in that it capsulised and consolidated the issues, concerns, and aspirations of women globally. One of the main items taken up in the "Beijing Platform for Action (BPFA)" was the issue of trafficking in women for prostitution and other forms of commercialised sex, including forced marriage and forced labour under Strategic Objective D.3 within the overall framework of violence against women. The BPFA called on governments to take appropriate measures to address the root factors and external factors that encourage trafficking in women and girls. It called for legislation that will punish perpetrators with civil and criminal measures, and protect victims by providing comprehensive programmes to assist in their recovery and rehabilitation.10

But the most significant initiative taken on the issue of trafficking has been the adoption of the UN "Optional Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children" (2000), one of the supplementary protocols of the UN "Convention on Transnational Organized Crime". Eleven sessions were held in Vienna from January 1999 to October 2000, with over 120 countries participating and with several international nongovernment organisations (NGOs) attending, particularly during the discussions on the "Protocol on Trafficking".11 Two perspectives emerged during the discussions on the protocol on trafficking. One perspective was represented by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW). It was supported by over 140 organisations and networks, such as the European Women's Lobby, Article One, Equality Now, the Association des Femmes de l'Europe Meridionale, and the Movement for the Abolition of Pornography and Prostitution, which later organised themselves into the International Human Rights Network (IHRN). This perspective proposed a definition that protected all victims of trafficking and not just those who could prove that they had been forced or coerced. It also proposed the prosecution of traffickers and pimps as well as protection measures for victims, and focused on the demand aspect that heretofore had been an invisible link in the trafficking chain.12 Moreover, the IHRN highlighted the linkage between the two protocols on the smuggling of migrants and the trafficking in persons, stressing the inclusion of the principle of "non-refoulement" in the protocol on smuggling of migrants. Since its expression in the "Refugee Convention" in 1951, non-refoulement has played a key role in how states deal with refugees and asylum-seekers.

The second perspective was represented by a coterie of organisations that supported legalised prostitution, like the Global Alliance Against Traffic on Women (GAATW) and prostitute collectives and organisations. These groups supported the notion of "sex as work" and "voluntary trafficking as migration for sex work," and systematically lobbied to limit the definition of trafficking to "forced" or "coerced trafficking," to omit any mention of trafficking for prostitution or sexual exploitation, and to delete the term "victim" as being too emotive. By limiting the coverage of trafficking only to those who can prove that they had been forced, this, in effect, was limiting the definition of trafficking to some and not all victims of trafficking.14

Below are the provisions of Article 3 of the "Optional Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children"-referred here as the "Optional Protocol on Trafficking."

a) "Trafficking in persons" shall mean the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability, or of the giving or receiving of payments of benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation.

Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, and servitude or the removal or organs.

b) The consent of a victim of trafficking in persons to the intended exploitation set forth in subparagraph (a) of this article shall be irrelevant, where any of the means set forth in subparagraph (a) have been used.

c) The recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of a child for the purpose of exploitation shall be considered "trafficking in persons" even if this does not involve any of the means set forth in subparagraph (a) of this article.

d)"Child" shall mean any person under eighteen years of age.15
This new UN Protocol highlighted the following elements:
· that trafficked persons, especially women and children in prostitution, are no longer regarded as criminals but as victims;

• that all victims of trafficking in persons are protected, not just those who can prove force (Art. 3a and b);
• that the consent of a victim of trafficking is irrelevant (Art. 3b) and that the victims will not bear the burden of proof (Art. 3b);
• that the criminal means by which trafficking takes place utilises different modes, including force, coercion, abduction, deception, or abuse of power; and that it is also less explicit, such as abuse of a victim's vulnerability (Art. 3a);
• that there is now an international definition of trafficking and an agreed set of measures and mechanisms for prosecution, protection, and prevention that can be the bases for national legislation and programmes on trafficking; and
• that this protocol is the first UN instrument to address the issue of "demand" and is calling on all delegations to strengthen measures to discourage demand that fosters all forms of exploitation of women and children (Art.9.5).16

With the impetus provided by international conferences like Beijing and numerous other regional and international conferences on trafficking, it has now come to a point that trafficking as an international issue had become a part of the agenda of the UN and other international and regional bodies. A clear definition of trafficking now guides the international community through the "Optional Protocol on Trafficking", and national governments now have a legal basis to enact their respective national legislations on trafficking.

Following the adoption of this protocol, the Philippines passed its own comprehensive anti-trafficking law (2003), followed closely by Korea. Thailand had earlier passed its own anti-trafficking law.17 The South Asian countries had passed the "South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Convention Against Trafficking", so far, the only Asian subregional convention on trafficking. Despite years of ignoring the problem, Japan finally came around and is in the final stages of its own anti-trafficking law.17 The "ASEAN Plan of Action to Combat Transnational Organized Crime" also identified trafficking in women as one of the six priority tasks that require interregional co-operation.
Despite many legislative and policy breakthroughs on the issue of trafficking, there are many issues and challenges that still need to be addressed.

Beyond Beijing: Issues and Challenges for More Effective Implementation of Anti-trafficking Strategies

Addressing barriers in the effective implementation of anti-trafficking programmes

In an insightful presentation at a global conference in 2002, Brian Iselin, Regional Legal Expert - Human Trafficking, UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Regional Centre for East Asia and the Pacific, suggested looking at the barriers in implementing a successful anti-trafficking strategy.18 The barriers he identified included:
· lack of:
- a comprehensive multisectoral anti -trafficking strategy that is holistic and integrated,
- understanding of the economics of the sex trade,
- appreciation of the denial and violation of human rights that victims experience in the course of trafficking,
- universal condemnation of the practice of human trafficking, and
- relative and normative social acceptance in some societies of the concept of human servitude;
· too much information that is unprocessed and aggregated, thus unable to generate meaningful data and advice;
· the issue of access to the law-knowing that there is law, understanding the law and what it can do to protect the victims, and invoking and claiming the power of that law;
· tension between strategies to reduce human smuggling through restrictive border controls versus addressing human trafficking;
· the need to change police culture from one of complacency in recognising the crime of trafficking to one that is more proactive and community-oriented; and
· the need to change police orientation from purely punitive to one that takes into consideration reports and complaints from third parties on NGOs.

Differentiating trafficking of persons and migrant smuggling
Trafficking occurs in conjunction with different types of movements, including immigration, migration, and refugee movement. Thus, there is bound to be confusion in differentiating one from the other. The "Optional Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children" and the "Protocol Against Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air" attempt to clarify these differences. Smuggling of aliens or "illegal migrant smuggling" is defined as "the procurement in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit, out of illegal entry of a person into a state party, of which the person is not a national or permanent resident."19
Unlike trafficking in persons that may occur both internally and internationally, migrant smuggling always involves a transnational movement across national borders. The Protocol on migrant smuggling recognises the following as criminal when done or committed intentionally for material and financial gain:

1. the smuggling of migrants;
2. when committed for the purpose of enabling the smuggling of migrants:
a. producing a fraudulent travel or identity document, and
b. procuring, possessing or possessing such a document; and
3. enabling a person who is not a national or a permanent resident to stay in the state concerned without proper legal requirements.20

As a result, smuggled migrants are considered criminals committing a crime against the state and are to be deported immediately. Persons who are trafficked, on the other hand, are considered victims who are entitled to protection and services since the crimes have been committed against their persons.21 Trafficking is further distinguished from migrant smuggling that involves illegally facilitating transportation to a foreign country for people who are willing to pay a fee for the service. Fear, force, violence and exploitation are employed to control trafficking victims. Smuggling of migrants is a highly risky enterprise that feeds on the vulnerabilities of migrants, who are sometimes yearning for a better life that they would accept even exploitative work conditions in receiving countries. Trafficking of persons, especially women and children, is perpetrated in most cases for prostitution, pornography, sex tourism, and other commercial sexual services.22

Despite the conceptual differences of trafficking and migrant smuggling, the reality on the ground is much more complex. Trafficked women and migrant women share commonalities in their plight. A migrant woman might be trafficked at anytime during the migration process because she might not have full control and knowledge of her end-destination and work. Trafficked women and migrant women have the same vulnerabilities, discrimination and abuse at any stage of their migration or of the trafficking process. Both driven by a desire to search for better work opportunities, they are both targets of traffickers and organised crime syndicates. The intersection of trafficking and migrant smuggling of women must be seen as arising from the push of globalising economies in need of more bodies for the sex industries and the sweatshops, especially in advanced countries.

Breaking the cycle of demand and supply
Trafficking is a demand-and-supply-driven reality. Most interventions on trafficking centre on women and children who are trafficked. But rarely interrogated are male sexual constructions of sexuality, attitudes and behavior that fuel the demand for the sex industry. As D'Cunha asserts (2002), the sex industry is predicated on "male-centred ideological assumptions that sex is a male right and a commodity, that commercial providers of sex services are largely women, and that women in prostitution exist as sexualised and commodified bodies functional to that male right."

The "Optional Protocol on Trafficking" is the first international human rights instrument that directly addresses the issue of demand. This protocol requires states parties to "adopt or strengthen legislative or other measures such as educational, social or cultural measures…to discourage the demand that fosters all forms of exploitation of persons, especially women and children, that leads to trafficking".23 A U.S.-led resolution on "Eliminating Demand for Trafficked Women and Girls for All Forms of Exploitation" was adopted by consensus in the 2005 UNCSW conference.

Interrogating male demand within the context of the trafficking issues is significant for three reasons.

First, it shifts the onus of responsibility and accountability away from the victim and on to the perpetrators-both the sex industry that drives it and the end user/buyer who participates in the exploitation of women and children.

Second, it allows people to connect prostitution as one of the main endgoals of trafficking for sexual exploitation, and to view both trafficking and prostitution as one integrated system of sexual exploitation.

Third, problematising male demand in the discourse highlights the gendered nature of trafficking for sexual exploitation that fosters, maintains and entrenches gender inequality.

Affirming a gender perspective in trafficking is critically important in evolving programmes that address the root causes of trafficking, which should include prevention, protection and prosecution. What are we trying to prevent and why? Who are the victims and who are the perpetrators? Women and children coming from the most destitute and impoverished circumstances from developing countries are clearly the most exploited in a hierarchy of power relations within the sex industry. This hierarchy is operated by a network of pimps, procurers, intermediaries, and the buyers.

There have been innovative approaches in addressing the demand issues. In the Philippines, for instance, "Youth Camps" educate young men on basic gender issues, the construction of masculinity and their sexuality as well as prostitution issues. Conducted by CATW-Asia Pacific in partnership with schools and communities, this project highlights the positive role that young adolescents can play in preventing sexual exploitation by upholding gender values of mutuality, respect and responsibility.24

Strengthening survivor-centred programmes and community-based prevention programmes

The active participation of survivors of trafficking is critically important in their own recovery and healing. The provision of legal, psychological and material support and services, including the provision of residency privilege for victims of trafficking, have become standards in the treatment of victims of trafficking. Stand Against Global Exploitation (SAGE) based in San Francisco, California has an outstanding programme managed by survivors for survivors, which include services like rescue, counseling, drug treatment, and alternative livelihood.

Assistance at this level must be complemented by effective community -based programmes that sustain awareness-raising on the issues of trafficking and sexual exploitation through partnerships between government and civil society sectors. The SANLAAP (dialogue) organisation and Prenana in India, and the Bantay-Bugaw (guard against pimps) programme of the CATW-Asia Pacific are examples of effective community partnerships with NGOs against trafficking. Mechanisms for early detection of illegal recruitment that can lead to trafficking must be in place in local government units, particularly in high risk and vulnerable areas.

Conclusion
Effective action against trafficking is going to require effective and integrated approaches for the long term. Interventions must be guided by a clear gender perspective that locates trafficking as a gender and human rights issue requiring preventive, prosecutory, as well as rehabilitative and recovery (of survivors) components. Stronger emphasis must be placed on prevention that addresses the root causes of trafficking-poverty, unemployment, violence against women, and discrimination. At the centre of the response system against trafficking must be the protection of the victims and potential victims by ensuring that their human rights are respected and upheld at all times. Trafficking is a complex problem that is often reduced to being a problem of illegal migration, national security, or an organised crime problem. Greater coordination, co-operation and sharing of strategies by international, regional and national governments, and NGOs are needed to develop a balanced, calibrated and humane response to trafficking that combines strategies that address the supply and demand aspects of trafficking as well as its prevention over the long term. No less than the future of generations of young women and children is at stake.

Aurora Javate-de Dios is the Executive Director, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW)-Asia Pacific; former Chairperson, National Commission of the Role of Filipino Women (NCRFW); and Associate Professor, Miriam College, Philippines.

Endnotes
1 The first international conference organised on trafficking was held in New York in 1988 by the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women. Since then, numerous international, national and local networks have organised seminars and discussions on trafficking that have been included in agendas for action at various levels.
2 International Organisation for Migration Statement by Ndioro Ndiaye, Deputy Director-General, on the occasion of the Special Session of the General Assembly on Children New York, 10 May 2002.
3 Richard, Amy O'neill. International Trafficking of Women to the United States: A Contemporary Manifestation of Slavery and Organised Crime. Center for the Study of Intelligence, USA, www.cia.gov/csi/monograph/women/trafficking.pdf
4 Kelly, Elizabeth, Journeys in Jeopardy. IOM, 2002, p. 21.
5 See Aurora J. de Dios article, The Trade in Women and Children: A Global Human Rights Crisis in SUD, University of Ottawa, 2005, for more detailed regional estimates of trafficking.
6 Huges, Donna. Factbook on Global Sexual Exploitation, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, 1999.
7 What is Pornography? www.care.org.uk/anon/background-info/
8 de Dios, Aurora J. Glamor, Glitter and Yen. unpublished dissertation, 2001.
9 The Resolution on Trafficking in Women and Girls (A/59/496) was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2005.
10 ESCAP Overview: Regional and International Mechanisms, Initiatives and Prospects, Proceedings from ESCAP Conference on Trafficking in Women, 1999, p.35.
11 The author participated in these debates on the UN Protocol on Trafficking as a member of the Philippine delegation in Vienna, Austria from 1998-2000.
12 Guide to the New UN Trafficking Protocol, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, 2000.
13 Guide to the New UN Trafficking Protocol, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, 2000, p. 4.
14 Ibid.
15 Ibid., pp.4-5.
16 Japan started to earnestly develop and anti-trafficking in persons plan of action after it had placed in Tier 2 (countries not doing enough to combat trafficking), as reported in the 2004 Anti-Trafficking Annual Report by the US.
17 Iselin, Brian. Barriers to Effective Human Trafficking Enforcement. Global Conference on the Human Rights Challenge of Globalization in Asia Pacific: Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA, November 13-15, 2002.
18 Article 3(a), Protocol Against Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, supplementing the Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, 2000.
19 Article 6, Protocol Against Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air
20 What is the Difference Between Trafficking in Persons and Alien Smuggling, http://www.protection project.org., p.1
21 Sixty-six (66) percent of trafficking victims were trafficked for sexual exploitation as documented in the U.S. Needs Assessment for Service Providers and Trafficking Victim, 2004; Coalition Against Trafficking Case Files of Filipina Trafficking Victims in Japan, Korea, Malaysia and Marianas, 2001-2003.
22 Art 9.5, "Optional Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Supplementing the Convention on Transnational Organized Crime" 2000.
23 The project was presented by Jean Enriquez, Deputy Director of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women-Asia Pacific, at the "UNCSW Beijing+10 NGO Conference" and was enthusiastically supported and applauded by delegations. Many countries like India, the U.S., and some Latin American countries are considering replicating the project in their countries.