Articles

Illegal Human Trafficking

Dear Friends,

Please see below for information about Illegal Human Trafficking.

THE TREATMENT OF PERSONS AND

THE ILLEGAL TRAFFICKING OF PERSONS

(APRIL, 2010, n. 5 ** CURIA, OSA, Frs. Michael and Alejandro

This is not just more information, nor anything less. Behind each one of the articles we send you, behind the names and text we write - always behind, because they are unknown to everyone - is the life and the history of a person. Perhaps living in deplorable conditions. Perhaps now deceased … They are human persons who are not as fortunate as we are. Many of them don’t have parents or siblings. They belong to no country. At times, they don’t even have a name. They are materially and spiritually poor. They are destitute. Nonetheless, they are the most loved sons and daughters of God.

SENSITIZE THE BROTHERS IN YOUR CIRCUMSCRIPTION

With this new information, the Secretariat for Justice and Peace, wishes to assist the friars of the Order in acquiring a greater awareness of the trafficking of persons, which is the priority goal for the years of 2009 – 2011. You, as a major superior or a delegate for Justice and Peace in your circumscription have the responsibility of helping your brothers become more aware of this cross of sacrifice for thousands and thousands of people. Until we manage to involve everyone in denouncing and taking action against this festering wound in our society, we cannot truly believe ourselves to be free nor truly brothers to the poorest among us.

EUROPE (ROMANIA): THE TREATMENT AND TRAFFICKING OF ORPHANS (II)

It was late. It was very cold. Across the street in the southeast city limits of Milan there was a teenager in jeans and a tee-shirt. She paced nervously back and forth on the sidewalk. She was stamping her feet on the pavement with her hands tucked underneath her crossed arms. I saw someone like a police officer asking for her papers.

At the end of the conversation I went to talk to the official. She told him her name was Mariana and that she was Romanian. 19 years old. According to him the teenager was not more than 16, even though the date of birth on her passport was 1990. Petite. Short, black hair. Her features suggested a life not yet lived.

The “constable” who stopped the teenager is a 51 year old inspector. He has been working for 20 years in the criminal field: homicide, prostitution, treatment of human persons. “Since I was 8 years old”, Mariana had told him, “my father came into my bed and made me touch him. When he wasn’t in jail and wasn’t beating my mother, he didn’t stop molesting me. And then, when I was thirteen years old I ended up in a center in Bacau. But the attraction of having some money turned the streets into a necessity for me.”

HOW DO THE GANGS OF MAFIOSI FUNCTION?

It is this “necessity” that ends up in the hands of the Romanian and Albanian “mafias” who organize the trafficking of young people and set them up in prostitution. Although each group of Mafiosi have their own idiosyncrasies depending on their locations, all use a very similar methodology. The network employs recruiters, sellers, chaperones and exploiters of both sexes. In these last few years, as we can see on our streets, there has been a noticeable increase in the number of Rumanian and Moldavian youth. This is due, among other things, to the ease of movement which their “status” as members of the European community permits. Some existing laws between the two countries permit Moldavians to obtain Romanian documentation. The same inspector I spoke with mentioned that the “the situation has changed”. Romanians are members of the European community. They arrive in Italy in vans or private cars and in small groups. In Milan they are helped by young women already in the city, under contract with fellow Romanians or Albanians. They provide them with a house, clothes, cell-phones … but the earnings their “protectors” had promised them, are not such, they remain an illusion, a empty promise. In one night a young woman can make 500 Euros, with rates that can vary from 30 to 70 Euros for services. They get less than 20% of that, some 3,000 Euros a month which, however, is a fortune. At times, some of the young women are forced to sell themselves during pregnancy and even up until they give birth. And the “minors”? It is usual to recruit from Romanian orphanages and ever more frequent for them to be sent to Swiss, German or Dutch locations, according to our contact.

WHERE CAN ONE FIND MORE INFORMATION ON THIS TOPIC?

You can find information on the internet under the heading: Trafficking of persons – Human trafficking

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

www.iom.int

http://www.afrol.com

http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_trafficking

http://www.humantraffikinged.com

http://www.humantraffiking.org

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trata_de_personas

www.antenamisionera.org

www.bambiniinemergenza.org