Report: Financial crisis feeds human trade

WASHINGTON, June 16 (UPI) -- The global financial crisis has made more people more likely to be lured by false promises of human traffickers, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.

When introducing the State Department's annual human trafficking report Tuesday, Clinton said the document "underscores the need to address the root causes of trafficking, including poverty, lax law enforcement, and the exploitation of women."

Economic pressure, she said. "especially in this global economic crisis, makes more people susceptible to the false promises of traffickers."

The worldwide financial crisis hes led to a shrinking demand for labor and a growing supply of workers willing to take risks, creating "a recipe for increased forced labor cases of migrant workers and women in prostitution," the report said.

The congressionally mandated report provides data from 175 countries about the level of human trafficking occurring within their borders. The report cites the International Labor Organization estimate that at least 12.3 million adults and children are victims of forced labor, bonded labor and sex slavery annually.

Six African nations -- Chad, Eritrea, Mauritania, Niger, Swaziland and Zimbabwe -- were included on the report's "Tier 3" list of countries whose efforts to combat trafficking are inadequate.

Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Syria remained listed on Tier 3 for another year, as did repeat offenders North Korea, Myanmar and Fiji.

Fifty-two countries were on the report's Tier 2 "watch list" because they were determined to have failed to meet the minimum anti-trafficking standards but working to do so.

The trafficking report "is not an indictment of past failures, but a guide for future progress," Clinton said. "With this report, we hope to shine the light brightly on the scope and scale of modern slavery so all governments can see where progress has been made and where more is needed."