Sunday, December 24, 2006
Is it Poltical Commitment
Speakers in a conference in Dhaka, Bangladesh stressed on poltical commitment of the Government to stop child trafficking. Daily Star reports on December 21, 2006 that "a total of 71 people have been punished since the year 2004 due to their involvement in child trafficking and 394 have been arrested". This number seems low as a lot of trafficking cases go unreported to the Authority.
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Domestic Violance in Bangladesh
Children are at risk when they face domestic violence. In Bangladesh, we still ignore domestic violence as a social problem. Read this article at Daily Star journal on domestic violence. The author, a law student in Bangladesh, writes in his article, "Almost all of civil and criminal laws of Bangladesh deal with violence against women committed within general community by strangers with few exceptions e.g. dissolution of marriage, dowry related violence, dower, maintenance, guardianship and custody. Present laws are ignorant about issues of sexual abuse e.g. marital rape, verbal or psychological or economic abuse caused by domestic violence and also fail to provide adequate remedy. High probability of non-conviction of accused under existing laws lowers rate of filing cases comparing total incidents of domestic violence". Definitely, we've to go a long way to counter domestic violence.
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Monday, October 30, 2006
Smile for a child, then end poverty
This is a very powerful video presented in the youtube. Watch this documentary to enroll yourself to fight world poverty.
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Tuesday, September 19, 2006
US Responses to fight human trafficking in Bangladesh
United States is offiering huge technical and financial resources in Bangladesh to fight human trafficking. There are a lot of technical reports that put in place by US initiative. As a child welfare professional, I'm really grateful to US respone. If you'd like to go through all the resources, please go to USAid Bangladesh page.
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Saturday, July 8, 2006
State of Human Trafficking in Bangladesh
In the recent years, Bangladesh has shown tremendous progress in combatting human trafficking. Even though, we need to take a lot of active measure to fight human trafficking in Bangladesh. Please review the annual Trafficking in Persons Report 2006 the US State Department. I've copied the Bangladesh section of the Report for readers:
"Bangladesh is a source and transit country for men, women, and children for the purposes of sexual exploitation, involuntary domestic servitude, child camel jockeying, and debt bondage. Women and children from Bangladesh are trafficked to India and Pakistan for sexual exploitation. Bangladeshi women migrate legally to Gulf states--Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, the U.A.E., and Saudi Arabia--for work as domestic servants, but often find themselves in situations of involuntary servitude. In addition, Bangladeshi boys are trafficked to the Gulf to serve as camel jockeys and internally as bonded laborers in the fishing industry. Women and girls from rural areas are trafficked internally for sexual exploitation and domestic servitude. Burmese women trafficked to India for sexual exploitation transit Bangladesh.
The Government of Bangladesh does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so. Bangladesh continued to make progress on efforts initiated two years ago. The government repatriated 166 child camel jockeys from the U.A.E., rescued 160 children from bonded labor in the fishing industry, launched a broad public awareness campaign, and provided anti-trafficking training to border guards and diplomats. Despite these achievements, Bangladesh continues to face a significant internal and international trafficking problem. Bangladesh should assign greater priority and resources to its law enforcement response to trafficking. It should also institute programs to protect witnesses.
Prosecution The Government of Bangladesh sustained efforts to punish traffickers in 2005, prosecuting 87 cases and convicting 36 traffickers -- 27 of whom received life sentences. Although the number of prosecutions increased over 2004, the number of convictions declined. Police also arrested 150 alleged traffickers. Notably, Bangladesh began prosecutions against child camel jockey traffickers. Although a lack of resources hinders investigations, Bangladesh expanded anti-trafficking police units to every district to encourage victims to testify against their traffickers and to compile data on trafficking. In response to inadequately trained police and prosecutors, the government worked with legal experts to provide specialized training to prosecutors and with IOM to develop a trafficking course for the National Police Academy. Despite persistent reports of security personnel complicity in trafficking, the government has investigated only three such cases since June 2004, charging eight officials with trafficking complicity.
Protection The Government of Bangladesh continued to provide an inadequate level of protection to victims of trafficking over the reporting period. With limited resources, the government supported crisis centers in hospitals that are open to trafficking victims, but it also relied heavily on NGOs to provide legal, medical, and psychological care to victims. Of the 166 child camel jockeys repatriated from the U.A.E., 144 have returned to their families, 16 are preparing for reunification, and authorities are searching for relatives of the remaining six. Bangladesh should institute a system to protect witnesses from retribution and to encourage more to testify at trials against traffickers.
Prevention Bangladesh made significant progress in its trafficking prevention efforts throughout the year through broad public awareness campaigns and specialized training. A campaign of public service announcements aired 3,152 television spots and 305 radio announcements warning the public of the dangers of trafficking. The Ministry of Social Welfare also provided anti-trafficking information to micro-credit borrowers, reaching over 400,000 at-risk women. Bangladesh noticeably improved its training efforts, providing entry-level diplomats and over 20,000 border guards with specialized anti-trafficking training. Over 2,100 imams received training on the risks, threats, and modalities of trafficking and 100 imams received training as trainers. As a result, 2,667 imams delivered specific anti-trafficking messages during Friday prayer services in 2005, reaching millions of people". Read more!
"Bangladesh is a source and transit country for men, women, and children for the purposes of sexual exploitation, involuntary domestic servitude, child camel jockeying, and debt bondage. Women and children from Bangladesh are trafficked to India and Pakistan for sexual exploitation. Bangladeshi women migrate legally to Gulf states--Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, the U.A.E., and Saudi Arabia--for work as domestic servants, but often find themselves in situations of involuntary servitude. In addition, Bangladeshi boys are trafficked to the Gulf to serve as camel jockeys and internally as bonded laborers in the fishing industry. Women and girls from rural areas are trafficked internally for sexual exploitation and domestic servitude. Burmese women trafficked to India for sexual exploitation transit Bangladesh.
The Government of Bangladesh does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so. Bangladesh continued to make progress on efforts initiated two years ago. The government repatriated 166 child camel jockeys from the U.A.E., rescued 160 children from bonded labor in the fishing industry, launched a broad public awareness campaign, and provided anti-trafficking training to border guards and diplomats. Despite these achievements, Bangladesh continues to face a significant internal and international trafficking problem. Bangladesh should assign greater priority and resources to its law enforcement response to trafficking. It should also institute programs to protect witnesses.
Prosecution The Government of Bangladesh sustained efforts to punish traffickers in 2005, prosecuting 87 cases and convicting 36 traffickers -- 27 of whom received life sentences. Although the number of prosecutions increased over 2004, the number of convictions declined. Police also arrested 150 alleged traffickers. Notably, Bangladesh began prosecutions against child camel jockey traffickers. Although a lack of resources hinders investigations, Bangladesh expanded anti-trafficking police units to every district to encourage victims to testify against their traffickers and to compile data on trafficking. In response to inadequately trained police and prosecutors, the government worked with legal experts to provide specialized training to prosecutors and with IOM to develop a trafficking course for the National Police Academy. Despite persistent reports of security personnel complicity in trafficking, the government has investigated only three such cases since June 2004, charging eight officials with trafficking complicity.
Protection The Government of Bangladesh continued to provide an inadequate level of protection to victims of trafficking over the reporting period. With limited resources, the government supported crisis centers in hospitals that are open to trafficking victims, but it also relied heavily on NGOs to provide legal, medical, and psychological care to victims. Of the 166 child camel jockeys repatriated from the U.A.E., 144 have returned to their families, 16 are preparing for reunification, and authorities are searching for relatives of the remaining six. Bangladesh should institute a system to protect witnesses from retribution and to encourage more to testify at trials against traffickers.
Prevention Bangladesh made significant progress in its trafficking prevention efforts throughout the year through broad public awareness campaigns and specialized training. A campaign of public service announcements aired 3,152 television spots and 305 radio announcements warning the public of the dangers of trafficking. The Ministry of Social Welfare also provided anti-trafficking information to micro-credit borrowers, reaching over 400,000 at-risk women. Bangladesh noticeably improved its training efforts, providing entry-level diplomats and over 20,000 border guards with specialized anti-trafficking training. Over 2,100 imams received training on the risks, threats, and modalities of trafficking and 100 imams received training as trainers. As a result, 2,667 imams delivered specific anti-trafficking messages during Friday prayer services in 2005, reaching millions of people". Read more!
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Glimpses of Poverty
Do you know what is poverty? Is it hungry face? Is it empty stomach? Is it crying baby for milk? Is it frail body? Isn't it shameful that our prosperity can not eliminate poverty? See this video:
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Friday, June 9, 2006
Child Trafficking Review in 2004
Somini Sengupta’s article on Child Traffickers Prey on Bangladesh was published in the New York Times on April 29, 2002. Her article surfaced a 10 year old boy Nuru Mia’s story. Nuru played as a camel jockey in the Dubai desert. His image shows the suffering of children as camel jockeys who are trafficked by criminals and their underworld networks and exploited by their rich patrons in the Middle East. BBC News featured story of some of these children repatriation to Bangladesh and the vivid image of their painful suffering. According to United Nations Children’s Funds (Unicef), about 1.2 million children are trafficked each year. Thousands of boys as young as five years are trafficked from Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan to the United Arab Emirates each year to work as camel jockeys
The economy of child trafficking goes beyond any supply and demand analysis or economic gains for parents. Case study of a poor ten year old girl from a Bangladesh village represents the horror of sexual exploitation. She is one of the 13,000 children who were trafficked out of Bangladesh in the last five years. Earlier this year in a seminar, it was referred that up to 20,000 women and children are smuggled out of Bangladesh annually (Daily Star, January 21, 2004). We share a global concern of child trafficking, as its extent and portrait are found to be very elusive. State Department’s Trafficking in Persons Report (2003) on human trafficking problem by countries is a comprehensive document for public awareness.
Tragically, children have become an easy prey of an emerging exploitative immigration practice. Thousands of children are sold and smuggled out of Bangladesh for physical and sexual exploitation in the recent years. We don’t know their names or addresses, they are simply lost in numbers, in unofficial estimates, or sometimes a few of them are caught in law enforcement actions. Child trafficking has attracted immaculate news headlines and further research interests. It is not incidental in Bangladesh context; its extent reflects absence of a structured social protection response for children, deterioration of social cohesiveness along with poor enforcement of criminal justice system. Child trafficking is a breach of human rights and children’s rights that deserves national attention for preventive and rehabilitative strategies. We need to look at child welfare advocacy resources that are active in Bangladesh for child protection.
Every child smuggled out of the country is simply one more number to the estimated calculation of thousands of children. Real pictures of their suffering, painful living and deprivation are mostly untold, unknown and tragically unnoticed. Children are stolen, their innocence is lost, their dreams are shattered, and more over, they are severely betrayed by our ambivalence and lack of social protection. They live and survive in a disgraceful life. Their smugglers and traders are stone hearted criminals who have allured them and their families. These young children even don’t know what their fault is. Their scars remain fresh, their tears don’t dry up, and our words can hardly describe their suffering.
Our ambivalence and indifference about child trafficking are very painful. It is a fundamental human rights challenge and the worst form of oppression of our time. We urge you to come forward to combat child trafficking. It could be a letter writing campaign and/or fund raising effort for helping children to repatriate and rehabilitate. We need your ideas and thoughts, as they are powerful for meaningful action. Our empathy should not evaporate with a silent sigh. All we have to do is to: “break the heart of stone”, and there is “No need to waste the foolish tear, or heave the windy sigh” as Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) portrayed a century ago. Read more!
The economy of child trafficking goes beyond any supply and demand analysis or economic gains for parents. Case study of a poor ten year old girl from a Bangladesh village represents the horror of sexual exploitation. She is one of the 13,000 children who were trafficked out of Bangladesh in the last five years. Earlier this year in a seminar, it was referred that up to 20,000 women and children are smuggled out of Bangladesh annually (Daily Star, January 21, 2004). We share a global concern of child trafficking, as its extent and portrait are found to be very elusive. State Department’s Trafficking in Persons Report (2003) on human trafficking problem by countries is a comprehensive document for public awareness.
Tragically, children have become an easy prey of an emerging exploitative immigration practice. Thousands of children are sold and smuggled out of Bangladesh for physical and sexual exploitation in the recent years. We don’t know their names or addresses, they are simply lost in numbers, in unofficial estimates, or sometimes a few of them are caught in law enforcement actions. Child trafficking has attracted immaculate news headlines and further research interests. It is not incidental in Bangladesh context; its extent reflects absence of a structured social protection response for children, deterioration of social cohesiveness along with poor enforcement of criminal justice system. Child trafficking is a breach of human rights and children’s rights that deserves national attention for preventive and rehabilitative strategies. We need to look at child welfare advocacy resources that are active in Bangladesh for child protection.
Every child smuggled out of the country is simply one more number to the estimated calculation of thousands of children. Real pictures of their suffering, painful living and deprivation are mostly untold, unknown and tragically unnoticed. Children are stolen, their innocence is lost, their dreams are shattered, and more over, they are severely betrayed by our ambivalence and lack of social protection. They live and survive in a disgraceful life. Their smugglers and traders are stone hearted criminals who have allured them and their families. These young children even don’t know what their fault is. Their scars remain fresh, their tears don’t dry up, and our words can hardly describe their suffering.
Our ambivalence and indifference about child trafficking are very painful. It is a fundamental human rights challenge and the worst form of oppression of our time. We urge you to come forward to combat child trafficking. It could be a letter writing campaign and/or fund raising effort for helping children to repatriate and rehabilitate. We need your ideas and thoughts, as they are powerful for meaningful action. Our empathy should not evaporate with a silent sigh. All we have to do is to: “break the heart of stone”, and there is “No need to waste the foolish tear, or heave the windy sigh” as Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) portrayed a century ago. Read more!
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