Many countries ignore human trafficking - UN

Human trafficking for the sex trade or forced labour market appears to be getting worse because many countries are ignoring the globalised problem, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said.

It gave no figure for the number of people trafficked every year, but a US State Department report has put it at 800,000 compared with the International Labour Organisation's estimate in 2005 that 2.5 million people were being trafficked annually.

The UNODC study said 40 per cent of affected countries had not registered a single conviction, crucial to deterrence.

UNODC said although sexual abuse was suffered mainly by women and girls, women accounted for the majority of traffickers in almost a third of the 155 countries surveyed.

Twenty per cent of victims were children, but they were the majority in Southeast Asia's Mekong region and parts of Africa.

"Children's nimble fingers are exploited to untangle fishing nets, sew luxury goods or pick cocoa. Their innocence is abused for begging or exploited for sex as prostitutes," UNODC said.

About 79 per cent of human trafficking involved sex slavery while 18 per cent covered forced or bonded labour, forced marriages and organ removal.

"Public opinion is waking up to the reality of modern slavery but many governments are still in denial. There is even neglect when it comes to reporting on or prosecuting cases of trafficking," Costa said in the report.

"We fear the problem is getting worse but we cannot prove it for lack of data, and many governments are obstructing."

UNODC said 63 per cent of the countries covered by the report had enacted anti-trafficking laws since a special UN protocol against the crime took effect five years ago.

The number of convictions was rising but most occurred in only a few states. Many others, especially in Africa, lacked legislation or the will to crack down on human trafficking. Conviction rates in most states rarely exceeded that for much rarer crimes such as kidnapping, and were far lower than the estimated number of victims, UNODC said.