Trafficking and Forced Prostitution
From the start, efforts to create human rights norms regarding trafficking have focused on punishing traffickers rather than the victims, in stark contrast to government practice described in the case studies in this chapter. International human rights instruments that prohibit trafficking and exploitation of prostitution address these practices in broad terms. Human Rights Watch is particularly concerned that many state parties have failed to protect women and girls from coerced trafficking and forced prostitution, or have failed to prosecute vigorously those who commit such abuse. The international community first denounced trafficking in persons in the 1949 Convention on the Suppression of Traffic in Persons and the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others (the Trafficking Convention). Under the terms of this treaty, state parties "agree to punish any person who, to gratify the passions of another, procures, entices or leads away, for purposes of prostitution, another person . . ."4 In addition, the Trafficking Convention requires state parties to sanction any person who runs or finances a brothel; in our view, law enforcement agencies should focus particularly on individuals who operate, aid or abet forced prostitution operations.5 States should further "adopt or maintain such measures as required . . . to check the traffic in persons . . . for the purposes of prostitution."6
With regard to persons who have been trafficked, the convention emphasizes their protection and safe repatriation. It calls on state parties "so far as possible" to "make suitable provisions for [trafficking victims'] temporary care and maintenance"; to repatriate such persons "only after agreement . . . with the State of destination"; and, where persons cannot paythe costs of repatriation, to bear the cost "as far as the nearest frontier."7 While we recognize the right of governments to make and enforce laws regulating national borders, they must distinguish between those who purposefully violate immigration laws and others who are victims of forced trafficking.
The obligation of state parties to take all appropriate measures to suppress the traffic in women was later reiterated in the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).8 CEDAW does not, however, elaborate upon specific steps. Like the Trafficking Convention, CEDAW links trafficking to the exploitation of prostitution, but fails to address trafficking for other exploitative ends, such as coerced marriage and forced labor.
4 Trafficking Convention, Article 1.
6 Ibid., Article 17. This includes making "such regulations as are necessary" to protect immigrants, in particular women and children, and all persons in transit.
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