According to the document, launched in December in New York, 63,251 victims of trafficking were detected in 106 countries between 2012 and 2014
According to the document, launched in December in New York, 63,251 victims of trafficking were detected in 106 countries between 2012 and 2014
By AFP
Venezuelan women forced into prostitution in Cartagena, indigenous Ecuadorians taken as children to beg in Cali, Colombian women sexually exploited in China or Chile, Colombians in forced labor in Argentina: for the UN, a Colombia is a country of origin, transit and destination for human trafficking.
"Trafficking is becoming more and more concentrated in the same region, on the same continent," the representative in Colombia of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Bo Mathiasen, told AFP, commenting on the latest report on this scourge.
According to the document, launched in December in New York, 63,251 victims of trafficking were detected in 106 countries between 2012 and 2014.
The UN is concerned about this "very lucrative" illicit business, which generates around US$ 32 billion a year globally, Mathiasen said, pointing out that almost a third of all victims worldwide are minors.
In Central America and the Caribbean, the percentage of boys and girls who are victims of this type of abuse is even higher: it reaches 62% and 64%, respectively, added the UN representative.
Although the UNODC study identifies armed groups as the main risk factor, by exploiting girls and women sexually and forcing men and boys to become combatants, this situation is not seen so much in Colombia.
For almost half a century, this South American country has been punished by cruel fratricidal violence.
"There are some associations, but in general it's a separate crime, it has its own dynamics. Colombia doesn't necessarily have more victims of the crime of human trafficking because of the internal conflict," Mathiasen explained.
According to experts, in Colombia, the greatest vulnerability to trafficking occurs in the regions of influence of criminal groups linked to drug trafficking and illegal mining.
"Organized crime adds human trafficking to its business," said Mathiasen.
From the coffee axis to China
In Colombia, areas of high mobility due to internal or external migratory flows, economic inequality and school dropouts increase vulnerability to human trafficking, said the coordinator of the UNODC Trafficking in Persons and Migrant Trafficking Program in the country, Carlos Andrés Pérez.
He cited a study by the University of La Sabana, according to which a network can invest around US$ 6,000 to take a Colombian woman from the department of Risaralda, in the heart of the coffee-growing region, to China. In just three months of sexual exploitation, it is possible to earn at least US$ 60,000 from this criminal practice.
Reports from the UN Office and the Colombian Ministry of the Interior show an increase in cases in recent years, but this doesn't exactly mean that the phenomenon is growing, but rather an increase in the number of notifications, the expert warned.
Pérez pointed out, however, that more cases were being detected in the country.
"In previous years, trafficking was linked to nationals transferred to other continents, but the strengthening of controls has led to an increase in internal cases," he said, adding that for every documented case, it is estimated that there is no information on at least 20 others.
According to official figures quoted by the UN, 73 victims of human trafficking were registered in Colombia in 2015 - the majority for sexual exploitation, forced labor, begging and servile marriage. Of this total, 86% were women.
The report identified the departments of Valle del Cauca (west); Cundinamarca (center), where Colombia's capital, Bogotá, is located; Caldas and Risaralda (center, coffee-growing axis); and Antioquia (northwest), where Medellín, the country's second most important city, is located, "as fragile territories for attracting victims," according to data from January 2015 to June 2016.
In 2015, the main destinations for the exploitation of these victims abroad were the Dominican Republic, China, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, Argentina, Panama, Paraguay and the United Arab Emirates.
Source: Examination – 13.01.2017