IV. Root
causes of trafficking in women and girls
18. Identifying, addressing and
eliminating the following root causes are key to States parties’ obligations to
prevent trafficking and sexual exploitation in women and girls in the context
of global migration: (a) systemic gender-based discrimination creating the
economic and social injustice experienced disproportionately by women and
girls; (b) situations of conflicts and humanitarian emergencies, including,
consequent displacement; (c) discrimination in migration and asylum regimes;
and, (d) the demand that fosters exploitation and leads to trafficking.
19. Criminal law alone is unable to
address or redress the crime of trafficking due to uneven harmonization of
laws, including the definition of trafficking both between countries and within
countries, complexity of the financial operations, powerlessness of justice
systems which are often corrupt, underfunded and under resourced to fight
against powerful trafficking nets. An effective anti-trafficking response
ensuring women and girls are able to exercise their fundamental rights must
therefore engage all substantive provisions of the Convention read within the
international human rights treaty framework.
A. Socio-economic injustice
20. Trafficking in women and girls is
rooted in sex and gender-based discrimination, gender-based structural
inequality and the feminization of poverty. Significantly, women and girls most
vulnerable to being trafficked belong to marginalized groups whose life
experience is marked by serious rights deprivation. These include: women and
girls living in rural and remote areas, indigenous and ethnic minority
communities, those with disabilities, with an irregular migration status, as
well as those who are displaced, stateless or at risk of statelessness,
refugees, asylum-seekers (including those whose claims have been rejected),
living in or coming from conflict or post-conflict settings; and, for girls,
without care or in alternative care. These groups often experience social,
political and economic exclusion in the form of being impoverished, uneducated
or under-educated, unregistered or undocumented, unemployed or underemployed,
carrying the burden of household and childcare responsibilities, restricted in
their access to State benefits, protection and services, having experienced
intimate partner and domestic violence, abuse and neglect in their family
environment, care institutions or subjected to child and forced and servile
marriage or deprivations due to widowhood. These situations can be aggravated
by the acquisition of an impairment or a severe illness as consequence of
trafficking including sexual exploitation.
21. Women and girls continue to be the
prime targets of traffickers for specific forms of exploitation due to
pervasive and persistent gender and age inequalities resulting in an economic,
social and legal status that is lower in comparison to that which is enjoyed by
men and boys. Violations of all Convention rights may be found at the root of
trafficking of women and girls and need to be addressed as part of a
gender-transformative approach that empowers women and girls by promoting their
civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights in line with Sustainable
Development Goals 1, 3, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, 13 and 16.
B. Discrimination in migration and asylum
regimes
22. Migration is a constitutive element
of modern society and can be empowering for women if they are able to migrate
and work in conditions that respect their dignity. While it presents new social
and economic opportunities for many women migration may also place their human
rights and security at risk, particularly if compelled to travel through
irregular channels and/or result in an irregular migration situation. Women and
girls face an increased risk of being trafficked at all stages of the migration
cycle, in transit, in reception and accommodation facilities, at borders and in
destination countries. Upon return they may experience reprisals and
revictimisation.
23. While States have a sovereign
prerogative to manage their borders and regulate migration they must do so in
full compliance with their obligations as parties to the human rights treaties
they have ratified or acceded to. That includes transparency and accountability
in the ways States govern migration and provide safe pathways guaranteeing the
human rights of women throughout all stages of migration.
24 Sex-specific or discriminatory
migration and asylum policies establishing measures such as increased border
control, refusal of entry, pushbacks, expulsion or detention limit the movement
of women and girls fleeing from crises and conflict zones. This heightens their
vulnerability to all forms of exploitation, particularly at points of transit,
not least due to an increased need to use the services of human smugglers or
other types of underground or criminal networks in order to move, both
internally as well as internationally to evade border controls. Girls
unaccompanied or separated from their families or other support structures due
to displacement are particularly vulnerable to being trafficked.
25. The Committee reaffirms that
displacement has specific gender dimensions and the Convention applies at every
stage of the displacement cycle, during flight, settlement and return. It has
recognized that gender-based violence against women and girls is one of the
major forms of persecution experienced by women and girls that may be grounds
for granting refugee status and asylum, and/or residence on humanitarian
grounds. Trafficking in women and girls breaches specific provisions of the
Refugee Convention and should therefore in specific cases be recognized as a
legitimate ground for international protection in law and in practice.
Furthermore, women and girl refugees are highly vulnerable to trafficking and
are in need of international protection, especially against refoulement.
26. Gender-neutral provisions in States’
migration policies contribute to limiting women’s access to safe and regular
migration pathways and to regular and decent job opportunities in transit and
destination countries. Women’s ability to migrate is further restricted by
gender-based stereotypes, discriminatory laws, discrimination and exploitation
in recruitment, lack of available decent work, limited reliable information on
migration. Migrant women also face indirect discrimination from migration laws
which sometimes have requisites such as a mandatory minimum income in order to
obtain a visa. Since women are often employed in low-waged and insecure
employment this makes it difficult for some women to satisfy these criteria.
27. Visa regimes may be responsible for
creating an economic and legal dependency on an employer or spouse, creating
the conditions for exploitation and for sponsors to operate with impunity.
Temporary or seasonal work in which migrant women are often engaged may not
offer pathways to more regular, long-term or permanent employment and often
does not offer unemployment protection, healthcare and access to other
gender-responsive social protection and essential services. Notably,
sex-specific migration bans or restrictions, designed to ‘protect women from
trafficking’, often heighten the risk of women becoming victims of trafficking
as they seek alternative ways to migrate.
28. A disproportionate number of migrant
women are engaged in informal and precarious employment, particularly in
sectors categorised as “low-skilled” such as care, domestic, manufacturing
services. In these sectors, sex-specific migration rules and policies intersect
with racial discrimination to perpetuate sex-based stereotypes about what
constitutes “women’s work” and discrimination against women. These
gender-segregated labour markets do not offer decent and safe working
conditions as they are either part of the unregulated informal economy or, where
regulated, provide fewer protections than national standards. Women migrants,
in particular domestic and farm workers, may be confined to their place of work
and have little access to information about their rights and entitlements
thereby exposing them to severe human rights violations.
C. Demand that fosters exploitation and leads
to trafficking
29. Strategies aimed at preventing
trafficking must take into account demand as a root cause. Failure to recognize
the demand is acknowledged to be one of the barriers to States addressing human
trafficking. Demand in the context of trafficking is often shaped by desire for
financial gain, discriminatory attitudes, including cultural attitudes, and
beliefs. Women may be preferred for certain forms of exploitation because they
are perceived as weak and less likely to assert themselves or to claim the
rights to which they are entitled. Certain ethnic or racial groups may be
targeted for trafficking-related exploitation on the basis of racist or
culturally discriminatory assumptions relating to, for example, their
sexuality, and servility or work capacity. The need to address demand for
certain forms of trafficking is particularly urgent.
30. Sexual exploitation persists due to
States parties’ failure to effectively discourage the demand that fosters
exploitation and leads to trafficking. Persisting norms and stereotypes
regarding male domination, the need to assert male control or power, enforce
patriarchal gender roles, male sexual entitlement, coercion and control which
drive the demand for sexual exploitation of women and girls. Massive financial
gains with few risks due to the impunity are still widespread. Paragraph 5 of
Article 9 of the UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in
Persons, Especially Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations
Convention against Transnational Organized Crime obliges states to adopt or
strengthen legislative or other measures to discourage the demand that fosters
all forms of exploitation of persons, especially women and children, that leads
to trafficking. The need to address the demand that fosters sexual exploitation
is especially important in the context of digital technology which exposes
potential victims to increased risk of trafficking.
31. In the context of labour as a form
of trafficking in women and girls, demand for trafficking persists due to
insufficient regulatory environment. Where workers are organized and where
labour standards for wages, working hours and conditions, and health and
safety, are monitored and enforced, where economic and social rights, as well
as changes to tax laws so States can finance the public services that women
need are adequately implemented, demand for the labour or services of
trafficked persons is markedly lower.
32. Medical advancements in organ
transplantation give a chance of surviving to critically ill individuals.
However, the dramatic scarcity of human organs, on the one hand, and a failure
address the legal responsibility of those in the demand and supply chain
encourage unregulated and often enforced organ removals.
D. Situations of conflict and humanitarian
emergencies
33. The obligations of States parties do
not cease in periods of states of emergency resulting from conflict, political
events, health crises or natural disasters. Women and girls are in increased
situations of vulnerability to gender-based violence including trafficking when
they are not able to meet their basic livelihood needs or face economic
desperation, which is often exacerbated in these contexts.
34. Trafficking in women and girls is
exacerbated during and after conflict and humanitarian emergencies owing to
displacement, the breakdown of political, economic and social structures,
instability and insufficient governance, including the absence of the rule of
law, increased militarism, the availability of small arms, weakening or loosing
community and family ties, high incidence of widowhood and the “normalization”
of gender-based violence, including conflict-related sexual violence, as an
aggravating factor of pre-existing structural gender discrimination against
women and girls.
35. Financial flows to certain terrorist
groups remains a critical component of trafficking especially sexual
exploitation. During humanitarian emergencies governments are often required to
divert resources including the use of policing and social services, making it
easier for traffickers to hide their operations and rendering victims
increasingly invisible as well as making it more difficult for victims to seek
protection, services, assistance and support.
E. The use of digital technology in
trafficking
36. Digital technologies have opened new
possibilities to bring positive impact on the society. At the same time, they
are posing new security challenges at both individual and state levels. The use
of electronic currencies offers tools to hide personal information such as
identification of involved parties and location, and allow to make anonymous
payments without disclosing the purpose of transaction. All of this facilitates
those involved in trafficking. Demand channels through social media, dark web
and messaging platforms provide easy access to potential victims thus
increasing their vulnerability.
37. The use of digital technology for
trafficking poses special problems during global pandemics. Under the COVID-19
State parties face growths of trafficking in cyberspace: an increased
recruitment for sexual exploitation on-line, an increased demand for child
sexual abuse material and technology facilitated child sex trafficking.
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