Human Trafficking is considered to be the third largest illegal trade behind Drugs and Arms smuggling. Unfortunately Pakistan is considered as a source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labour and prostitution. Poverty, lack of education, immigration policy, environmental conditions, fractured families, lack of economic opportunities, war torn societies, persecution of a particular group of population based on their ethnicity, religious beliefs and sectarian conflicts are some of the causes of human trafficking.
Boys and girls are bought, sold, rented, or kidnapped to work in organized, illegal begging rings, domestic servitude, prostitution, and in agriculture in bonded labour. Illegal labour agents charge high fees to parents with false promises of decent work for their children, who are later exploited and subject to forced labour in domestic servitude, unskilled labour, small shops and other sectors. The country’s largest human trafficking problem is bonded labor, in which an initial debt assumed by a worker as part of the terms of employment is exploited, ultimately entrapping other family members, sometimes for generations. Trafficking experts describe a syndicated structured system for exploiting women, girls, and LGBTI (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Intersex) individuals in sex trafficking, including offering victims for sale in physical markets. In past some NGOs reported markets in Pakistan where allegedly girls and women are bought and sold for sex and labour.
Pakistani law did not criminalize all forms of sex and labour trafficking. Section 369A of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) amended in March 2016, criminalized transnational and internal forced labor and transnational and internal sex trafficking of women and children. Inconsistent with international law, Section 369A required a demonstration of force, fraud, or coercion to constitute a child sex trafficking offense, and therefore did not criminalize all forms of child sex trafficking
Pakistan is a source for human traffickers who recruit innocent people for their nefarious designs. In some cases, girls are taken into fake marriages and their so-called husbands force these newly wedded girls into prostitution in Iran or Afghanistan and other countries with China being the new addition to this list. In other cases, non-state militant groups kidnap children, buy them from destitute parents, or coerce parents with threats or fraudulent promises into giving their children away; these armed groups force children to spy and fight in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The militants often sexually and physically abuse the children and use psychological coercion to convince the children that the acts they commit are justified. Pakistan’s large number of IDPs, due to natural disasters and domestic military operations, are vulnerable to trafficking. Pakistani men and women migrate voluntarily to the Gulf states and Europe for low-skilled employment-such as domestic service, driving, and construction work; some become victims of labor trafficking. False job offers and high recruitment fees charged by illegal labor agents or sub-agents of licensed Pakistani overseas employment promoters entrap Pakistanis into sex trafficking and bonded labor. Some Pakistani children and adults with disabilities are forced to beg in Iran. Pakistan is a transit country for trafficking victims coming from Afghanistan and central Asian republics for their onward travel to Gulf countries or Europe. Similarly Pakistan is a destination country for men, women, and children subjected to forced labor-particularly from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. Women and girls from Afghanistan, China, Russia, Nepal, Iran, Bangladesh, Uzbekistan, and Azerbaijan are reportedly subjected to sex trafficking in Pakistan. Refugees from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Burma, including Rohinyga, as well as religious and ethnic minorities such as Christians and Hazaras, are particularly vulnerable to trafficking in Pakistan.
Many Pakistani women and men migrate voluntarily to the Persian Gulf States, Iran, Turkey, South Africa, Uganda, Greece, and other European countries for low-skilled employment such as domestic work, driving or construction work; once abroad, some become victims of labour trafficking. False job offers and high fees charged by illegal labour agents or sub-agents of licensed Pakistani Overseas Employment Promoters increase Pakistani labourers’ vulnerabilities and some labourers abroad find themselves in involuntary servitude or debt bondage. Employers abroad use practices including restrictions on movement, non-payment of wages, threats, and physical or sexual abuse. Moreover, traffickers use violence, psychological coercion and isolation, often seizing travel and identification documents, to force Pakistani women and girls into prostitution in the Middle East and Europe. There are reports of child and sex trafficking between Iran and Pakistan; Pakistan is a destination for men, women and children from Afghanistan, Azerbaijan and Iran who are subjected to forced labour and prostitution.
The victims of trafficking experience feelings of helplessness, guilt, self-blame, shame, humiliation, depression and post-traumatic disorder. In some cases, victims also resort to substance abuse to curb their depression which exacerbates the problem. These vulnerabilities of victims add strength to the working of traffickers and make it easier for the traffickers to exploit their victims. But in the recent years a new phenomenon has added to this illegal trade. The growing trend of illegal human organs transplantation has further aggravated the situation. FIA has unearthed many such cases where victims were being trafficked for illegal transplant of their organs. No doubt there are discrepancies and deficiencies in the laws dealing with this crime. The very definition of Human Trafficking is a limited one in the Prevention and Control of Human Trafficking Ordinance, 2002.It explains “human trafficking as ”obtaining, securing, selling, purchasing, recruiting, detaining, harbouring or receiving a person, notwithstanding his implicit or explicit consent, by the use of coercion, kidnapping, abduction, or by giving or receiving any payment or benefit, or sharing or receiving a share for such person’s subsequent transportation out of or into Pakistan by any means whatsoever for any of the purposes mentioned in section 3”.
It omits to identify trafficking inside Pakistan. While the lack of comprehensive internal anti-trafficking laws hindered law enforcement efforts, a number of other laws are used to address this issue. Several sections in the Pakistan Penal Code, as well as provincial laws, criminalize forms of human trafficking such as slavery, selling a child for prostitution, and unlawful compulsory labour, with prescribed offences ranging from fines to life imprisonment. Pakistan prohibits all forms of transnational trafficking in persons with the Prevention and Control of Human Trafficking Ordinance (PACHTO) 2002; the penalties range from seven to 14 years’ imprisonment, heavy fine or both. Government officials and civil society report that judges have difficulty applying PACHTO and awarding sufficiently stringent punishments, because of confusion due overlapping phenomenon of Human Trafficking and Migrant Smuggling and the presence of similar offences in the Pakistan Penal Code. In addition, the Bonded Labour (System) Abolition Act (BLAA) prohibits bonded labour, with prescribed penalties ranging from two to five years’ imprisonment, a fine, or both. Pakistani law did not criminalize all forms of sex and labour trafficking. Section 369A of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) amended in March 2016, criminalized transnational and internal forced labor and transnational and internal sex trafficking of women and children. Inconsistent with international law, Section 369A required a demonstration of force, fraud, or coercion to constitute a child sex trafficking offense, and therefore did not criminalize all forms of child sex trafficking. Section 369A prescribed penalties ranging from five to seven years imprisonment, or a fine, or both. These penalties were sufficiently stringent but, with respect to sex trafficking, were not commensurate with those prescribed for other serious crimes, such as rape. Several other sections of the PPC criminalized some forms of human trafficking, such as slavery and selling or buying a minor for the purpose of prostitution; maximum penalties for these offenses range from a maximum of five years to life imprisonment. Transnational sex and labor trafficking offenses, as well as some non-trafficking crimes such as migrant smuggling and fraudulent adoption, were criminalized in the Prevention and Control of Human Trafficking Ordinance (PACHTO),2002 which prescribed penalties of 7 to 14 years imprisonment. The government reported investigating 90 alleged traffickers, prosecuting 53, and convicting 29 under PACHTO in 2017, compared with investigating 98 alleged traffickers, prosecuting 60, and convicting 25 in 2016.
To be continued
The author is an Assistant Director in Federal Investigation Agency who is well versed in in investigating the organized and white collar crimes