More than 12 million are modern slaves, U.S. says

More than 12 million are modern slaves, U.S. says

news.yahoo.com

A sobering new report from the State Department finds that more than 12 million people worldwide are victims of "trafficking in persons" — trapped in forced labor, bonded labor or forced prostitution. But just 4,166 people were convicted of trafficking last year, the report says.

But there's still much work ahead, the report says. The State Repartment estimates that only 0.4 percent of all modern slavery victims were identified last year. Human trafficking is a multibillion-dollar business

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Also from article:

Clinton said that for the first time, the State Department will rank the United States using the same standards as it uses for the other countries. The country earned the department's highest ranking, meaning that the government is in full compliance with U.N. anti-trafficking protocol. Countries near the bottome of the list include China, Saudia Arabia, India, Iran and Russia.

In this day and age, you would like to think that this thing was no longer possible...but it is.

I actually think that this number is FAR higher as China alone would have to boost these numbers up.

I think the article is right however, it's going to get worse as things around the world are getting worse.

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

[edit on 14-6-2010 by David9176]

It is way higher than 12million.

Try about 6.5 billion.

That sounds more accurate of a account for the Earth Slave Index.

the government takes half my paycheck and gives it to bankers and oil barons sounds like slavery to me

In my world travels, I have met many of these people, mostly women. When I was in a very modern and civilized country in the Persian Gulf, I met a woman from Kiev, Ukraine. She (and a large number of other women from similar Soviet block nations) had been promised good jobs with good pay, but when they arrived in the Middle East they found out that they were going to be required to work out of the hotel as prostitutes. Any money made from their "work" was giving directly to the bosses to cover the cost of a hotel room she shared with several of the other girls and food. They were not allowed to leave the hotel for any reason and had to make a certain amount of money for the boss before they would be flown back to their home countries. My guess is that most spent at least a year or two trying to earn that kind of money.

The same happens on a larger scale to Thai women. You can go to just about any country and run into women from Thailand who were promised good pay for normal types of work but end up being prosituted instead. It is a truly sad phenomenon.