Key highlights of the report:
- Total numbers: There are 25 million adults and children suffering from labour and sex trafficking all over the world.
- Domestic trafficking:
- In 77% of the cases, victims are trafficked within their own countries of residence, rather than across borders.
- Victims of sex trafficking were more likely to be trafficked across borders while victims of forced labour were typically exploited within their own countries.
- Palermo Protocol: While much has been done since the Palermo Protocol (an international framework to tackle trafficking) in terms of countries building legal frameworks, more needs to be done to tackle domestic trafficking.
- Categorisation of countries:
- The report categorises countries into three groups based on the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), U.S. legislation enacted in 2000.
- The categorisation is based not on the magnitude of a country’s trafficking problem but on efforts to meet minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking.
- Indian scenario:
- India was placed (i.e., remained) in Tier 2.
- It recommended India to include amending the definition of trafficking in Section 370 of the Penal Code to “include forced labour trafficking and ensure that force, fraud, or coercion are not required to prove a child sex trafficking offence.”
