Julio / July 2009

 

 

 

    Home

Creating a Bright Future Today for

Children, Women, Men & Families

   

 

 

    

 

 

/ Welcome


Dedicated to Ending the Sexual Oppression of

Latina, Indigenous & African Women & Children in the

Americas 

Since March, 2001


Remember Them!


About the leading edge human rights work of Dr. Laura Bozzo


Search

Site Map


OUR REPORTS

All of our reports and commentaries: 1994 to present

About Us

2006 - Migration, Social Reform and Women's Right to Survive

2005 - Defending 'Maria' from Impunity

2003 Slavery Report


ISSUES INDEX

Our Site Map


The Crisis Facing Indigenous Women and Children

A young Indigenous girl child from Paraguay, South America, freed from sexual slavery by police in Argentina.

Native Latin America

Native Bolivia

Native Brazil

Native Colombia

Native El Salvador

Native Guatemala -

   Femicide & Genocide

Native Mexico

   Acteal Massacre

Native Peru

United States

Native Canada

African Diaspora

Haitian children are routinely enslaved in the Dominican Republic

Afro Latin America and the Caribbean

The Crisis Facing Latin American Women and Children

Introduction

Key Facts

HIV-AIDS Issues

About Machismo

Concept of Impunity

More Information

Central America / Mexico Region

Central America

El Salvador

Honduras

México

   Juarez Femicide

Nicaragua

Panama

Caribbean Region

Spanish Speaking

Cuba

Dominican Republic

Puerto Rico

French Speaking

Haiti / Dominica

English Speaking

Jamaica

Trinidad and Tobago

South American Region

Argentina

Brazil 

Columbia

Ecuador

Guyana

Paraguay

Venezuela

Crisis - U.S. Latinas

Crisis: U.S. Latinas

Washington, DC

Workplace Rape

U.S. Rape Cases

Sexual Slavery

Trafficking Overview

The Global Crisis

Latin American

   Sexual Slavery

U.S. Latina Slavery

Latina Child Sex

   Slavery in San Diego

Worst Cases

Urgent Human Rights Issues in Mexico

Oaxaca

Striking Mexican

   Women Teachers

   are Violently

   Attacked by Police

   in Oaxaca

Antenco

Foto: Belinda Hernández

Mexico Police

   Rape 7 and Assault

   16 Other Women at

   Street Protest

Lydia Cacho

Journalist / Activist

   Lydia Cacho is

   Railroaded by the

   Legal Process for

   Exposing Child Sex

   Networks In Mexico

Other Issues

School Exploitation

Forced Sterilization

The Jutiapa, Guate-

   mala Child Porn

   Scandal

The Elio Carrion

   Shooting Case

President Bush's

  Immigration

  Proposal

Other Disasters

The Darfur Genocide

Impact of Hurricanes

  Stan and Wilma

Hurricane Katrina

Other Regions

Africa

Asia / Pacific

Middle East

Europe

Reference

Who's Who

Organizations

Books

Media Articles

 

Indigenous & Latina Women & Children's Human Rights News from the Americas 


 

 
Jan.  Feb.  Mar. Apr.  May  June  July  Aug. Sep.  Oct.  Nov.  Dec.

News and Events - English
Other News Archives: 2001 - 2002 - 2003 - 2004 - 2005 - 2006 - 2007

March 2008 News



Added March 31, 2008

Maryland, USA

Baltimore - Police Commissioner Frederick H. Bealefeld III [has] accused Mark Castillo, 41, of killing [his 3 young] children by submerging them "one at a time" in the bathtub of a top-floor room at the Baltimore Marriott Inner Harbor...

Castillo... according to court records[,] suffers from bipolar disorder...

On Christmas Day 2006, Amy Castillo sought a restraining order against her estranged husband, expressing concern for the children's safety. In a court petition, she wrote that he "has never actually hurt them but did tell me that the worst thing he could do to me would be to kill the children and not me so I could live without them..."

A temporary order was granted by a district court judge, and the case was transferred to circuit court, where the couple's custody battle was underway. After a hearing Jan. 10, Judge Joseph A. Dugan Jr. denied Amy Castillo's request to issue a permanent restraining order...

At least twice last year, motions that would have withheld visitation rights were denied. At one point, according to the records, Amy Castillo was fined for refusing visitation rights.

- Daniel de Vise, Raymond McCaffrey, Elissa Silverman

The Washington Post

March 31, 2008


Added March 28, 2008

United States

...More than 100 local law enforcement agencies — including Los Angeles and Orange counties in California and Maricopa County in Arizona, which includes Phoenix — have begun or are waiting for training to help the Department of Homeland Security root out illegal immigrants and hand them over for deportation...

Advocates say the training beefs up the power of the overworked Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency. Detractors say it will discourage millions of immigrants from reporting crime or cooperating with police investigations...

"People are very, very fearful of interaction with law enforcement, said Susan Shah, with the New York-based Vera Institute of Justice, a nonprofit. "Even people with legal status, whose families may have mixed immigration status, now have a fear of opening the door..."

In Falls Church, Va., staffers at the Tarirhu Justice Center, which works with immigrant victims of domestic abuse, say they are fielding calls from women who have been assaulted, yet refuse to go to police.

"When there's confusion about what policy applies to you and when it does, the safe course of action is to avoid authorities altogether," said Jeanne Smoot, the center's director of public policy...

- Monica Rohr

Associated Press

Mar 29, 2008

LibertadLatina Commentary

Undocumented Women and Girls Who Are Caught Between Increasing Immigration Law Enforcement And Recession Face Sexual Exploitation

Prostitution, quid-pro-quo work arrangements and non-reporting of rape result from a bad economy and tougher federal, state and local immigration enforcement.

...Ms. undocumented Latina finds herself with no relief from comprehensive immigration reform, no green card, no work permit, no job, little understanding of the details of federal, state and local laws, no protection from crime, protection that should be provided by police forces that today may arrest and deport her, no way to feed herself and her children, and no access to the social services that could help to alleviate those desperate circumstances.

In that situation, Ms. Latina will not report rape to police.  She will not say "no!" to a potential or current employer who says (in violation of the law) that sex is the price she must pay for employment, and she may not say "no!" to a pimp or sex trafficker who offers her 'la vida facil' (the easy life) as a prostitute.  If she goes home to Bolivia, Peru, Nicaragua, Colombia, Mexico or the Dominican Republic, she will face exactly the same conditions of life, except for the fact that she will not be able to support her  family...

Read the full essay

- Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

Mar 29, 2008


Added March 27, 2008

Washington State, USA

Jury deliberates serial rape case

[Anthony Casper] Dias, 28, is charged with 20 crimes in Pierce County – including multiple counts of first-degree rape, kidnapping and robbery – and faces more than 100 years in prison if convicted as charged.

He’s also charged with 19 crimes in King County, where authorities believe he committed several rapes and home-invasion robberies. He’s to go on trial in King County Superior Court in August.

Police arrested Dias in Federal Way in November 2005 after cornering him at an apartment where he is accused of kidnapping and sexually assaulting two girls...

“They all know Anthony Casper Dias,” [Pierce County deputy prosecutor Lori] Kooiman said of the victims. “They know him because they lived a nightmare while he lived out his fantasy. He did whatever the heck he needed to do to get what he wanted, which was rape, rape and rape some more.”

- Adam Lynn

The News Tribune

March 27, 2008


Added March 26, 2008

Massachusetts, USA

Pittsfield — The case of a local man accused of sexually assaulting three minors in 2005 has made it to trial in Berkshire Superior Court, following a tumultuous pretrial phase in which motions were filed to suppress information and to gain access to prosecutors' records...

[Cristian A.] Aragon, [a native of El Salvador,] who will use a Spanish interpreter during the trial, is accused of assaulting three white girls. One of the girls was 12 and two were 14 at the time of the alleged incidents, which occurred in Pittsfield and Lanesborough between Jan. 1 and June 30, 2005, according to the Berkshire District Attorney's Office.

Aragon was 18 when he was arrested on July 17, 2005...

- Conor Berry

Berkshire Eagle

March 26, 2008


Added March 26, 2008

New York, USA

[Queens] A U.S. immigration screening officer faces felony charges for allegedly demanding and receiving oral sex from a [Colombian] woman seeking a green card, according to authorities and court documents...

The two met in December in the man's car, and during that meeting, the man told her that "in return for assisting her in her green card application, the complainant must have sex with him at least two times," according to the documents. The woman said she tried to leave the car, but, documents said, Baichu grabbed her and forced her to perform oral sex on him...

Isaac Baichu, 46 [an immigrant from Guyana], was arrested last week...

Immigrant advocate Michelle Brane said such conduct is not unusual. Immigrants, she said, are vulnerable and at the mercy and disposal of immigration officials...

- Ashley Broughton

CNN

March 21, 2008

 


Added March 23, 2008

Mexico

ONU: Corrupción y desidia policiaca alientan la explotación sexual infantil en México

The United Nations' Special Rapporteur on the Sale of Children, Child prostitution and Child pornography, Juan Miguel Petit has warned in his recent report on conditions in Mexico that "the testimonies of minors who are sexually exploited in Mexico's large cities is profoundly coincidental in regard to the fact that corruption and apathy on the part of police forces is one of the primary reasons why exploitation and human trafficking continues to develop."

Petit stated that sexual exploitation and trafficking in children, especially on Mexico's national borders [with Guatemala and the United States], in tourist areas [such as Acapulco and Cancun], and in the nation's large cities, is a situation that could evolve into an "out-of-control pandemic" if Mexico does not engage in a profound and intensive exercise to reverse its social politics.

Petit: "The inefficiency, poor equipping of police, in addition to corruption" and a lack of monitoring and enforcement protocols exist in a wide range of municipal and police entities who are charged with assuring that children are not exploited in the "sexual marketplace." These conditions favor the exploiters [trafficking networks and pimps].

Petit also noted that in the year 2000, an estimated 25,000 minors lived abandoned on the streets of Mexico. Petit stated that the great majority are victims of sexual abuse.

Víctor Ballinas

La Jornada

March 11, 2008

See also:

UN Human Rights Council: Report on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography : addendum / submitted by the Special Rapporteur, Juan Miguel Petit : mission to Mexico [PDF]

Visita a Mexico - Informe del Relator Especial sobre la venta de niños, la prostitución infantil y la utilización de niños en la pornografía, Juan Miguel Petit [PDF]


Added March 23, 2008

Dominican Republic

Campesinas dominicanas rechazan impunidad de quienes violaron a dos niñas y mataron a su madre

In a case that has caused widespread protests, a judge in Haitian border region of the Dominican Republic has freed 8 men accused of gang-raping and murdering a women with mental illness, and then proceeding to gang-rape her 12-year-old daughter and her 8-year-old daughter.  The attack occurred in Mella, in the province of Independencia.

One of the seven accused, Ernesto Pérez was put on trial, but was later acquitted but the trial judge.

Although the federal Attorney General's office and the Supreme Court are investigating whether complicity [in corruption] existed in the court in question, the message of impunity has left many Dominican women and men outraged.

Sergia Galván, executive director of Mujer y Salud [Women and Health], a non-profit organization with 20 years fighting for gender equality, was indignant about the course of judicial action in this case.

Galván: "During the sentencing hearing that freed Ernesto Pérez, [the judge] tried to justify the impunity of the proceedings, stating that the accused rapist's rights trumped those of the victims. We are going to file an appeal. We are asking for the case to be re-opened. We are going to demand that all of the accused face justice."

Galván went on to state that, if justice is not served, the case will be presented in international legal forums such as the Inter-American Court.

- Mirta Rodríguez Calderón)

www.glocalia.com

March 10, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

Nicaragua

Monstruosidad con hija de cinco años

Las Minas - RAAN [Atlantic Autonomous Region] - A 25-year-old man has been arrested for raping and sodomizing his 5-year-old daughter, leaving her bleeding and unconscious.

The accused fled his home the evening of the incident when, after his wife had returned home, he fled the house. Upon discovering the rape, the mother of the victim reported the crime to police. Her daughter was taken to the city of Siuna for medical treatment and a forensic examination. The girl will require reconstructive surgery, according to her mother.  Police report that they have not yet found and arrested the father.

Family violence in Las Minas has increased dramatically, with 301 cases, including 96 reports of sexual abuse. The rise in such cases is creating alarm among local, regional and national authorities, but there is no evidence of a major initiative to combat this evil.

- El Nuevo Diario

March 12, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

United States - Iraq

Female veterans report more sexual, mental trauma

...Women have made up about 11 percent of the military force in Iraq and Afghanistan in the past six years, according to the Department of Defense; that's an estimated 180,000 women in the war zone...

...The [US Veterans Administration has] diagnosed 60,000 veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder. Of those, 22 percent of women suffered from "military sexual trauma," which includes sexual harassment or assault, compared with 1 percent of men...

...Many women have trouble reporting the trauma to their superiors out of fear of retribution.

"When you are in a war zone, your survival depends on people watching your back and on unit cohesion," Westrup said. "The same individuals who attacked you are those who will be protecting you, or you'll be fighting alongside the next day..."

- Randi Kaye and Ismael Estrada

CNN

March 19, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

New York, USA

New Rochelle - A suburban police sergeant who is married to a New York City anchorwoman was charged Wednesday with raping a 17-year-old girl hours after he helped arrest her boyfriend at her house.

Sgt. David Rodriguez pleaded not guilty to charges of raping a 17-year-old girl.

New Rochelle Sgt. David Rodriguez pleaded not guilty to forcible rape, agreed to an order of protection keeping him away from the teenager and posted $25,000 bail. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to 25 years in prison...

The sergeant's wife, Darlene Rodriguez, anchorwoman of WNBC-TV's "Today in New York," was in tears outside the courtroom before the arraignment. She left the courthouse dry-eyed with her husband and said, "I'm here to support my husband. I believe in him. I love him. He's innocent 100 percent..."

- The Associated Press

March 20, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

Colorado, USA

Denver police are looking for a man who allegedly exposed himself to a 6-year-old girl in restroom and then ran away.

Police said the girl and her family were dining at Johnny Rockets around midnight on March 1. The girl went to the restroom by herself.

Ernesto Navarrette followed the girl and exposed himself to the child, said police spokesman John White.

The girl ran to her parents and Navarrette fled the restaurant, White said. The girl's father tried to chase Navarrette but lost him...

- TheDenverChannel.com

March 16/17, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

Connecticut, USA

Police investigate a possible indecent exposure incident involving three teenage girls in Greenwich.

The girls were walking on Sound Beach Avenue in Old Greenwich on Saturday around 2 PM. A Hispanic male, approximately 20-30 years in age, lured the girls by asking for directions and then asking them to look at his little kitten. At this point, the girls noticed the male's pants were pulled down and he was massaging his genitals...

- WTNH

New Haven, Connecticut

March 16, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

Florida, USA

[Fort Meyers] - Twenty-four men -- including two from Punta Gorda -- came to Fort Myers this weekend bringing tools of seduction, coercion and rape. They thought they would meet a child home alone. Instead, they found the police and a national news correspondent lying in wait...

The scenes, all caught on tape by NBC's "Dateline" as part of its "To Catch a Predator" feature, shocked even veteran law enforcement agents.

Few men arrived empty-handed. Daniels said several brought their laptop computers and alcohol. At least one had male enhancement pills. One had rope and duct tape.

- Anne marie Apollo

Naples Daily News

April 24, 2008


Added March 23, 2008

Ohio, USA

A man from Mason, Ohio, is arrested, accused of sending sexually explicit messages and pornographic videos of himself to a police officer posing as a 15-year-old girl.

The Internet sex sting was an operation that involved three different law enforcement agencies, the Belmont County Sheriff's Department and a U.S. marshall.

David Tirado, 24, was arrested at Kings Island Resort on Friday.

Bethesda police police arrested him while he was on the job, after they said Tirado sent sexual messages and nine pornographic videos to a decoy...

- WTOV 9

March, 2008


Added March 15, 2008

Michigan, USA

Lansing - A local man was sentenced on Monday to 120 years in prison for sexually exploiting a minor, and distributing and possessing child pornography. The case was investigated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Michael Hinojosa, 33, of Lansing... was sentenced... before Judge Paul L. Maloney...

A computer forensic analysis of the seized items resulted in discovering more than 600 images of children, primarily prepubescent girls, engaged in sexually explicit conduct. Also discovered were images of Hinojosa engaging in sex acts with an 8-year old girl, which he photo-graphed and/ or videotaped. He later distributed some of these images via the Internet.

"All children have an absolute right to grow up free from the fear of being sexually exploited," said Brian M. Moskowitz, special agent in charge of the ICE Office of Investigations in Detroit. "Children should never have to fear those who are supposed to protect them. ICE will relentlessly pursue anyone who sexually exploits our kids."

- U.S. ICE

March 11, 2008


Added March 15, 2008

New Jersey, USA

Alberto Solano-Cardenas

 

Newark - U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers over the weekend removed Alberto Solano-Cardenas, a Costa Rican national who is wanted for sexual assault on a juvenile in his home country. Solano-Cardenas is wanted in Puntarenas and he was returned to Costa Rica Saturday afternoon to face the charges.

Members of the ICE Newark Fugitive Operations Team arrested Solano-Cardenas on February 20 due to information provided to ICE by INTERPOL...

- U.S. ICE

March 03, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Texas, USA

*

Suspect David

Salazar

- Houston Chronicle

Girl says she was kidnapped, used as sex slave

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A 16-year-old Mexican girl knew to use a cell phone to call 911 to report she was being held against her will and used as a sex slave. What she didn't know was where she was.

- Ruth Rendon

The Houston Chronicle

March 13, 2008

Retenida como esclava sexual

- The Associated Press

March 13, 2008

Freed Girl tells police she was a sex slave

Jacinto City - A recently rescued Mexican teen told police she was held as a sex slave in a Texas house since being smuggled into the country two months ago.

Police said the 16-year-old girl was found Friday at a Jacinto City residence after using her captor's cellular phone to call 911...

She allegedly was held in a padlocked room with bars on the windows, and sexually abused repeatedly by different people at the home and at different locations.

Gregoria Salgado Vazquez and her son, David Salazar, are each charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child and aggravated kidnapping, the newspaper said.

They are being held in the Harris County Jail in lieu of $400,000 bond.

- United Press International

March 12, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Mexico

El Gobierno apoya la pedophilia

Mexico's government aids and abets child sexual exploitation

The recent [February, 2008] four-day visit to Mexico of Louise Arbour, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, resulted in inspired comments about human rights conditions in the nation.

Among High Commissioner Arbour's statements:

1 - Arbour asked the government of Mexico to apply the same level of resources to dismantling child sex trafficking networks, and protecting women's rights in 'femicide' plagued Ciudad Juarez, as it now applies to its war against organized crime.

2 - During meetings with families of women and girls murdered in Ciudad Juarez, Arbour heard that none of them have access to the criminal justice system...

[The article's author:]

This (the above list) is our international image today.

Mexico protects the operations of the cruelest international pedophile [child sex trafficking] networks on earth. This occurs despite the clearest proof that this activity is occurring, such as in the case of Puebla governor Mario Marin's involvement in the abuse of journalist Lydia Cacho. And in a shame of shames, the Supreme court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) itself acted in a sinister manner to justify these acts...

We say to President Felipe Calderon... that a great scandal would follow if the Mexican government ignored High Commissioner Arbour's recommend-ations.

It is undeniable that today, both federal institutions and big business provide assistance to child sex trafficking networks.

If such a denial of the facts by the Calderon government lead to a slowing of international investment in Mexico, then that would cause [Calderon and big business leaders] to tremble [but not the outrage of allowing uncontested pedophile sex trafficking and femicide to continue].

- Manú Dornbierer

El Siglo de Durango

Durango, Mexico

Feb. 19, 2008

See also:

LibertadLatina

Journalist / Activist

   Lydia Cacho is

   Railroaded by the

   Legal Process for

   Exposing Child Sex

   Networks In Mexico

 


Added March 14, 2008

Mexico

ONU: Pide a periodista Lydia Cacho dejar México por seguridad

Mexico City - During her most recent visit to Mexico, Louise Arbour, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, asked renowned journalist and human rights activist Lydia Cacho to leave Mexico to avoid additional violations of her basic human rights.

After the Supreme Court of Justice the Nation (SCJN) ruled that no grave violations of Cacho's human rights occurred [during her kidnapping and beating by corrupt police under the orders of Puebla state governor Mario Marín and accused millionaire child sex trafficker Kamel Nacif], Cacho declared that she had lost faith in Mexico's criminal justice system.

Cacho has announced that she will present her case to the European Tribunal in April, 2008.

During her Mexican visit the UN's Arbour offered Cacho her complete support to gain political asylum outside of Mexico and mount a legal case before international judicial bodies.

On February 13, 2008, Journalists Without Borders reported that Mexico had the highest number of murders of journalists (as retaliation for their work) in the Americas. During 2007 two journalists were murdered, three other communications workers were killed and 3 journalists 'went missing.'

- El Semanario

Mexico

Feb. 19, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Mexico

Mexico: Tratantes de blancas secuestran a estudiante

Nayarit - Across northern Mexico it is clear that a powerful sex trafficking gang is operating. On February 14th, Valentine's Day, 2008, 15-year-old Reina Talía Martínez Jiménez was apparently kidnapped by this gang...

Reina's mother fear's that Reina was kidnapped by sex traffickers who cajole young girls and then sell them into forced prostitution.

She contacted police immediately, and submitted a complaint. After 5 days, police began to respond to the mother's inquiries with excuses. Reina is gone, and the family fears that police are doing nothing at all to investigate the case.

Reina's mother had to stop the interview as her tears overcame her. She declared: "I just don't know what to do."

Periodico Express

Mexico

Feb. 19, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Virginia, USA

Immigration-Linked Prostitution Cases Pose Challenge

[Woodbridge -] The business cards handed to men at a North Woodbridge grocery store didn't say much. Just a first name, a cellphone number and the phrase Casa de Carne, or House of Meat.

But their simplicity made clear the illicit purpose: sex.

Authorities say the cards solicit customers for highly organized prostitution rings that cater to Hispanic immigrants and chauffeur women from out of state. Although prostitution crosses ethnic and racial lines, these immigration-related cases raise complex questions about the interplay of local and federal law and are likely to pose special challenges for Prince William County police in the push against illegal immigration that began this week...

"A lot of girls we've interviewed don't even know what city they are in or what state they're in," said 1st Sgt. Daniel Hess, commander of a street crime unit that has handled several of the prostitution cases...

"These detectives who have this training now understand the nuances of immigration law and how we can protect victims of human smuggling," Deane said. "The goal of these cases really should be the people who are running these operations, the people who are making the money."

In the prostitution cases uncovered locally, law enforcement officials say women get about $30 for 15 minutes and are allowed to keep half of that.

"They are called las treinteras," after treinta, the Spanish word for 30, said Dilcia Molina, a human rights advocate. "In the world of sex work, they are usually the cheapest and the poorest. They are the ones who are usually on the periphery."

- Theresa Vargas

The Washington Post

March 06, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

New York, USA

[A] New York City correction officer indicted in the rape and robbery of several women at gunpoint in Hempstead may have carefully selected Hispanic women to prey upon, police are probing -- because those women may be more likely to be undocumented and less likely to report the crime.

Ricardo Walters, 42, of 132 Martin Ave. in Hempstead... was arrested last September when one of his alleged victims flagged down a Hempstead police officer during an attack on Jerusalem Avenue...

- Zachary R. Dowdy

New York Newsday

March 7, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Connecticut, USA

An 11-year-old girl was raped... after she accepted an offer to party from two teenage boys she had met at Hartford Public Library, police said.

About 10 p.m., hours after they first met, the girl found refuge and the kind ear of a manager at the Burger King on Weston Street. The girl was intoxicated and upset, he said. She told police that she had been sexually assaulted next door at the Motel 6...

"It appears that they were strangers," Assistant Chief Neil Dryfe said. "It was a horribly traumatic situation that she has to deal with for the rest of her life."

The investigating officers... found Orlando Nicholas Ocasio, 18.., Orlando Mendez, 19.., and Wilberto Quinones, 17..., all of Hartford, at the motel... They were taken into custody...

- Tina Brown

Hartford Courant

March 1, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

United States

At least one in four teenage girls nationwide has a sexually transmitted disease, or more than 3 million teens, according to the first study of its kind in this age group.

A virus that causes cervical cancer is by far the most common sexually transmitted infection in teen girls aged 14 to 19, while the highest overall prevalence is among black girls -- nearly half the blacks studied had at least one STD. That rate compared with 20 percent among both whites and Mexican-American teens, the study from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found.

- The Associated Press

March 11, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Japan

Tokyo - Japan should ban possession of child pornography and crack down on animated films, comic books and computer games that show children being sexually exploited, UNICEF said Tuesday....

Critics say a major flaw with the current law is that while it bans production and distribution of child pornography, it is not a crime to possess it...

"(As) Japan, known worldwide as an IT and software contents giant, is left uncontrolled, hundreds of thousands of children ... continue to be sexually exploited," the UNICEF statement said.

- The Associated Press

March 11, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Argentina

Mendoza: investigan una red de pornografía infantil

A female preschool teacher, age 35, and her brother (age about 30), a film student, are suspected of having run an Internet-based child pornography distribution ring that exploited children between the ages of 1 and 5.

The Directorate of Criminal Intelligence and police in Mendoza made the arrests after a one year investigation. Prosecutor Eduardo Martearena is preparing the case against the accused.

- La Nacion

Argentina

Feb. 21, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Nicaragua, Wisconsin, USA

Wausau woman helps Nicaraguans unmask pain

Wausau, Wisconsin - I returned from Nicaragua with appreciation and understanding for Nicaraguan women who are involved in leadership training and will be helping others address the harmful effects of domestic abuse...

...These rural Nicaraguan women had asked for training to become better leaders in their communities where there is a high incidence of domestic abuse, compounded by low employment and high alcoholism...

...in Nicaragua, services barely exist. If a woman is in danger, there is no shelter for her to go to. The police are not likely to help because few established laws against domestic violence are enforced. During Nicaragua's 10-year civil war, rape was used as a control tool. As in many developing countries, exploitation of girls as sex slaves is being investigated...

- Wausau Daily Herald

March 12, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Arkansas, USA

De Queen - Rape and kidnapping charges were filed against two De Queen men for allegedly choking and raping an 18-year-old woman who authorities say later walked about four blocks to report the attack.

Jesus Tapia, 25, and Daniel Sanchez, 21, remain in the Sevier County jail...

- Texarkana Gazette

March 1, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

North Carolina, USA

Greenville - Federal authorities say a former police officer was sentenced to 21 months behind bars for charges related to pulling over Hispanic drivers and taking their money...

Holding said that Hilsinger would stop Hispanic motorists for minor traffic violations, then take money from their wallets. On two of the four occasions, Holding said Hilsinger's victim was an undercover police officer.

- The Associated Press

March 10, 2008


Added March 14, 2008

Maryland, USA

Police are searching for a suspect who raped a woman Monday morning near a stairwell in an apartment building.

The 44-year-old woman was taking a walk around 11:30 p.m. Sunday when she was approached by the male suspect who had a knife. The suspect led the woman to a lower stairwell landing in an apartment building... and forcibly raped her...

The suspect is described as a Hispanic male, 39 or 40 years old, 5’11” to 6’0” tall, weighing approximately 220 pounds. He was wearing his black hair pulled back in a pony tail...

- WLJA TV

March 12, 2008

 


Added March 02 2008

Bolivia

La triste historia de Luz, una nena de 12 años esclavizada y violada

The story of Luz, a 12-year-old girl indigenous who was sold into slavery to serve as a nanny by her parents, and faced rape and other abuses.

Julia Cruz happened to be sitting next to a 12-year-old Bolivian girl, Luz, traveling on the same bus from Argentina to Bolivia. Julia noticed that the girl's hair and clothes had dried blood on them, and that Luz had 13 infected cuts on her face. During the long journey, Julia, speaking to Luz in her native Quechua language, was able to learn her story of modern-day enslavement and rape in Argentina.

Luz recounted how, in February of 2006, a neighbor talked to her parents and offered work for her in Argentina, as a nanny, for the neighbor's daughter, Margarita Aguirre Almendras, age 33, for $50 dollars per months.

The parents, from the empoverished community of Tipaka, near Sucre, Bolivia, had too-manny children to be able to feed them. They sent Luz on a bus to Argentina to work.

Margarita and her husband, Juan Barriga Partes (also from Bolivia), age 29, their son, and another couple, lived under the same roof. They earned a living by operating a clandestine textile workshop.

Immediately, Luz was forced to work from 6 am, cleaning the kitchen. After that, Luz was forced to work until 2 am each day cleaning the textile shop and folding cloth. There was nothing about being a 'nanny' in this job.

Luz continued working this way until June, when Juan, finding Luz asleep on the floor of the workshop at 4 am, violently raped her after Luz refused his offer to pay her a lot of money for sex. Juan also threatened to not send Luz home to Bolivia if she refused.

After the rape, Luz was bleeding profusely. Even after cleaning herself off, she continued to bleed heavily. She couldn't walk.

Margarita then entered the room. Juan told his wife that Luz was sitting around doing nothing. Margarita reacted by grabbing Luz by the hair and throwing her to the floor.

Margarita's violence continued all through the next week. She told Luz, while beating her: "I know what you did with my husband." Margarita then beat Luz with a broom handle until the broom handle broke.

Luz: "After that, there was not a day that went by without my being beaten by Margarita." Margarita told Luz that she wished that Luz would die. Margarita beat Luz 4 or 5 times a day.

Margarita kept Luz locked-up 24 hours a day without food. Margarita stabbed Luz in the face with scissors and a knife. Margarita cut-off Luz's hair. One day, Margarita found a broken beer bottle and slashed Luz's face, cutting a serious gash in her face.

Twelve hours later, Juan, her rapist, took her to the hospital. Juan lied to the doctors and told them that Laz was assaulted in the street. Hospital records show that the facial wound from the beer bottle was 10 centimeters long, and cut to the muscle.

Luz: "When I came home from the hospital, the family turned the television volumen up, and beat me, and burned my clothes and all of my things. After that, I didn't work. They just beat me.

At the end of July, pressure from workers into the shop forced Margarita to free Luz. Before putting her on a bus to Bolivia, Margarita threatened to throw Luz into the Riachuelo River. She denied having ever mistreated Luz.

Upon arriving in Bolivia, bus passenger Julia Cruz took Luz to a police station, where she retold her story. A Bolivian prosecutor contacted the Argentine government.

After a year of waiting, Argentine police detained Juan Barriga Partes. Margarita was arrested in Bolivia.

Psychologists treated Luz for 6 months, and have returned her to her family. They note that Luz, feels obliged to earn income for her family. Her prognosis is 'guarded.'

- Rolando Barbano

El Clarin

Feb. 18, 2008


Added March 02 2008

Nicaragua

Niña de 9 años violada por 2 hombres está embarazada

Managua - A 9-year-old girl has become pregnant as the result of being raped in the community of Laguna de Apoyo in southeastern Nicaragua, accordding to the Women's Commission of Masaya Province.

The alleged perpetrators are neighbors of the girl. Ronald Lopez, 52, and his son Pilar Lopez, age 30. Ronald is presumed to have fled Nicaragua [and is known to be in Costa Rica].

A trial against the accused began on Febraury 27, 2008.

The victim, whom the local press have named Carmencita (Little Carmen), was left alone to care for her brothers, agres 5 and 3, when her parents travelled to the capitol, Managua, for work.

Since the case became public, Carmencita has been harassed and shunned by her neighbors, especially by the family of the accused. She has been sent to live with an aunt in a far-away city.

- ACAN - EFE

Feb. 18, 2008


Added March 02 2008

Nicaragua

Grave denuncia de comisionada jefe de Comisaría de la Mujer

Mercedes Ampié, chief commissioner of the national Commission for Women, has publicly denounced the fact that the nation's children face a growing threat from sexual aggression by adults, and that the judicial system is insensitive and lenient toward perpetrators of child sexual abuse.

The Commissioner made specific reference to the recent case of a 9-year-old girl who was made pregnant by two male neighbors. Ampié stated: "Sending a predator home [from prison, pending trial] is not a practice allowed for in the penal code. That was the judge's decision. What the judge should take into account is that, just as the perpetrator was well-enough to commit the crime, his is well-enough to do the time."

- Rafael Lara

El Nuevo Diario

Feb. 19, 2008


Added March 02 2008

Connecticut, US

Rocky Hill - The Wethersfield assault on a 62-year-old woman occurred Aug. 3, 2004, and was considered a cold case until a national database struck a hit of matching DNA from an Oct. 30, 2007 attack in Winter Park, Fla. That victim was 86.

The Wethersfield attack occurred... around 6 p.m., police said. The victim was walking on the path when an assailant grabbed the 62-year-old woman from behind and told her to stop screaming or he'd kill her, police said.

He pulled her sweatshirt over her face and again said he'd kill her if she looked at him, police said. The attack occurred in the brush and the man, described as a Hispanic male in his 30s who had "golden" skin and spoke fluent English with a Spanish accent...

During the Winter Park attack, a man described as a Hispanic male, about 5 feet eight inches tall, entered the 86-year-old victim's apartment through an unlocked door and restrained her on her bed as he assaulted her, police said. He took her purse and fled,..

- Lisa Backus

Journal Register News Service

Feb. 28, 2008


Added March 01 2008

Texas, USA

To Catch a Killer is the true story of killer Andy James Ortiz, his young victims, and the Fort Worth police and Tarrant County prosecutors who brought him to justice. The 24 chapters will continue through March 9, with a chapter published most days.

...The Fort Worth detectives could barely speak as they stared at the bedroom.

The photographs of young girls. The women's underwear. The girls' names and phone numbers -- more than 100 in all.

Five days earlier, the body of a 13-year-old girl had been found dumped at Marine Creek Lake. Officers believed she had been killed by the man who lived in the room. They were certain she was not his only victim.

But nothing -- nothing -- had prepared them for this.

Thus begins "To Catch a Killer," the true story of a homegrown serial killer and the dogged detectives who finally put an end to his madness.

- Deanna Boyd, Melody McDonald

Star-Telegram

Feb 29, 2008


Added March 01 2008

North Carolina, USA

Ashville - Police have added patrols in the area where a 63-year-old woman was raped by an intruder and said Friday they were trying to put together a sketch of the attacker.

Investigators also are looking for any links between the rape and reports of a peeping Tom in January and a break-in last week at Oakview Villas.

Some Oakview Villas residents also Friday said they had not been told of any problems at the apartments.

"If we had been notified about the other incidents I believe measures would have been taken to prevent it (the rape)," resident Zac Rhew said...

Police described the attacker as Hispanic...

- Mike McWilliams, Josh Boatwright

Asheville Citizen-Times

Feb 29, 2008


Added March 01 2008

Florida, USA

The Cape Coral Police Department learned of an attempted sexual battery on an adult female. The victim told police that at 8:30 AM. on Thursday, February 28, a man rang the doorbell at her home and she answered it. When she opened the door, the man forced his way into her home and attempted to commit a sexual battery. The victim believes something startled the man and he fled the area, but she's not sure whether he fled on foot or was in a vehicle.

Police are asking citizens to be on the lookout for the suspect who is described as a Hispanic male...

- WINK

Feb 29, 2008


Added March 01 2008

Mexico

Adolescentes de Oaxaca, Chiapas y Tabasco abusadas en su infancia

Adolescents between the ages of 15 and 19, from the southern Mexican states of Oaxaca, Chiapas and Tobasco were surveyed about abuses suffered in childhood. In many cases, these abuses have continued into adolescence.

The survey on physical, sexual, emotional and economic violence was developed starting in March, 2007 by Catholics for the Right to Decide, Gender Equality, Work and Family, Informed Reproductive Choices, and Ipas Mexico. The research effort was funded by the European Commission effort to develop "The promotion of gender equality and non-violent attitudeas and conduct between adolescents in the indigenous and rural communities of Mexico.

Some 62% of respondents from the three states had faced emotional violence, 28% had endured physical violence, 13% had experienced sexual violence, and 4% encountered economic violence. Sixty five percent of respondents had been beaten during childhood.

Young women from all three states reported having been sexually abused during childhood, whereas only young men from Tobasco state reported such abuse. Young men included being forced to engage in sex [a common right of passage imposed by fathers who send their boys to brothels] as part of the sexual abuse experience.

Sixty percent of these young women faced emotional violence in community settings, 54% faced such violence at home, and 61% had faced emotional violence at school.

The young women surveyed expressed the fact that they feel that women are predispoed to suffer violence. Only 77% felt that women should denounce violence to the authorities. Fifty percent of male and female respondents beleive that violence against a female spouse is justified in cases of infidelity.

Sofía Robles Hernández, of the Network for Sexual and Reproductive Rights in Mexico (Ddeser), indicated that the survey project aims to elevate in children and youth an awareness of gender equality in relation to violence against women and girls. These goals can be realized through the development of educational and violence prevention programs in indigenous and rural communities, in collaboration with local authorities and institutions.

- CIMAC Noticias News for Women

Mexico City

Feb. 29, 2008

 

 
     

LibertadLatina

News / Noticias

 


Mandanos un... Email
Send us an...

LibertadLatina

Búsqueda Google

Google Search

Google


News Archive

June 2009

2009

May   2009

2008

April  2009

2007

Mar., 2009

2006

Feb., 2009

2005

Jan., 2009

2004

Dec., 2008

2003

Nov.  2008

2002

Oct.   2008

2001



LibertadLatina

Added: May 27, 2009

New Section

Analysis of the political actions and policies of Mexico's National Action Party (PAN) in regard to their detrimental impact on women's basic human rights



Últimas Noticias

Latest News



Added: July 03, 2009

LibertadLatina Commentary

This protest poster says: "We won't be silent, and they will not silence us; Feminists of Honduras!"

Photo:  Feminist International Radio Endeavor (FIRE)

We at LibertadLatina join with humanity in expressing our complete outrage at the leaders of the coup d'etat in Honduras. The leaders of the coup were not justified in kidnapping the democratically elected president of the nation and sending him into exile. The United Nations General Assembly, the Organization of American States and U.S. President Barak Obama, among many leaders of nations in the Americas, have all joined in demanding that President José Manuel Zelaya Rosales be returned to power.

Although the coup was approved by Honduran Supreme Court and Congress, this only shows that the nation's democratic institutions are weak. In Colombia, for example, President Álvaro Uribe, a conservative, is seeking, just as did President Zelaya in Honduras, to change the constitution to eliminate the current limits on the number of terms that a president may serve. Yet nobody is trying to overthrow Uribe for have proposed such an idea. The fact that President Zelaya had set-up a popular referendum, to allow the voters to decide the issue, was apparently too much democracy for the coup plotters, so they pounced on Zelaya and raped democracy in the process.

The independent press, including Feminist Radio International Endeavor (FIRE), CIMAC Noticias in Mexico City, and Indymedia Chiapas, have provided excellent coverage of the true story that is taking place inside Honduras. Some of the key stories are reprinted here.

The coup leaders have declared a state of siege, have targeted human rights activists, and have used rifle fire to attack unarmed protesters who are simply outraged that these cowards have resorted to taking power by force.

Coups were a common power-grabbing tactic in Latin America in the late 1900s. The region has since made significant progress in moving towards democracy. This coup is just one of many indicators that democracy is not a 'done deal' in all nations of the Americas.

The conservative coup plotters will, consistent with the emergent anti women's rights movement represented elsewhere in Latin America (with whom they are apparently allied), not bode well for women's equality.

We applaud the activism that we are seeing from brave women and men in the face of this military repression. Just as happened during the popular uprisings against dictators across Latin America in the 1980s and 1990s, the coup leaders in Honduras are using the tactics of the 'dirty wars' that lead to the murders and rapes of tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Chile, Argentina, Mexico and other nations of Latin America.

Video from a number of sources shows the terrorism with impunity that the coup's military supporters are using on innocent protesters.

See especially this YouTube video posted on Narco News web site that records the rifle fire of soldiers who were shooting into crowds of protesters, as well as an interview with a congressional representative as she visits wounded at a local hospital and expresses her indignation at the coup.

It is an act of cowardice for the current Honduran coup government to block CCN in Spanish, block the Internet, and place Honduras in a stage of siege with a suspension of all individual liberties. Given the repression that just occurred in the aftermath of presidential elections in Iran, the world community has very little tolerance for  such illegal behavior in Honduras.

Coup leaders, return President Zelaya to his elected position.

Nobody elected you.

Your corrupt government is not wanted and it will not stand!

End impunity now!

Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

July 3, 2009


Added: July 03, 2009

Honduras

Banner: "Feminists in Resistance; Coup leaders get out!

Photo: CIMAC Noticias

Urge mayor presión a golpistas: feministas hondureñas

Lideresa pro-vida, designada canciller por golpistas 

Ante el Estado de Emergencia en Honduras, feministas y luchadoras sociales lanzaron un llamado a la comunidad internacional para que pronuncien una condena más enérgica contra lo que denominaron gobierno usurpador; “nos están disparando, golpeando, violentando todos nuestros derechos”, denunciaron…

Honduran Feminists Urge Greater International Pressure Against Coup Leaders

A female pro-life leader has been appointed foreign affairs chancellor by the usurpers

In the face of the state of siege that has been declared in Honduras, feminists and social activists have launched an appeal to the international community to deliver a strong condemnation against what they termed a usurper government. They state that: “We are being shot, beaten, and they are violating all of our rights.”

In a telephone interview with CIMAC Noticias, Hilda Rivera, coordinator of the Center for Women's Rights in Honduras, said that support from Latin America and the global community is urgently needed. Yesterday, the National Congress of Honduras approved a State of Emergency, temporarily suspending individual liberties...

"...We are urging more pressure from the world community, because the situation is becoming more violent here” says Rivera.

"Policemen and soldiers are shooting and beating us. It is urgent that the government not be given additional time [to consider ultimatums to step down]. We have put up with four days of bullets, beatings and rain. There is a general tiredness in the population. Nonetheless, the violence is increasing, so we are standing up to fight.”

Rivera stated that the coup is a serious setback for the entire society, and particularly for women, who’s rights were already restricted. With this coup, the problem is magnified...

Until now, "within the feminist movement we have not anticipated everything that may happen, but we are clear in our understanding that, with this ‘law of the strongest,’ we can be detained, they can raid our offices and homes, and we cannot assemble. It is of grave concern to us that we have important issues on our agenda that are threatened by the coup, such as the legalization of emergency contraception." ...

A central concern for Rivera is the safety of human rights defenders. “The government has already begun to ‘hunt’ various organization leaders by raiding their houses and arresting them." The coup plotters know that  women do not falter in our struggle. There is a danger that repression against feminist leaders may follow.

As an example that the coup government is not interested in defending the rights of women, Rivera cites the naming of the founder of Provida [Pro Life] in Honduras as Foreign Affairs Chancellor.

Eco-feminist Daysi Flores told Feminist International Radio (RIF) that the people are afraid and outraged. They cannot come out of their homes. But, says Flores, feminist resistance has been declared. Women’s rights are going to continue to progress, and we are going to continue the struggle.

Full English Translation

Gladis Torres Ruiz

CIMAC Noticias

News for Women

Mexico City

July 2, 2009


Added: July 03, 2009

Honduras

Comunicado de grupos y organizaciones del Movimiento de Mujeres y Feminista de Honduras 

A Las Organizaciones Internacionales,  Cooperación Internacional, Organismos de Derechos Humanos y a lLos Estados del Mundo

El día domingo 28 de Junio, el Presidente de la República José Manuel Zelaya Rosales, fue agredido, secuestrado y enviado a la República de Costa Rica en el avión presidencial, custodiado por cuerpos militares argumentando que había violado la Constitución de la República por implementar una consulta popular mediante una encuesta de opinión, donde se consultara al pueblo si estaba de acuerdo o no que el 29 de noviembre se colocara una cuarta urna para proponer una Asamblea Nacional Constituyente, que tuviese como objetivo elaborar una nueva Constitución con la plena participación ciudadana de los diferentes actores sociales del país…

Statement By Feminist And Women¹s Organizations From Honduras Following the Coup D‘Etat

To International Organizations, International Development Agencies, Human Rights Institutions And To The States Of The World:

On Sunday, June 28, 2009 the democratically elected President of the Republic of Honduras, José Manuel Zelaya Rosales, was assaulted, abducted and sent to the Republic of Costa Rica in the presidential plane guarded by the military...

The people are peacefully expressing their rejection of the coup d’etat, demanding the immediate reinstatement of President Zelaya, and a return to the Rule of Law...

Given these egregious series of events, we request the support of international development agencies and the international community to demand the reinstatement of the Rule of Law, to demand an end to the prosecution of the members of the cabinet of President Manuel Zelaya Rosales and leaders of social movements and the media, and an end to all types of brutal violence and to prevent the imposition of fascism in our country. 

Most Honduran citizens advocate for peace, solidarity and the respect of human rights.  We emphatically denounce the complicity shown in these events by the Human Rights Commissioner of Honduras, Dr. Ramón Custodio, before the regional and international human rights organizations and the international community.

June 29, 2009

Tegucigalpa, Honduras

Signed:

Centro De Estudios De La Mujer ­ Honduras (Cem-H) - The Women's Studies Center

Centro De Derechos De Mujeres (Cdm) - The Center for Women's Rights

Centro De Estudios Y Accion Para El Desarrollo De Honduras (Cesadeh) - The Center for Development Studies and Action of Honduras

Red De Mujeres Jovenes (Redmuj) - The Young Women's Network

Acciones Para El Desarrollo Poblacional (Adp) - Action for Population Development

Red De Mujeres Adultas (Redmucr) - The Adult Women's Network

Colectivo De Mujeres Universitarias (Cofemun) - The Collective of University Women

Marcha Mundial De Las Mujeres, Comité Nacional - Honduras Global Women's March - Honduras

Articulaciones Feminista De Redes Locales - Articulation of Local Feminist Networks

Comisión De Mujer Pobladora Articulaciones Feminista De Redes Locales -  - Rural Women's Commission - Articulation of Local Feminist Networks

Movimiento De Mujeres Socialistas, Las Lolas - The Socialist Women's Movement, The Lolas

Convergencia De Mujeres De Honduras Iniciativa Centroamericana De Seguimiento A Cairo Y Beijing - The Honduran Convergence of the Central American Initiative to Follow-up on Cairo and Beijing

Feministas Independientes - Independent Feminists

Published by Feminist International Radio Endeavor (FIRE)

June 29, 2009


Added: July 02, 2009

Honduras

"Feminists in Resistance" Photo: CIMAC Noticias

Vive Honduras una insurrección popular contra usurpadores

Berta Cazares, candidata independiente a la presidencia

México DF - Vivimos en Honduras una insurrección popular, un levantamiento con la decidida participación de las mujeres, en contra de las fuerzas armadas y el grupo oligárquico que derrocó al presidente democráticamente electo Manuel Zelaya, pero el costo es alto y la situación de la población civil, incluida la niñez, es crítica, la vida cotidiana está alterada y la brutal represión tiene como blanco principal a la juventud…

Honduras is Experiencing a Popular Uprising Against the Usurpers

An interview with Berta Cazares, independent candidate for president

Honduras is living through a popular uprising, one that is being carried out with the wholehearted participation of women against the armed forces and the oligarchic group which overthrew democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya. The cost has been high, and the situation for civilians, including children, is critical. Everyday life has changed, and the brutal repression is targeting our youth.

Bertha Cazares Flores, an independent candidate for president of Honduras and the national leader of the Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras, described the situation in Honduras in a phone interview with CIMAC Noticias, three days after the military high command, most of Congress and the Supreme Court overthrew the President and his Cabinet…

Hundreds have been injured in the country, especially young people, said Cazares. In the 'Progress City' (Ciudad Progreso) area, the repression was especially brutal, perhaps because that area has historically been a center for social struggles...

In rural and indigenous areas of Honduras the situation is quite critical, including in [the town of] San Francisco de Ocaña, where, during the 1980s, the Army used machine guns against the civilian population. "That's where the resources should go, to see what is really happening there," Cazares says.

Cazares added that the people continue to defy the siege, the curfew and the ban on travel. There are military checkpoints throughout the country. Hundreds of people from rural areas, teachers and indigenous people, are moving toward to the capital...

Thursday

CIMAC: What should we expect on Thursday, the day announced by Manuel Zelaya for his return to Honduras? [The planned return date for President Zelaya has been pushed back to Saturday since this story was written. - LL]

Cazares: We call upon social movements and organizations that defend international human rights to come to Honduras in delegations, to support the civilian population...

We hope that [Mayan Guatemalan Nobel Peace Prize laureate] Rigoberta Menchú, along with other personalities such as Mirna Anaya, a judge on the Supreme Court of El Salvador, and [Argentinean 1980 Nobel Peace Prize leareate] Adolfo Perez Esquivel will arrive [to support President Zelaya].

Meanwhile, Berta is preparing - with an arrest warrant against her and the knowledge that "assassination is a terrible thing in Honduras" - for progress to be made today, Wednesday, when civic organizations will protest against the coup at an army cordon, just three blocks from the house that she one day hopes to govern from.

Full English Translation

Guadalupe Gomez Quintana

CIMAC Noticias

News for Women

Mexico City

July 1 2009

See also:

Informan de batallones hondureños que se niegan a reprimir al pueblo

Radio Progreso, pese a ser acallada por los militares golpistas, confirmó en una de sus transmisiones clandestinas que varios batallones de las Fuerzas Armadas de Honduras, desde el lunes han roto con los golpistas y el gobierno de facto, y han anunciado que permanecerán al margen de la represión al pueblo de su país...

Honduran Army Battalions Reject Repressing the Population

Honduran station Radio Progreso, despite being shut-down by the coup leaders, has confirmed in one of its clandestine transmissions that a number of battalions of the Armed Forces of Honduras have, since Monday, June 29th, broken with the organizers of the coup d'etat and the de facto government. They have announced that they will remain on the sidelines of the repression...

 Radio La Primerísima

Managua, Nicaragua

June 30, 2009


Added: July 1, 2009

Chile

President Michelle Bachelet of Chile, during a June 23, 2009 visit with U.S. President Barak Obama

Bachelet Remueve a Jefe Policial

La presidenta de Chile, Michelle Bachelet, removió al jefe de la policia de investigaciones (civil), Arturo Herrera, tras una serie de denuncias de corrupción, incluida una que involucró a policías con una red de prostitución infantile…

Hace una semana, en el aniversario 76 de la policía de investigaciones, Herrera lamentó la relevancia dada por medios de difusión al caso de prostitución infantil que involucró a un grupo de policías activos.

Bachelet Removes Police Chief

The president of Chile, Michelle Bachelet, has removed the chief of the Investigations Police, Arturo Herrera, after a series of allegations of corruption, including a case in which police officers were allegedly involved with a child prostitution network.

Herrera resigned the post three months before his scheduled retirement. He did so after a telephone conversation with the president, held while she was visiting Mexico.

Upon her return to Chile the president accepted the resignation and appointed as his replacement Marco Antonio Vasquez, now police chief in the region of Bío Bío, 500 kilometers south of Santiago…

A week ago, during the 76th anniversary of the Investigations Police agency, Herrera lamented the importance that the media had given to a case of child prostitution involving a group of police officers.

www.ansa.it/ansalatina

June 29, 2009

See also:

Director of Chile's Investigation Police Steps Down

Americas Quarterly Online

June 26, 2009

See also:

LibertadLatina

Our January, 2006 news page, which contains articles about Chile's first woman president, pediatrician Dr. Michelle Bachelet, who along with her mother was imprisoned and tortured by former dictator Agosto Pinochet's forces. Bachelet's father, an air force general, was tortured to death under the Pinochet regime.


Added: June 30, 2009

Texas, USA, Mexico

Man handed 5 years in sex trafficking

A former registered nurse was sentenced Wednesday to five years in prison for engaging in what was the first and so far only federal sex-trafficking case in San Antonio.

Brent Andrew Stephens, 41, who surrendered his nursing license amid the criminal case, pleaded guilty in March to conspiracy to harbor aliens for financial gain and conspiracy to engage in sex trafficking by force, fraud and coercion…

Stephens admitted that he and his business partner, Timothy Gereb, planned to use young Mexican women as escorts and in a massage parlor in May 2007.

The two paid Stephens' personal assistant, Maria de Jesus “Jessica” Ochoa; her sister, Consuelo Pilar Ochoa; and their mother, Isabel, to recruit and smuggle females from Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, to San Antonio.

The Ochoas smuggled three victims, including two minors, and took them to Stephens. The victims were given alcohol, threatened at gunpoint by Gereb and warned not to return to Mexico, court documents state…

The victims told agents that once they arrived in San Antonio, they were told they would have to work as prostitutes for five years to pay the $3,000 smuggling fees…

Gereb, 50, was sentenced earlier to 10 years in prison. Isabel Ochoa, 60, received time served. Consuelo Ochoa, 34, was sentenced to 18 months for the sex-trafficking case and 39 months for a separate drug case. Maria Ochoa, 32, got 12 months and one day and is now out of jail.

Guillermo Contreras

Express-New

June 25, 2009


Added: July 01, 2009

Florida, USA

Lee County at Forefront of Slavery Fight

"We're light years ahead of other communities," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Molloy, who's prosecuted 20 slavery and human trafficking cases throughout Southwest Florida over the past decade, freeing 50 victims. "Because of our united community efforts, we're in a place most areas aspire to."

Those efforts include a two-man team at the Lee County Sheriff's Office, a multi-agency task force and a new command center at Florida Gulf Coast University: The Esperanza Project.

"What's happening at FGCU is electric - just electric," Molloy said.

One of a scant handful of university-based human trafficking research centers in the country, it opened eight months ago with $100,000 in seed money from a federal anti-trafficking grant given to the Lee County Sheriff's Office.

The center's name means "hope" in Spanish. It's also the pseudonym of the 11-year-old girl whose enslavement in Cape Coral became a galvanizing force as Lee county's first high-profile victim.

In 2005, the girl was discovered in Cape Coral, pregnant and bleeding. Born in Guatemala, she was sold to a man who brought her here and forced her into sexual and domestic slavery. She was repeatedly raped and beaten during her two-year captivity. Molloy eventually sent her captors to federal prison.

Her case sparked a wave of questions and self-examination among law enforcement and residents alike.

In short order, the Sanibel chapter of Zonta International, a service group, made human trafficking its signature cause.

The U.S. Department of Justice awarded the Lee County Sheriff's Office a $450,000, three-year grant to combat human trafficking.

By the end of 2005, Molloy said authorities were working on more trafficking cases in Southwest Florida than many entire state sees in a year…

"(The U.S.) spends about about $23 million on this annually - that's not much at all,"... "Estimates are there are about 17,000 [new] foreign-born trafficking victims alone [each and every year] and 17,000 homicide victims, and yet we solve 70 percent of the homicides and 1 percent of trafficking cases." ...

The man in the No. 1 human trafficking job in Washington is Luis C. de Baca. The new ambassador-at-large to monitor and combat trafficking in persons at the State Department promises trafficking will be a priority of the new administration as well - especially, of Secretary of State Hilary Clinton...

Amy Bennett Williams

www.News-Press.com

June 28, 2009


Added: June 30, 2009

Mexico

Mexican Congressional Deputy Maricela Contreras speaks out about defects in trafficking law's regulations

Denuncian colusión de bandas y funcionarios para secuestrar migrantes  

México - La presidenta de la Comisión de Equidad y Género de la Cámara de Diputados, Maricela Contreras, denunció que bandas organizadas coludidas con autoridades cometen la mayoría de los secuestros contra migrantes en las zonas fronterizas.

Señaló que según el Informe Especial sobre los casos de secuestro contra migrantes se documentaron nueve mil 758 personas privadas de su libertad, y de ese total en nueve mil 194 casos el delito fue cometido por ese tipo de organizaciones criminales...

Congress Explores Allegations of Collusion Between Criminal Gangs and Government Officials to Kidnap Migrants

According to the Special Report, 9,758 persons were deprived of their liberty

In 9,194 cases, the offense was committed by criminal organizations

The president of the Commission on Equality and Gender of the Chamber of Deputies, Maricela Contreras has reported that Mexican authorities have colluded with organized gangs to commit the majority of kidnappings targeting migrants in border regions.

Deputy Contreras noted that a special report on cases of kidnappings against migrants documented the fact that 9,758 people had been deprived of their liberty, and that in 9,194 of these cases, organized crime was the perpetrator...

The report states that migrants who enter Mexico are subjected to extortion, robbery, kidnapping, illegal searches, beatings, chases, being thrown off of moving trains, rape, threats, psychological pressure and even murder.

Contreras pointed out that the assailants most often mentioned by victims are elements of the Federal Preventive Police, military personnel and agents of the National Institute for Migration.

Data reported by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (CEPAL) indicates that along the southern border of Mexico, 70 per cent of migrants are victims of violence. Some 60 percent of migrants suffer some form of sexual abuse, including rape.

The CEPAL report also emphasizes that the United States border with Mexico is also a very dangerous region, where women migrants become victims of sexual violence, forced prostitution, human trafficking and murder.

Deputy Contreras denounced these human rights violations and called upon Mexican society to not tolerate inefficiencies, incompetence and  complicity by govern-ment officials, behaviors that threaten the lives and integrity of thousands of men and women who cross the borders into Mexico...

Full English Translation

El Financiero Online

With information from Notimex / JOT

June 27, 2009

See also:

Mexico

20000 Migrants a Year Kidnapped in Mexico En Route to US

Some 20,000 of the 140,000 illegal migrants en route to the United States who travel through Mexico to find work and a better life are kidnapped each year and subjected to rape, torture and murder, crimes that usually go unpunished due to the corruption of the authorities, fear of reprisals and distrust of authorities, according to Mexico’s independent National Human Rights Commission.

Mexico City – More than 1,600 migrants, above all Central Americans en route to the United States to find work, are kidnapped monthly and subjected to humiliations that usually go unpunished due to the corruption of the authorities, Mexico’s independent National Human Rights Commission reported.

“The kidnapping of migrants has become a continuous practice of worrying dimensions, generally unpunished and with characteristics of extreme cruelty,” commission chairman Jose Luis Soberanes said Monday at the presentation of the report.

Between September 2008 and February 2009, the commission registered a total of 198 separate cases of mass kidnappings of migrants involving 9,758 victims...

EFE

June 17, 2009

Sitio Oficial de Maricela Contreras Julián - Maricela Contreras' official web site (In Spanish)

Maricela Contreras Julián en la página oficial de la Cámara de Diputados - Maricela Contreras' Congressional web site - In Spanish


Added: June 28, 2009

Mexico

Mexican Congressional Deputy Maricela Contreras, chairwoman of the national commission to combat trafficking, speaks out about defects in the federal regulations published by President Calderón that weaken the nation's first federal anti-trafficking law

Atorada, ley contra tráfico de personas

Señala diputada que Segob no incluyó fiscalía en el reglamento

La Comisión de Equidad y Género de la Cámara de Diputados lamentó que a pesar de que se han detectado redes de delincuencia organizada dedicadas a la trata de personas en el país, el programa nacional de combate contra este delito no podrá operar sino hasta 2011 debido a que no se ha instalado la comisión encargada de su elaboración y no cuenta con una partida presupuestal específica...

Mexico’s Law to Prevent and Punish Trafficking in Persons is Stuck in the Mud

The Interior Department failed to include a role for the special prosecutor for trafficking's office in the law’s published regulations

The regulations as written will tie the hands of the anti-trafficking law’s enforcement provisions until 2011

The Commission on Equality and Gender of the Chamber of Deputies (the lower house of Congress) regrets the fact that despite having identified organized crime networks involved in human trafficking in the country, the national program to combat this crime cannot begin operating until 2011. The [unexpected] delay is due to the fact that the commission responsible for standing-up these efforts does not yet have a line item in the federal budget, and therefore it has not been created.

Deputy Maricela Contreras of the Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD) and chairwoman of the anti-trafficking commission, noted that another failure of the Department of the Interior (SEGOB) in drafting the required federal regulations that will activate the 2008 anti-trafficking law is the fact that SEGOB did not create a role for the office of the Special Prosecutor for Crimes of Violence Against Women and Trafficking (FEVIMTRA) [an office of the Attorney General of the Republic] as one of the institutions responsible for combating trafficking...

Contreras, as part of her analysis of the official anti-trafficking regulations published on February 27, 2009 in the Official Gazette, added that the targeting of organized crime is also absent from the regulations.

"This situation is serious, because the regulations do not recognize that the problem [of trafficking] originates with various forms of criminal organizations, from disorganized bands that are just starting up to the more highly structured trafficking networks and mafias," says Contreras...

The Joint Committee of Congress has made an appeal to President Calderón’s legal counsel requesting that the Executive open the official regulations for revision [to repair the many defects within]. Presidential deputy legal counsel Javier Sanchez Arriaga responded to Congress by stating that changing the regulations was a responsibility of the Interior Department (Segob). [And thus, nothing was ever done to improve the regulations - LL]

Full English Translation

Liliana Alcántara

El Universal

June 20 2009

See also:

The Joint Committee of the Mexican Senate and Lower House has voted unanimously to ask President Calderón to revise his federal regulations governing the nation’s first anti-trafficking law.

The current regulations have no minimum standards, nor do they integrate the work of key federal agencies

Mexico City – Mexico City congressional deputy Maricela Contreras, president of the Commission on Equality and Gender of the Chamber of Deputies, has declared that a re-writing of the published Federal Regulations that enable the 2008 Law to Prevent and Punish Trafficking in Persons is urgently needed, given that there is an indifference and unwillingness on the part of the federal government to stop this crime wave, [of human trafficking - in defiance of the will of Congress].

...Contreras, who had called for the declaration, stated that "the published rules were delivered late [after a 9 month delay following the law’s passage, and after four warning to President Calderón from Congress -LL], they are 'plain,' and they contain omissions. The rules don’t provide any tools to combat or prevent trafficking, much less any provisions for the care of the victims, who are mostly girls and women. For these reasons, President Calderón should have the rules revised, because in their current state, they aren’t worth anything."

Full English Translation

CIMAC Noticias

May 22, 2009

See also:

¡Héroes!

Lea nuestra sección sobre la lucha de varios congresistas y defensoras de los derechos humanos para lograr obligar que el Presidente Felipe Calderón publica un reglamiento fuerte respladar a la nueva ley: Prevenir y Sancionar la Trata de Personas, de 2008, que hasta ahora es sigue siendo una ley sin fuerzas.

Read our special section about the brave work of advocates and congressional leaders in Mexico to break-through the barriers of impunity and achieve truly effective federal regulations that will enforce the original congress-ional intent of Mexico's 2008 Law to Prevent and Punish Trafficking in Persons.

LibertadLatina

 

Added: June 28, 2009

Mexico, Canada

Pedophile ring suspect caught in Mexico

A Canadian suspected of heading a North American pedophilia ring has been arrested in Mexico in possession of four million photographs and videos of children shown naked or striking suggestive poses.

The suspect, Arthur Lelland Sayer, "was caught red-handed at his home in Tijuana, Baja California (close to the US border) with a large number of photos and videos that were stored on over a dozen hard drives", Mexico City's public prosecutor said in a statement on Thursday.

A Mexican police investigation is ongoing to dismantle a major child pornography network and to "find evidence that it is active in the three North American countries: Mexico, the United States and Canada."

The crime ring was discovered by the "cyber police" of Mexico's Public Safety Ministry, which arrested the Canadian on Sunday along with agents from FEVIMTRA, a special unit that combats human trafficking.

Agence France-Presse (AFP)June 27, 2009


Added: June 28, 2009

Cecilia Romero, head of Mexico's national immigration service, says that sex tourism and pedophile networks are "inevitable."

"El turismo sexual es inevitable" - Cecilia Romero del Instituto Nacional de Migración de México

Photo: El Universal

LibertadLatina Commentary

President Calderón, the Human Rights Crisis at Mexico's Southern Border is Unacceptable

Our current series of articles covering the human rights emergency facing women and girl migrants at Mexico's southern border responds directly to the recent comments of Cecilia Romero, head of Mexico's national immigration service (the National Institute for Migration - INM). Director Romero stated in a press interview with El Universal, a major Mexico City daily paper, that human trafficking is "inevitable", and that, "the existence of the smuggling of migrants, human trafficking, pedophile networks, and the kidnappings and violence that affect thousands of migrants are only "evils of mankind" that Mexico cannot eradicate.

We strongly disagree with Director Romero and others in the leadership of Mexico's National Action Party, who habitually dismiss critical women's rights issues, including the femicide murders in Ciudad Juarez, as being the inevitable, and 'normal' results of male human behavior.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The citizens of Mexico, Mexico's Congress and the international community need to hold the government of President Felipe Calderón accountable for his allowing unending mass gender atrocities to occur on Mexico's southern border with Guatemala and Belize.

In this hell-on-earth, an estimated 450 to 600 migrant women are sexually assaulted each day, according to the International Organization for Migration. Police response is almost non-existent. At times, police are complicit in this criminal violence.

Mexico's southern border is also the largest zone on earth for the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC), according to Save the Children.

As Father Luis Nieto states in the below article about Salvadoran mothers who must come to Mexico's border to grieve for their raped and murdered daughters, "We cannot keep quiet, we cannot be complicit in this."

We strongly agree with that sentiment. Silence is also violence.

The federal government of Mexico is not ignorant of this ongoing catastrophe. The United Nations, the International Organization for Migration, Save the Children, elements of the Catholic Church, the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) and many members of Congress have, for the last several years, demanded action to end these atrocities.

Although INM director Cecilia Romero promised in February of 2007 that she would "entirely eliminate this terrible situation," no visible action has been taken to do so as of June of 2009, 16 months after Romero made that promise.

With the current economic slowdown and the expansion of global criminal sex trafficking operations, the rapes, kidnappings and sexual  enslavement of innocent migrants on that border is increasing with no end in sight.

As the United States Congress prepares to send over $400 million dollars in largely military aid to Mexico as part of the Merida Initiative to combat the drug cartels, we insist that human rights conditions be placed on those and other U.S. foreign aid funds that are headed to Mexico.

Mexico must close down the mass rape,  kidnapping, murder and child sex trafficking gauntlet that exists with total impunity on its southern border.

We also want to see the estimated 4,000 mostly Mayan indigenous children kidnapped from this region and sold to brothels in Tokyo, and also the uncounted thousands of other indigenous child victims who have been sold to brothels in New York and Madrid rescued, repatriated and then truly cared for.

Do you need money, President Calderón, to get these things done? Or is a misogynist, 'socially conservative' ideology that is resurgent in Mexico, and that has as its strongest voice the PAN political party, the real problem here?

Esta barbarie no será perdonado por Dios!

This barbarity will not be pardoned by God!

If Mexico does not have control over this part of its own territory, or if, as appears to actually be the case, the PAN's socially conservative agenda won't allow it to defend innocent and vulnerable women and children in crisis, consistent with their apathetic reaction to the femicide murders in Ciudad Juarez, then perhaps an international force organized by the Organization of American States, or by the United Nations needs to step-up to the plate, offer to help Mexico, and take control of the situation.

This crisis in Mexico is the best example in the Americas of why a new Global Plan of Action, as proposed by Ecuadorian Minister of Justice and Human Rights (Attorney General) Néstor Arbito Chica and diplomats gathered at the United Nations on May 13, 2009, is needed to get around this impasse.

Somehow, the fact that the government of Mexico is a signatory to the Palermo Protocol, and the fact that Mexico passed its 2009 U.S. Department of State Trafficking in Persons Report evaluation with a relatively positive Level 2 Rating (as we also acknowledge State's strong critique of corruption in Mexico), misses the point.

New and out-of-the box strategies are needed to oblige Mexico to fulfill its international obligations to end this mass gender atrocity once and for all.

It is not an impossible task.

The status quo today is... unacceptable!

End impunity now!

Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

June 28, 2009


Added: June 28, 2009

Mexico

Salvadoran mothers gather to pray and leave offerings and crosses for their family members who were abused, kidnapped and murdered in the 'mugging and rape guantlet' at Mexico's southern border region known as 'La Arrocera' - the Rice Cooker.

Madres salvadoreñas depositan ofrendas en "La Arrocera"

El 80 porciento de los abusos cometidos contra los inmigrantes se cometen en esta zona de Huixtla, Chiapas

Huixtla, Chiapas - Los parientes de indocumentados fallecidos y desaparecidos visitaron "La Arrocera" , un pequeño tramo de escasos cuatro kilómetros que los indocumentados utilizan para evadir la caseta migratoria El hueyate, en Huixtla...

Salvadoran mothers leave offerings for their murdered children at "The Rice Cooker"

80 percent of abuses against migrants occur in this area near the city of Huixtla, Chiapas

Huixtla, Chiapas - relatives of deceased and missing undocumented migrants visited "La Arrocera," a four kilometer long rural trail that north-bound Central and South American migrants use to bypass the Hueyate immigration station in the city of Huixtla, Chiapas.

Under strict security arrangements and with the support of Mexico's National Commission on Human Rights (CNDH), members of the Committee of Families of Deceased and Missing Migrants toured the area of "the Rice Cooker" near Huixtla, a municipality in the state of Chiapas, where dozens of men and women have been assaulted, raped and murdered.

"The Rice Cooker" is a [rural] migrant trail where 80 percent of the assaults and homicides in the region are committed, according to testimony gathered by the Catholic Church and human rights organizations.

Even police will not enter this zone unless they have several officers armed with high-powered weapons.

Father Luis Angel Nieto prayed for eternal rest for all of those migrants who lost their lives here in their attempt to reach "the American Dream."

For the second time during the trip, Father Luis Nieto demanded that the Mexican authorities combat these crimes, that for several years have sewn pain and fear.

"We cannot keep quiet, we cannot be complicit in this," he said.

After prayer, the Salvadorans planted dozens of crosses in memory of those who lost their lives here and who were never identified.

During the emotional ceremony, the mothers and fathers could not contain their tears. The sadness and pain invaded their faces. Most knew the true meaning of "the Rice Cooker".

Juan de Dios Garcia Davish

Feb. 11, 2009

See also:

“Wall of Violence” on Mexico’s Southern Border

Calderon’s “two-faced” policy combines police, the military, gangs, and Los Zetas [ex-military, who are now 'hit men' for the drug cartels] to fulfill US mandate to deter Central American migration

...Wall of Violence

“Migrants don’t have rights in Mexico,” says Father Heyman Vazquez Medina, founder of El Hogar de la Misericordia. “It’s ok to beat them, extort money from them, rob them, sexually abuse them, murder them, and nothing happens.

Central American migrants’ legal security guarantees appear to be repeatedly and permanently violated by individuals and groups of people who rely on the protection, consent, tolerance, or acquiescence of the State and who have the power of weapons, money, police protection, corruption, and impunity. They have put a price on the head of each migrant.”

Migrant shelter staffers say those who abuse migrants operate with absolute impunity... [Father Alejandro Solalinde Guerra, the southern coordinator of the Catholic Church’s Human Mobility Mission Migrants program] recalls one case where a woman was kidnapped from one of the shelters he oversees. Solalinde remained in contact with her family throughout the ordeal. When she finally turned up in the United States, she said that the group that kidnapped her forced her to make several [pornographic movies]. When they finally brought her to the US-Mexico border, they made her family pay thousands of dollars in ransom. Solalinde offered to fly her back south and pay all of her expenses if she filed a complaint with the government. The woman refused, saying she never wanted to set foot in Mexico ever again.

Even when migrants or human rights organizations do file complaints, they almost never result in arrests or convictions. Solalinde says that almost every time he calls the police because migrants have identified and located their attackers, he can’t find a police force that will arrest the suspects. They all say they don’t have jurisdiction in immigration affairs...

 ...[Mercedes Osuna of La Semilla del Sur, a Chiapas-based organization that works primarily on indigenous issues] explains that [after crossing into Mexico, to avoid a migration station on the highway north], undocumented migrants must walk a roundabout route through an area called la Arrocera. La Arrocera is teeming with violent criminals who mug [and rape and kidnap] migrants as they pass through. Osuna spoke with some migrants who recently passed through la Arrocera. They told her that in la Arrocera they saw uniformed Chiapas state police in marked vehicles pick up and drop off people who mugged migrants. In la Arrocera, the muggers are painfully thorough: migrants complained to Osuna of being stripped searched. The assailants even checked their victims’ anuses and vaginas for hidden valuables.

Police don’t just offer rides to assailants; they often are the assailants...

**

The “Wall of Violence” is fierce: El Hogar de la Misericordia [a migrant shelter] estimates that 80% of all migrants who pass through Chiapas state have been assaulted during their travels. Approximately 30% of the women who come to El Hogar de la Misericordia report being sexually assaulted in la Arrocera, Chiapas, which is only one of many stops along the migrants’ route. Fermina Rodriguez of the Fray [Friar] Matias de Cordova Human Rights Center, which monitors human rights on Mexico’s southern border, says, “When you talk to women, they consider rape to be part of the price they pay to migrate.” ...

Kristen Bricker

My Word is My Weapon

Dec. 24, 2008


Added: June 27, 2009

Panama

A 'Genteleman's Club' in Panama

Photo: Panama Star

The Sexual Reality of the Country

Panama is not only seen as a tax haven, but also a sexual paradise for tourists where everything is available for the right price

Every country has a seedy side and Panama is no exception. Like many other places in the world the sex industry is thriving and attracting visitors.

For many tourists that is one of Panama’s attractions. The so called “gentlemen’s clubs” offer not only beautiful women willing to do anything for the right price, but also the promise of forbidden pleasures.

Technically speaking sexual tourism is a crime, however there are Internet sites where the would be traveler will not only have all the their traveling arrangement taken care of, but also they throw into the package a lovely companion of whatever sex and age depending on the client’s preference...

Prostitution is a big business and organized crime gangs regularly bring women from Colombia, the Dominican Republic and other countries to work in the sex industry.

They bring the girls under false pretences promising them work. In reality the human traffickers take away their passports and use them as prostitutes in nightclubs and bars.

They are scared and lonely, in a foreign country, with nowhere to run to. They are terrified of the human traders and too afraid to go to the police because they know they are going to be deported...

Perhaps the worst part of the sex industry is the commercial sexual exploitation of children through on-line pornography and actual prostitution.

The Public Ministry is currently investigating 40 cases involving commercial sexual exploitation of children and pornography...

Marijulia Pujol Lloyd

Panama Star

06-04-2009


Added: June 27, 2009

Mexico

Senators José Luis Máximo García Zalvidea (left) and Rubén Velázquez,

Senators Lázaro Mazón (left) and Francisco Javier Castellón Fonseca

PRD pide a INM explicación por red de lenocinio

Legisladores del PRD pidieron la comparecencia de Cecilia Romero Castillo, comisionada del Instituto Nacional de Migración (INM), por el caso de mujeres sin papeles de Centroamérica prostituidas...    

Legislators call upon the Joint Committee of Congress to call immigration (INM) director Cecilia Romero in to appear and explain apparent involvement of INM agents in Yucatán sex trafficking network

Congressional lawmakers from the Party of the Democratic Revolution [one of Mexico’s three main political parties] have called for Cecilia Romero Castillo, commissioner of the National Institute for Migration (INM) to appear before Congress to explain the situation of a case in which undocumented Central American women where prostituted in [the state of Yucatán, with the alleged involvement of immigration agents in criminal activity].

Senators José Luis Máximo García Zalvidea, Rubén Velázquez, Lázaro Mazón and Francisco Javier Castellón Fonseca presented an accord before the Standing [joint] Committee of Congress to "invite" to the commissioner of the INM to a meeting with legislative members of the First Committee.

PRD legislators want Romero to report on the performance of INM immigration officers in the areas of human rights, and especially in the state of Yucatán, “where a network dedicated to trafficking in persons and sexual exploitation of women" [involving INM officers] has been discovered.

The PRD congressional members have also asked the Standing Committee of Congress to request that the Attorney General’s Special Prosecutor for Crimes of Violence Against Women and Trafficking in Persons (FEVIMTRA) investigate and take action against agents in the INM’s Yucatán office for their involvement in human trafficking and sexual exploitation.

The Standing Committee was also asked to request from the National Commission on Human Rights that it open an investigation into the case, and assist the foreign national victims who have filed criminal complaints in the case.

Jorge Ramos and Ricardo Gomez

El Universal

Mexico City

June 17 2009


Added: June 27, 2009

Colombia

The 11 month police operation was code named for this well known Colombian novel

Así operaba la red de trata de personas más poderosa del país, desmantelada por la Policía  

Un grupo de 20 investigadores de la Policía de Infancia y Adolescencia de Medellín adelantó toda la investigación, que se inició en julio del año pasado. Una joven de 18 años denunció su caso. 

"Una amiga me dijo que le estaban ofreciendo un trabajo en Bogotá y que nos iban a pagar 300 o 400 mil pesos. Cuando nos presentamos nos subieron a un bus, pero para el Urabá. Luego nos recogieron en un taxi, nos quitaron los papeles y nos llevaron a una casa de citas. Allá un señor nos dijo que ya sabíamos a qué íbamos, hasta que la ley nos encontró como a los cinco días"...

Police dismantle the largest sex trafficking network discovered to date in Colombia

A group of 20 police investigators from the Children and Adolescents unit in the city of Medellin developed the entire investigation, which began in July of 2008. An 18-year-old youth originally reported to network to authorities.

"A friend told me that she had been offered a job in [the capital city of] Bogotá that would pay 300 to 400 pesos [between $140 and $185 US dollars]. When we reported for work we were told to board a bus, but it was bound for the city of Urabá. Then our employers picked us up in a taxi, they took our identification and took us to a brothel. There, a man told us that we knew what we were going to have to do. We were rescued by the police 5 days later.” ...

The authorities arrested 69 people, including 17 women. Police remain on the trail of another 28 suspects.

There were so many similar complaints from victims that investigators had concluded that they were not dealing with two or three people who induced women into prostitution, but a powerful network. One that trafficked women from Medellin not only to other cities in Antioquia department [state], but also to the capital, Bogota , and to Cucuta, Cartagena, Santa Marta and towns in the Magdalena Medio [the eastern-most region of Antioquia]. There are also indications that the network had contacts abroad to traffic women to Aruba and Venezuela...

"Send me another one like her and we will call the account even"

Police intercepted communications between members of the network. They were able to establish that eight people, which they called ‘The Commission,’ sold women for amounts ranging from 30,000 to a million Colombian pesos [between $14 and $467 US dollars].

One intercepted communicated from a customer of the network [a brothel owner] to a member of the ‘Commission stated: "You sent me a woman for 30,000 pesos, but she was very ugly. Send me another one like her and we’ll call the account even.” ...

After the operation, code named 'Candida Eréndida' [Innocent Eréndira, a novel by famed Colombian Nobel Literature Prize winner Gabriel García Márquez], police distributed leaflets in the city of Medellin to warn the public not to be taken in by these networks.

Police continue to investigate the network’s links abroad.

Full English Translation

www.eltiempo.com

June 26, 2009


Added: June 26, 2009

Mexico, Guatemala

Photo: CIMAC Noticias

Niñez y prostitución en la frontera sur, el costo de llegar a EU

Leticia, una vida entre ebrios, maras y policías

Segunda y última parte

Suchiate, Chiapas. - Leticia, como miles de púberes y jóvenes en el submundo de la explotación sexual infantil en México, sobrevive entre ebrios, en esta zona de 700 kilómetros de frontera con Guatemala y Belice.

Tenía 12 años cuando llegó sola a Chiapas por primera vez, con la ilusión de continuar viaje y cruzar la frontera estadounidense en busca de un mejor futuro. Ahora, en su sexto intento, trabaja en una cantina de la zona. Apenas ha cumplido 14 años de edad...

The Cost of Reaching the U.S.; Children and Prostitution at Mexico’s Southern Border

Leticia at age 14: a life drinking, gangs and police

Second and last part

Suchiate, Chiapas state - Leticia, like many pre-teen and teenage youth living in the underworld of child sexual exploitation in Mexico, survives between bouts of heavy drinking here along Mexico’s 700 kilometer border with Guatemala and Belize.

Leticia was 12-years-old when she came alone to Chiapas for the first time, with the illusion of being able to reach and then cross the U.S. border in search of a better future. Now, after her sixth attempt, she works in a cantina (bar) in the area. She has just turned 14...

Unlike many of her fellow teen prostitutes, Leticia did not have to sell her virginity, a ‘service’ that customers are charged between $2,000 and $3,500 for. "I wanted to marry my boyfriend, but he abandoned me when he learned that I was pregnant. I had an abortion at two months out of disappointment," said Leticia, expressing with her child’s eyes a false maturity that shows even more her clearly her helpless...

Leticia says that many customers not only want to have sex, but they also want to photograph her or record her on videotape or on cell phones in exchange for an additional amount of money...

...The Chiapas State’s Attorney has, during 2009, dismantled three gangs dedicated to the sexual exploitation of minors in the cities of Tapachula, Tuxtla Gutierrez and Rayón. At least 14 detainees facing charges for procuring, criminal association and assault, among other charges.

The children and underage youth freed from these gangs had been forced to work in sexual slavery for more than 12 hours each day. They had to bring their enslavers $2,000 during that period. In exchange, they were given one plate of rice and beans to eat. These facts are just the tip of an ominous iceberg...

Full English Translation

Manuel de la Cruz

CIMAC Noticias

News for Women

Mexico City

June 25, 2009

LibertadLatina Commentary

We at LibertadLatina once again applaud the detailed, consistent and high quality reporting that CIMAC Noticias in Mexico has provided on the critical issues affecting women and girls in Mexico and across Latin America.

The global humanitarian organization Save the Children has identified Mexico's southern border with Guatemala and Belize as being the largest zone for the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) in the entire world. We have long recognized this fact, and accurate reporting in the Spanish language press, from CIMAC and also mainstream Mexican newspapers has provided a window into this nightmare.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) office in Tapachula, Chiapas has estimated that between 450 to 600 women and girl migrants who cross the border into southern Mexico are raped each and every day, with little or no law enforcement reaction in response.

In Tapachula, a prostitution 'mega-center' in Chiapas state, over 50% of the 20,000 females working in prostitution are underage girls and youth who have been forced by others or by economic necessity to accept a life of sexual exploitation. Some 50% of them are from the Mayan majority nation of Guatemala.

Chiapas, being a state located on this lawless border, is the only government entity in the world that is not actually a  nation to have established a direct relationship with the United Nations to address human trafficking. This region's crisis is indeed an emergency that requires the focused attention from the world community.

President Felipe Calderón of Mexico has been less than enthusiastic about fighting human trafficking, given his year-long effort to foot drag on efforts to publish effective regulations to enable the nation's first anti-trafficking law.

Now, Cecilia Romero, head of Mexico's immigration service (the National Institute for Migration - INM), has stated that human trafficking is "inevitable", and added that, "the existence of the smuggling of migrants, human trafficking, pedophile networks, and the kidnappings and violence that affect thousands of migrants are only "evils of mankind" that Mexico cannot eradicate.

Women and children's rights and immigrant rights groups in Mexico have been under-standably outraged by these comments. We join with them in denouncing such a hands-off and dismissive approach to confronting the mass gender atrocity of sexual exploitation and violence with impunity that is now taking place across Mexico.

We remain especially concerned that Cecilia Romero,  a former congressional deputy, senator and a long-time activist and official in the National Action Party (PAN) since 1982, is, through her statements about the 'inevitability' of sex trafficking, effectively justifying such criminal sexual exploitation and the lack of a Mexican federal response to that illegal enterprise. This policy position is consistent with many other statements and actions from the socially conservative PAN, that actively seek to diminish the independence and basic individual human rights of women.

It thus remains the responsibility of the international community to address these issues in collaboration, and in solidarity with the many elements of Mexican society who desire to be liberated from this Taliban-like mass movement to repress the basic humanity of women and girls.

Members of Congress, and activists in organizations such as the Teresa Ulloa's Mexico City based Latin America and Caribbean branch of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, as well as brave reporters like Lydia Cacho (who has been unjustly jailed and still faces death threats for her activism), and news agencies such as CIMAC Noticias (who's offices have been ransacked in the past for their reporting on sexual exploitation), all deserve the support of the international community, and they deserve our help.

We especially laud Teresa Ulloa and CIMAC Noticias for standing up to denounce the exploitation of indigenous women and girls, who are the primary target of many traffickers and rapists.

Let's give the advocates for women and girl's human rights in Mexico the help that they need now, while there is still time to avert an even more well organized war against women and girls than the one that is happening today!

End impunity now!

Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

June 26/27, 2009

See also:

Mexico vows to improve migrant's treatment

Mexico City - Mexico's head of migration [Cecilia Romero Castillo] on Tuesday pledged to improve the agency's detention centers in response to criticism that Mexico fails to give Central American immigrants the same respect it demands for its own citizens in the United States....

The Mexican government has acknowledged that many officials are bribed by human smugglers. Migrants face abuse from corrupt police as well as
violent gangs who wait on the southern border to rob and assault them.

The government-funded National Human Rights Commission, U.N. human rights officials and other non-governmental organiza-tions say they have documented abuses.

The migration depart-ment's plan aims "to entirely eliminate this terrible situation," Romero told a news conference. [Yet as of June, 2009 they have failed to act on this promise - LL.]

Answering U.S. concerns, President Felipe Calderon also has promised to strengthen security on Mexico's southern border to stop the tide of illegal migrants - the majority of whom use Mexico as a way station to the United States...

In January [2007], Mexico detained more than 10,000 illegal migrants, and
expects that number to increase to 205,000 by the end of [2007],
according to a report by the migration department....

Lisa J. Adams

The Associated Press

Feb. 28, 2007


Added: June 25, 2009

Mexico, Guatemala

Photo: CIMAC Noticias

Leticia, de 14 años, sobrevive en la explotación sexual

24 mil niñas y niños prostituidos u obligados a la pornografía

Primera de dos partes

Suchiate, Chiapas - Leticia es una niña centroamericana de 14 años, sin documentos, a quien prostituyen en una cantina de este municipio fronterizo con Guatemala.

Han pasado casi dos años desde que dejó su país natal para migrar rumbo a Estados Unidos. A pesar de las duras condiciones en que vive para lograr su objetivo, no deja de intentarlo. Sabe que la deportación es casi segura, según sus propias palabras, pero ni eso la detiene en su idea de cruzar la frontera, alternativa que encontró ante la miseria y el incierto futuro en su lugar de origen... 

Leticia, Age 14, Survives in Sexual Exploitation

24,000 boys and girls forced into prostitution or pornography across Mexico

First of two parts

Suchiate, Chiapas state – Leticia is a 14-year-old undocumented Central American girl who is being prostituted in a Cantina (bar) in this town on the Guatemalan border.

It has been almost two years since Leticia left her native country to migrate to the United States. Despite the harsh conditions she has had to live through in order to achieve that goal, she will not give up. She knows that her deportation from Mexico is almost certain, as she herself says. But she will not be detained in her effort to reach the U.S. border, seeking to find an alternative to the misery and uncertain future that she faced in her homeland.

Leticia’s situation is no different than that of  hundreds of children who have been trapped by this border region’s commercial sex networks, who have offered their victims “a way to make fast money.”

They are victims of exploitation of the international networks of traffickers who grab them either before or after they cross the border at the Suchiate River or along clandestine smuggling paths that exist all along the border with Guatemala. Advocacy organizations who fight on their behalf refer to them as “sex slaves...”

The director of the Movimiento Ciudadano de la Frontera Sur (Southern Frontier Citizen’s Movement), Juan José González, notes that the phenomenon of prostitution in the region has increased alarmingly. These are not isolated cases, he says.

On the streets, and in bars, clubs, schools and outside of shopping centers in cities such as Suchiate, Tapachula, Cacahoatán, Tuxtla Chico and Huixtla, it is common to find women [and girls] of different ages engaged in prostitution...

For now, while Leticia continues to be a victim of sexual exploitation, the director of Mexico’s National Institute for Migration (INM), Cecilia Romero, has recently told the newspaper El Universal that the existence of smuggling of migrants, human trafficking, pedophile networks, and the kidnappings and violence that affect thousands of migrants are only "evils of mankind" that Mexico cannot eradicate.

Full English Translation

Manuel de la Cruz

CIMAC Noticias

News for Women

Mexico City

June 24, 2009


Added: June 24, 2009

The United States, Mexico

Joaquín Aguilar Méndez, right, a former altar boy, has sued the Rev. Nicolás Aguilar, shown in photo at left. (From a web site that takes an opposing position in the case of Nicolás Aguilar - in Spanish).

Arquidiócesis de Puebla y Los Ángeles toleran pederastia

México DF.- Integrantes de la Red de Sobrevivientes de Abusos por Sacerdotes (SNAP, por sus siglas en inglés) interpusieron una demanda contra las arquidiócesis de Los Ángeles, California, y de Tehuacán, Puebla, querella que involucra a los cardenales Roger Mahony y Norberto Rivera, respectivamente, informa la Agencia NotieSe.

El ciudadano, identificado como Juan Doe (“Juan Nadie”), abusado sexualmente en 1988 por el sacerdote mexicano Nicolás Aguilar, acusa a esas instancias eclesiales y al Departamento de Educación de California de negligencia en la protección a su persona, puesto que Aguilar trabajó como profesor después de ser transferido de Tehuacán a Los Ángeles por el entonces obispo local, Norberto Rivera...

CIMAC Noticias

News for Women

Mexico City

June 23, 2009

Charges of cross-border church abuses continue

Mexico City - A victims’ group said Thursday that it was filing a new lawsuit in Los Angeles, California, against Mexican and U.S. church officials accused of sheltering a suspected pedophile priest.

The lawsuit accuses Mexico City Cardinal Norberto Rivera of conspiring with Roman Catholic officials in the United States to shelter Nicolas Aguilar, a Mexican priest wanted in California for 19 felony counts of committing lewd acts on a child.

This is the third lawsuit filed by the group, Survivor’s Network of Those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, against the Catholic Church for allegedly protecting Aguilar. Two previous lawsuits filed in Los Angeles against the Mexican cardinal by Mexican citizens were dismissed in 2007.

This time, however, the unnamed plaintiff is a U.S. citizen.

“In this case it was a North American boy molested in North American territory,” said Jose Bonilla, a lawyer for SNAP.

Bonilla said he was “practically 100 percent sure” that the plaintiff, identified only as John Doe, would have his day in court. “But it’s going to be a long process,” he said.

In addition to Cardinal Rivera, the lawsuit charges the archdiocese of Tehuacan in the Mexican state of Puebla, where Rivera worked at the time, the archdiocese of Los Angeles and the California Department of Education with failing to protect the plaintiff from Rev. Aguilar.

Foreign Correspondency

June 18, 2009


Added: June 24, 2009

Colombia

Stella Cardenas, director of Fundacion Renacer (the Rebirth Foundation)

Insuficientes, Nuevas Sanciones Sobre Turismo Sexual Y Pornografía Infantil En Colombia

Bogotá.- La muerte de Yesid Torres, de apenas 15 años, conmovió a los habitantes de Cartagena de Indias, Colombia, donde la explotación sexual va en aumento. El menor de edad falleció a consecuencia de una sobredosis de cocaína que consumió en el apartamento del italiano Paolo Pravisani, pederasta de 72 años,  quien lo había contratado para proveerle servicios sexuales, informó la agencia Semlac…

New Sanctions on Child Pornography and Sexual Tourism in Colombia are Insufficient

Bogota .- The death of Yesid Torres, a boy who had just turned 15, shocked the people of the city of Cartagena de Indias, where sexual exploitation is increasing. The youth died from an overdose of cocaine consumed in the apartment of Italian Paolo Pravisani, a 72 year old pedophile who had contracted Torres to provide sexual services.

In response to increasing levels of sexual exploitation, Colombian lawmakers passed a law on June 10, 2009 that applies new penalties, including a 20 year prison term for those who engage in producing child pornography. The law also makes child sex tourism a crime.

The legislation provides for prison sentences of 4 to 8 years for persons who promote child sex tourism, without the possibility of parole. The length of the sentence may be increased by half when the victim is under 12 years of age.

Stella Cardenas, director of Fundacion Renacer (the Rebirth Foundation), notes that although the penalty for promoting child sex tourism under the new law is higher than the 3 year sentence available under the old law, the length of sentence is still too low. She adds that the law fails to address cases of aggressors who sexually exploit youth between the ages of 14 and 18 who have consented to engage in [commercial] sex, often due to economic hardship.

CIMAC Noticias

News for Women

Mexico city

June 23, 2009

Véase también:

Luz Stella Cardenas

Luz Stella es la directora y fundadora de la Fundación Renacer, una organización que trabaja con niños y niñas víctimas de explotación sexual y ha atendido a lo largo de su historia a más de quince mil niños de Bogotá, Cartagena y Barranquilla. Desde 1988, su propósito fundamental ha sido combatir la explotación sexual infantil y acompañar a las personas explotadas sexualmente en su recuperación y realización personal...

Somos Más

Feb. 08, 2006

See also:

About Stella Cárdenas

Stella Cárdenas is building new institutional protections against child prostitution and pornography in Colombia by persuading the government to extend the mandate of its ministry charged with protection of children, the Ministry of Family Welfare... Stella and her Fundación Renacer ("Rebirth Foundation") contributed substantially to the passage of Law 360. This law, passed in 1997, for the first time assigned penalties–fines or jail sentences–for anyone who draws children into prostitution...

Ashoka International

2001


Added: June 23, 2009

Mexico

Mexico's immigration commissioner Cecilia Romero

El turismo sexual es inevitable: INM

Para la comisionada del Instituto Nacional de Migración, Cecilia Romero, el turismo sexual, tráfico de personas, comercio de mujeres, redes de pederastia, plagio y violencia contra miles de migrantes son “males de la humanidad” que México no puede erradicar...

Mexico’s Immigration Chief: Sex Tourism is Inevitable

According to Cecilia Romero, the commissioner of Mexico’s National Migration Institute (immigration service), sex tourism, human trafficking, female commercial sex work, pedophile networks, and the kidnappings and violence that victimize thousands of migrants [crossing Mexico to get to the U.S.] are "evils of mankind" that Mexico cannot eradicate.

Even if such practices have triggered: 1) harsh reports [about Mexico] from the U.S. Department of State and Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission (CNDH); 2) complaints by foreign victims about their forced prostitution and sex trafficking; and 3) complaints from  [undocumented] Cuban migrants who have been extorted for thousands of dollars in their quest to get to Florida, Romero concludes that all of these problems have existed since the origins of migration...

[Commenting on strong criticism of the INM and repeated calls for her resignation,] Romero argues that the National Migration Institute has implemented a 'purification' effort which has caused a number of problems to emerge into the public spotlight.

The immigration director noted that since her team arrived as part of President Felipe Calderón’s government, she has accomplished much, but she is also aware that those achievements will never be enough [to solve the problems that exist].

Romero said that the vast majority of complaints that have been submitted [about official corruption] originate from within the INM itself. So far about 300 immigration officers have been reprimanded or removed. "This shows that we are making progress, although I will never be satisfied in our war against organized crime."

Romero adds that when there is discussion about immigrants, the finger is always pointed at the INM. But, she says, the criminal networks have state police, corrections officers and also immigration agents on their payrolls. We are investigating and pursuing them. Romero insists that her agency is taking action to get to the bottom of the problem of corruption.

Jose Gerardo Mejia

El Universal

June 20 2009

LibertadLatina Commentary

We appreciate the fact that Cecilia Romero, the commissioner of Mexico’s National Migration Institute, is a rare federal agency director who is willing to be honest in expressing the Felipe Calderón Administration's lack of interest in treating the mass gender atrocity of adult and child sexual exploitation in that nation as a serious crisis requiring an urgent response.

According to the traditional beliefs of Roman feudalism that still prevail in Mexico, such behavior is, as Director Romero says, simply "inevitable."

The hidden follow-on to that statement is: "If it is inevitable, why do anything to fight it?"

So a nation like Mexico ends up doing only the minimum necessary to placate the U.S. State Department's Trafficking in Persons Office with the objective of receiving a reasonably good rating in the annual TIP report.

In other words, Romero is saying: Victims, don't hold your breath as you wait for help. That help is not forthcoming from President Calderón's federal government.

That is not a good enough answer!

Commissioner Romero's statement is consistent with the lack of action that the Mexican public sees from its federal government in regard to addressing modern human slavery and other forms of violence against women.

We are especially concerned that this policy position, stating that mass sexual violence and slavery is inevitable, is consistent with other positions taken on women's human rights issues by President Calderón's National Action Party (PAN), such as stating that the women who have been kidnapped, tortured, raped and murdered by the hundreds in Ciudad Juarez caused their own deaths because they wore immodest clothing and walked in bad parts of town.

End impunity now!

Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

June 23/24, 2009

See also:

LibertadLatina

Analysis of the political actions and policies of Mexico's National Action Party (PAN) in regard to their detrimental impact on women's basic human rights


Added: June 23, 2009

Colombia

El turismo sexual aumenta cada día más en el país  

Bogotá - Las cifras sobre turismo sexual en Colombia son alarmantes. Vender el cuerpo a clientes que llegan de todas partes del mundo, se ha convertido en uno de los mejores negocios en el país, siendo Cali una de las primeras ciudades en la lista...

Sex tourism is increasing on a daily basis

Bogota - The figures on sexual tourism in Colombia are alarming. To sell your body to customers who arrive from all over the world has become one of the best businesses in the nation, with Cali being the city at the top of the list.

According to a report of the Rebirth Foundation (Foundation Renacer), in the past two years the phenomenon has grown 53% in Cali, the capital of Valle del Cauca department [state]. Minors form the majority of those involved in the business.

The most appealing magnets for foreign tourists who come to our nation are the bodies of girls between 12 and 14 years [who are sold to them in prostitution]. This business generates huge profits for the mafia. Although 202 cases have been documented during the past 24 months, these incidents have been reported neither to the police for minors nor to the SIJIN (the Judicial Investigations and Intelligence Service). 

elpaisvallenato.com

June 21, 2009

LibertadLatina Commentary

Colombia may indeed be a leader in efforts to combat modern human trafficking. In the U.S. State Department's 2009 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report, Colombia received a 'Tier 1' rating, the highest possible, to reward their efforts against human trafficking.

Yet Colombia's government and certain social elements contribute to a large number of human rights abuses, especially those that victimize Afro-Colombians in Indigenous peoples, who face wanton murder, rape and displacement by the military and right wing paramilitary forces hell bent on stealing their land and conducting their own perverted version of 'social cleansing.' Leftist guerillas are not innocent either.

These abuses, including the forced conscription of underage girls and accompanying sexual abuse perpetrated by illegal armed groups on both sides of the conflict contribute to an environment where mass human trafficking is made possible.

With an estimated 70,000 victims of human trafficking being created annually, Colombia is right up there with Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Argentina as one of the major nations involved in the illegal trafficking of women and children for sexual exploitation.

We recommend that an index of trafficking behavior in these nations that is separate from the annual TIP report be developed to assess the true story 'on the ground' in the nations of the Americas. Currently, the TIP rating system does not reflect the true intensity of the problem.

End impunity now!

Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

June 23, 2009


Added: June 21, 2009

Colombia - The United States

María is keeping her identity hidden, for fear of reprisals.

Photo: Helda Martínez/IPS

Trafficking Victims’ Ordeal Never Over

Bogota - A mixture of rage, impotence and terror is evident behind the sadness in María’s eyes. It’s been five months since she escaped from her captors in the United States, where she was taken under a false job contract, and she still can’t shake off her fear…

According to the available data, some 70,000 people fall victim to human trafficking every year in Colombia, which ranks third in the number of victims in Latin America, behind the Dominican Republic and Brazil.

…Statistics only partially reflect the magnitude of the crime, because many of the victims refuse to go to the police for fear traffickers will carry out their threats, or that they will be shunned by their community, or simply because they don’t realize just how severely their rights have been violated…

…People do fall for the bogus offers because they are in dire need of an opportunity for a better life. That was what happened to María, a 40-year old woman originally from the central province of Tolima, who was living on the outskirts of Bogotá when she was captured by members of a trafficking mafia.

She admitted to IPS that she’s still scared her captors will find her or come after her kids…

She’s also filled with rage. In November 2008 she and her family carefully examined the work contract before she decided to accept a job as a domestic in the home of a wealthy Colombian family in the United States…

But everything changed when she arrived at her destination somewhere in the U.S. … They took away her passport and other documents, then forced her to work all day long, from 5 a.m. through midnight, with only half a day’s rest on Sundays, and drastically reduced her meals, feeding her a meager vegetable diet…

[A] woman from El Salvador told María that what her "employers" were doing was illegal, explained how to unblock the telephone, and gave her an emergency number to phone the police for help.

But the police merely forced her captors to give back her passport and admonished them for how they were treating her.

That night, María’s kidnappers scared her with all sorts of threats against her and her family back in Colombia. They warned her that if she didn’t sign a paper exonerating them from all responsibility, they would report her to the police and accuse her of several offences, and she would be thrown in jail for years.

She was finally able to sneak out of the house while her kidnappers thought she was sleeping, and was driven to a shelter for human trafficking victims by the Salvadoran woman and her husband.

"There I started to get better. I spoke several times with my children and the rest of my family, and I came to realize that there are many people in the same difficult situation as me. Two other Colombian women were there with me, and another four had left the day I arrived," she said…

Inter press Service (IPS)

June 10, 2009

LibertadLatina Commentary

Ten years ago a Colombian woman caught in an almost identical situation of domestic labor slavery approached a hair dresser, asking for help to escape her employer - a wealthy Colombian diplomatic family living in the Washington, DC region. I made good her escape, and that of a friend who worked for another diplomatic family from Colombia.

The victim's employer yelled and screamed at her, made her work under constant verbal threats from 6 am until midnight, forced her to cook, clean, mow the lawn and shovel the snow for a family of five living in a big house on a large piece of land, and forbade her to leave the house alone. Only during one of her 'supervised' visits to a local hair salon was she able to contact a sympathetic person willing to help. That person contacted me.

This woman still lives in fear of her employer, but has gotten married and has brought her daughter to the U.S.

Many middle and upper class women across Latin America employ domestic workers. A very large number of these employers act in a fashion that reflects extreme cruelty, and is consistent with the manner in which wealthy women in the Roman Empire treated enslaved women in their homes.

We see the results of this attitude in the Roman Empire through the example of the poorly fed and frail servant girls, barely given enough food to survive, whose well-preserved bodies have been found in the ruins of the houses of wealthy Romans who lived in the city of Pompeii.

Many wealthy and middle class women continue to treat their 'hired help' in the same slave-like fashion in one offshoot of the Roman Empire known as modern Latin America. You just have to watch a Mexican soap opera on a Spanish language TV network anywhere in the world to confirm that ugly fact.

As a millionaire Greek business owner once explained to me, the fact that Mediterranean cultures enslaved each other 'back and forth' for millennia lead directly to the fact that there is no remorse for slavery in Latin America. He told me that when he arrived in the U.S. years ago, his biggest surprise was that white Americans felt remorse for the past enslavement of African Americans.

That remorse does not exist in the Mediter-ranean region. By extension (and Spain is one of these Mediter-ranean cultures), remorse for slavery does no exist among the elites in Latin America.

So how can the world depend upon the judgment, and trust the actions of such elites to pass anti-trafficking laws and enforce them, when tolerance for labor and sexual exploitation was and is built into the very foundation of Latin American societies?

This is why a new Global Plan of Action against slavery, proposed by a number of United Nations member countries, is needed, because... given the existence of the U.S. State Department's Trafficking in Persons report or not, international legal instruments, and the threat of U.S. economic sanctions will not break through the Roman wall of impunity that enslaves Latin America's oppressed populations, and especially the poor, the indigenous and the African descendent, without engaging in out of the box thinking and action to end this crisis.

In other words, the modern anti-trafficking movement, and the actions of many international and U.S. bodies assume that all nations want to collaborate to end sex and labor  trafficking. That sentiment is true among some sectors of society in Latin America. But powerful economic and political forces thrive through the exploitation of the victims of modern human slavery, while ancient cultural and religious traditions justify such inhumanity.

Mexico's National Human Rights Commission recently announced that some 1,600 mostly Central American migrants traveling through Mexico to reach the U.S., mostly women and girls, are kidnapped each month into slavery. It is known that sexual slavery predominates in Mexico much more so than labor slavery. In the case of domestic servitude, involving tens of thousands of underage Indigenous girls in Mexico, sex and labor slavery, co-exist).

This is happening to the benefit of the elites and paid-off corrupt officials in Mexico, while at the same time the publication of serious federal regulations that are urgently required to enact the nation's first anti-trafficking law was intentionally delayed by President Felipe Calderón for 11 months. When the rules were finally published, after four stern warnings from Congress, they were watered down to make the law ineffective.

Many members of Mexico's Congress of the Republic have admonished President Calderón for not caring about the plight of trafficking victims.  Together with non-governmental organizations, these legislators have organized an effort to insist that President Calderón withdraw his current anti-trafficking regulations and allow them to be re-written to put the teeth back in them to reflect the original intent of Congress in passing the law. It is obvious that President Calderón finally published the regulations so that Mexico would receive a positive rating (Tier 2) in the 2009 U.S. State Department Trafficking in Persons Report.

Meanwhile, 20,000 migrants, mostly women and children, are kidnapped into slavery in Mexico each year while corrupt and apathetic law enforce-ment and government officials not only don't lift a finger to help these victims, but, as the 2009 TIP report acknowledges, they are sometimes direct participants in these kidnappings.

In addition, 4,000 Indigenous Mexican children remain enslaved in prostitution in Japan, while neither Mexico nor Japan do anything to find and rescue them.

Eight year old Mexican girls have been reported as being trafficking "into the brothels of the basements of New York" both currently and since at least the mid 1990s, if not earlier.

Yet these realities are not reflected in the 2009 U.S. State Department Trafficking in Persons Report, which was also true under the administration of former President George W. Bush.

The overall TIP report assessment of Mexico is accurate, but the nuances, detailing the intentional resistance by the Calderón administration against actually caring about and acting to defend trafficking victims and those at risk, is not reflected in the report.

The misogynist policies of the far right members of Calderón's National Action Party (PAN) are also not reflected in the 2009 TIP report. It is not in their best interest to clamp-down on modern human slavery, a position reflected in their efforts to foot-drag on building effective anti-trafficking efforts at the federal level.

Truth be told, Mexico's economy would be seriously 'harmed' if all forms of labor and sexual slavery ended. That does not justify extending the life of such exploitation for even one second.

We applaud Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Trafficking in Persons Office Director Louis C. De Baca, the first Latino head of the office, for the release of an expanded and well thought out Trafficking in Persons report, the first delivered by a Democratic administration.

But the case of Mexico, as well as the case of the major criminal enterprise that is the trafficking of mostly Afro-Latina women from the Dominican Republic to Argentina (while anti-trafficking analysis largely ignores this issue) are two areas that greatly concern us.

We look forward to seeing serious emphasis placed on addressing sex and labor trafficking in Latina America, especially where indigenous and African descendent populations are targeted, because in both types of slavery, these peoples comprise a very large segment of those who are at risk.

If this basic task of putting greater focus on the Latin American issue is accepted by the U.S. State Department, we should expect to see new initiatives in the Trafficking in Persons Office that go beyond the limited work that is being done today to address this emergency.

Latin America's exploding human trafficking crisis was virtually ignored during the past decade by the U.S. Government, except where foes of the U.S., including Cuba and Venezuela were concerned.

The real bad guys make their money in Mexico, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Colombia and Argentina. The Mexican trafficking mafias enslave 500,000 sex trafficking victims, according to Teresa Ulloa, director of the Latina American and Caribbean office of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women and Children. Yet the U.S. State Department declares, following the estimates developed by the United Nations funded International Labor Organization (ILO), that only 1.5 million sex slaves exist in the entire world.

So if both Teresa Ulloa and the ILO are to be believed, then Mexico has 1/3 of the world's sex slaves? Something is wrong with these numbers.

In addition, Save the Children has recognized that the southern Mexican border region is the largest area for the commercial sexual exploitation of children in the entire world. That fact is also missing from the 2009 TIP report.

We do not need another 8 years of obfuscation about the true and horrific magnitude of modern human slavery in Latin America.

We also do not need a diminished focus on this emergency because the forces that favor the legalization of prostitution are strongly represented in liberal Democratic circles. Their work is largely academic, and it does not account for the mass victimization of children and underage youth, especially in Latin America, who cannot possibly be seen as consenting, willing participants in the sex trade.

As well, we do not need to limit action against human trafficking to only a focus on further adoption of the Palermo Protocol, an approach which was defined during a gathering of diplomats at the United Nations on May 13, 2009 as being ineffective.

As we have stated before... We are encouraged by the brave efforts of United Nations diplomats and Ecuadorian Minister of Justice and Human Rights (Attorney General) Néstor Arbito Chica to promote a Global Plan of Action to get around the very clear fact that the Palermo Protocol, and regional efforts by the Organization of American States (OAS) are insufficient to successfully fight this aggressive criminal war against a whole generation of Latin American and especially Indigenous women and girls.

We look forward to seeing the United States take a leading role to step-up efforts to bring this crisis under control. We also look forward to seeing the U.S. State Department demonstrate leadership in addressing the hard issues in Latin America without seeing the rules changed behind closed doors in favor of quieting criticism of U.S. allies in the region, something that was quite blatant during the last U.S. Administration.

Those at risk, and those who are today enslaved in the region deserve our undivided attention and an honest approach to ending the condoned and officially sanctioned mass gender atrocity that is modern human slavery in Latin America.

The time of the Roman Empire is over!

Free my people now!

End impunity now!

Chuck Goolsby

LibertadLatina

June 21/22, 2009

See also:

En Japón, de 3 a 4 mil niñas mexicanas víctimas de ESCI

Afirma la experta Teresa Ulloa

Three to four thousand underage indigenous girls from the poor states of Oaxaca, Chiapas, Guerrero and Mexico [state] have become victims of commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) in Japan.

Puebla city, in Puebla state - Teresa Ulloa, Latin America and Caribbean Director of the Coalition Against Trafficking of Women (CATW) announced her estimates of the numbers of indigenous children sex trafficked to Japan, and explained that traffickers trick the victims using offers of thousands of dollars for their parents in exchange for  [obtaining permission] to take their daughters. The parents are told that their girls are going to the United States to work in fast food restaurant jobs.

Taking advantage of the condition of submission that Mexico's indigenous communities are forced to live in, the traffickers take their victims to Japan where they are prostituted and work as geishas, a role that Asian women no-longer want to play because today they have more decision-making power than in the past.

Ulloa said that before these victims from Japan are repatriated, the home conditions of these girls must be investigated to assure that they can be reintegrated without facing the risk of being sold or sexually exploited again.

Ulloa noted that in the year 2002 the CATW helped to repatriate two sisters, ages 8 and 10, who had been prostituted in a brothel in New York. They were subjected to exploitation again, 15 days later, because their family "had sold their daughters in exchange for two goats and two cases of beer."

During her interview with CIMAC Noticias, Ulloa declared: "the subject [of child protection] is not on the national agenda. Much attention is paid to drug trafficking, but the government hasn't even realized that the same drug trafficking networks are used for the [sex] trafficking of children, and that organized crime regards this activity to be one of their most important businesses." ...

Nadia Altamirano Díaz

CIMAC Noticias

Dec. 12, 2008

See also:

Mexico: Más de un millón de menores se prostituyen en el centro del país: especialista

Expert: More than one million minors are sexually exploited in Central Mexico

Tlaxcala city, in Tlaxcala state - Around 1.5 million people in the central region of Mexico are engaged in prostitution, and some 75% of them are between 12 and 13 years of age, reported Teresa Ulloa, director of the Regional Coalition Against Trafficking in Women and Girls in Latin America and the Caribbean...

During an international seminar in the city of Tlaxcala, Ulloa noted that, due to the conditions of marginalization in which they live, at least 50 million women and children in Latin America are at risk of being recruited for sexual exploitation.

La Jornada de Oriente

Sep. 26, 2007


Added: June 22, 2009

The United States - Latin America

The US Human Trafficking Report 2009: Whatever makes you think it's political?

The USA sometimes tries to make out the "equal partners" thing with the rest of the Americas and sometimes it doesn't. You get The Hawaiian making some lip service to the greater cause at the moment, but when push comes to shove and the bureaucrats are let loose, those old habits of arrogance, selective memory based on friendships and high-handedness towards "the brown people down there" shine on through.

Today the US State Department's ninth annual "Trafficking in Persons Report" was published, and here's how the region stacks up in the eyes of TheWorldPoliceman.™

Level One (complies with all, we luvs ya): Colombia

Level Two (not up to scratch but we see you're making an effort, try a bit harder, boyz): Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Peru, Uruguay.

Level Three (hmmm..not so good, kiddies. We're watching you so don't do anything stupid): Argentina, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Rep Dom, Venezuela

Level Four (bad bad bad naughty naughty sanctions sanctions): Cuba

But the biggest guilty party on human trafficking is left off the list completely. The country where many labor and sex slaves are sent by their paymasters and blind eyes are turned. Go on....take a wild guess as to which one.

The Democratic Underground

June 16, 2009


Added: June 21, 2009

The Americas

2009 TIP Ratings
Tier 1
Tier 2
Tier 2 Watch List
Tier 3

2009 U.S. Department of State Trafficking in Persons Report - Nations of the Americas

A-C: Antigua and Barbuda (Tier 2), Argentina (Tier 2 Watch List), Bahamas (Tier 2), Barbados (Tier 2), Belize (Tier 2 Watch List), Bolivia (Tier 2), Brazil (Tier 2), Canada (Tier 1), Chile (Tier 2), Colombia (Tier 1), Costa Rica (Tier 2), Cuba (Tier 3)

D-K: Dominican Republic (Tier 2 Watch List), Ecuador (Tier 2), El Salvador (Tier 2), Guatemala (Tier 2 Watch List), Guyana (Tier 2 Watch List), Haiti (missing), Honduras (Tier 2), Jamaica (Tier 2)

L-P: Mexico (Tier 2), Nicaragua (Tier 2 Watch List), Panama (Tier 2), Paraguay (Tier 2), Peru (Tier 2)

Q-Z: ST. Vincent and the Grenadines (Tier 2 Watch List), Trinidad and Tobago (Tier 2), Uruguay (Tier 2), Venezuela (Tier 2 Watch List)

See also:

Letter from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

Letter from Ambassador Luis C. de Baca

Introduction

Major Forms of Trafficking in Persons

The Three P's: Punishment, Protection, Prevention

Financial Crisis and Human Trafficking

Topics of Special Interest

Victims' Stories

Global Law Enforcement Data

Commendable Intiatives Around the World

2009 TIP Report Heroes

Tier Placements

Maps

U.S. Government Domestic Anti-Trafficking Efforts

U.S. Department of State Office of Trafficking in Persons

June 16, 2009


Added: June 20, 2009

Guatemala 

Justicia parece no llegar en casos de niñas víctimas de violencia

El sistema de justicia parece no ser efectivo en los casos de tres niñas asesinadas recientemente en San Lucas Sacatepéquez y de una menor violada en Sololá, ya que se han registrado señales de negligencia en las investigaciones y parcialidad en el estudio de las pruebas, denunció la Fundación Sobrevivientes...

Justice Appears Distant in Cases of Girl Victims of Violence

The non-governmental organization La Fundación Sobrevivientes (the Survivor’s Foundation) has denounced the fact that Guatemala’s justice system does not appear to be working effectively in two criminal cases: 1) that of three girls killed recently in San Lucas Sacatepequez; and 2) the case of a minor girl raped in the city of Sololá. The Foundation states that there have been indications of negligence and bias in the evaluation of the evidence in these cases.

In the first case, a 13-year-old girl was raped on July 8, 2008 in Sololá. Judge Frank Armando Martínez allowed the accused assailant, Martín Tambríz, to be freed despite conclusive evidence of his guilt. Forensic evidence had showed a positive DNA match tying Tambríz to the rape. The Foundation plans to appeal the acquittal.

Lawyers for the Survivor’s Foundation also expressed concern about the case of three girls, ages 7, 8 and 12, who were “butchered” on May 29, 2009 in the hamlet Chicamán in San Lucas Sacatepequez. It was ascertained that one of the victim’s was raped. Three men suspected in the crime have been detained. The Foundation emphasizes that there are signs of negligence in the investigation conducted by the District Attorney of Sacatepéquez, a fact that will not contribute to solving these crimes.

The Survivor’s Foundation has asked that the case be moved to the capital, Guatemala City to insure that the investigation and preparations for prosecution are able to be observed, ensuring that due process is respected in the case.

CERIGUA

June 19, 2009


Added: June 20, 2009

Guatemala

Juana Méndez, right, and her translator explain in Court how one of the two police-men who raped her told her after the attack: "Why are you complaining? I will put two bullets into you and throw you over an embankment."

From the documentary film on the Juana Méndez case (in Spanish on YouTube)

Guatemala.- Una indígena guatemalteca es la primera mujer maya que logra que encarcelen a un policía por haberla violado

Nebaj - La indígena guatemalteca Juana Méndez ha sido la primera mujer maya que abre un proceso judicial contra un policial por haberla violado y logra que sea condenado, según contó ella misma en una entrevista con Europa Press.

El gran índice de impunidad en delitos contra las mujeres, según han denunciado reiteradamente asociaciones feministas, se rompe así con este caso. A Méndez "le hicieron daño" y ella "no lo quiso dejarlo así, quiso decir la verdad".

Pese a las amenazas de muerte y a los consejos que personas de su entorno le reiteraban para que retirase del proceso contra el policía, ella decidió seguir adelante. "Qué pienso, que tiene que haber ley; si un hombre me hizo eso, tiene que pagarlo"...

An Indigenous Mayan Woman has Become the First Female in Guatemala's History to Achieve the Conviction and Imprisonment of a Police Officer for Having Raped Her in Custody

Nebaj - Juana Méndez has become the first Mayan woman [in this Mayan majority nation] to pursue legal proceedings against a policeman for the crime of rape resulting in a conviction and a prison sentence.

This case succeeded despite the high rate of impunity for crimes against women, an issue that has repeatedly been raised by feminists.  Méndez stated: "they did me harm" and she "did not want to leave it at that, I wanted to tell the truth."

Despite death threats and the repeated advice from people around her to withdraw the case against the policemen, she decided to go ahead. "What do I believe? I believe that the rule of law has to exist. If a man does that to you, he has to pay.” Juana Mendez said that with the full support of her husband, who had told his wife that he would not respond to this problem with domestic violence [a common reaction of the husbands of rape victims]…

Méndez’ struggle for justice caused her insomnia from fear, and she couldn’t eat. But she never retreated, saying, “I had to tell the truth.” "I told the judge that these policemen had raped me.” Her female friends told her that she should not pursue the case, because her husband would beat her. She replied to them: “I don’t care if my husband beats me. I am going to tell the truth.”

The one policeman who was tried has been sentenced to 20 years in prison. Asked whether she fears retaliation when the convicted rapist gets out of prison, Méndez said that "I am afraid that he will do something. But I don’t think that he will get out of prison."

Echoing the sentiment of many indigenous defense association leaders, Méndez denounced the situation of impunity that we live through in Guatemala, and above all, she protests the crimes that were committed during the 36-year armed conflict [that ended in 1996]. I regret that the victims and the murderers have to live together.

Francisco Otero

Europa Press

May 10, 2009

See also:

New film about Juana Mendez

Juana Mendez will be remembered in Guatemala as the first woman who succeeded in achieving a conviction against a serving police officer for mistreating her in custody.

During her detention at the police station in Nebaj she was raped and sexually assaulted by several officers, one of whom was finally brought to justice. The Institute of Comparative Studies in Penal Sciences, ICCPG from its initials in Spanish, and Project Counseling Services, have made a film about the case which you can see here, in three parts (in Spanish).

El Instituto de Estudios Comparados en Ciencias Penales de Guatemala (ICCPG) fue el productor de una pelicula documental sobre el caso de Juana Méndez

From the film:

A study conducted in 2005 by the The Institute of Comparative Studies in Penal Sciences found that 75% of women arrested in Guatemala suffer sexual abuse at the hands of policemen while in custody.

Some 43% of these victims file complaints in regard to their abuse.

The answer of the Government, says the film, is: impunity.

Gabriela Barrios

Also about Juana Mendez:

Supervivientes del genocidio Maya se sienten "olvidados" y acusan al Gobierno de incumplir los acuerdos

Supervivientes del genocidio Maya, acaecido durante la guerra civil de Guatemala (1960-1996), acusaron al Gobierno de la nación de incumplir los acuerdos de paz de 1996 y denunciaron que "se sienten olvidados" por las autoridades del país centroamericano.

Survivors of the Mayan Genocide Feel "Forgotten" and Accuse Guatemala's Government of Having Ignored their Obligations Under the 1996 Peace Accords

Nebaj - Mayan survivors of the genocide, which took place during Guatemala's civil war (1960-1996), have accused the national government of violating the 1996 national peace agreements and they feel neglected by the authorities of the Central American country.

This is what Juana Méndez believes. She asserts that "we continue living in poverty because our people have not yet recovered from the crimes committed against us." “They have not acknowledged the fact that the victims need material, as well as psychological support, such as in the form of opening a museum so that the families [of the victims] can understand what happened.”

Méndez explained that in her case, she had to flee to the mountains to avoid being attacked by soldiers. She doesn’t remember any longer how how long she was in hiding, but she feels that she is “one more victim of the military violence,” which had a major impact on women. However, Méndez says that she appreciates the efforts made by non-governmental organizations to bring light upon the violence that Guatemalan women suffered in the flesh during the war.

Francisco Otero

Europa Press

May 09, 2009


Added: June 20, 2009

Colombia

Statement of Ms. Navanethem Pillay, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to the 11th Human Rights Council

"In Latin America, I wish to reiterate that Colombia remains a situation of utmost concern. That country's 40-year-long armed conflict has resulted in enormous human, social, economic and political costs. Civilian lives, security and property continue to be targeted by all armed groups. Indigenous and Afro-Colombian are disproportionately affected. Sexual violence as a war tactic is directed against women and girls. Most victims are women heads of larger households, in their 40s, with limited education and few opportunities to work. The conflict continues to displace people. Antipersonnel mines, which the Government banned, but which are planted by guerrilla groups, keep exacting their toll on civilians.

I welcome the Government's invitation to a number of Special Procedures mandate holders, but also call upon it to act on their recommendations in an effective manner. The Government should take all the necessary steps to protect civilians, mitigate their suffering and address their need for justice."

United Nations Human Rights Council; United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)

Geneva, Switzerland

June 03, 2009


Added: June 20, 2009

Mexico 

2009 TIP Report: Summary of Evaluation of Mexico's Anti-trafficking Efforts

Mexico is a large source, transit, and destination country for persons trafficked for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor. Groups considered most vulnerable to human trafficking in Mexico include women and children, indigenous persons, and undocumented migrants. A significant number of Mexican women, girls, and boys are trafficked within the country for commercial sexual exploitation, lured by false job offers from poor rural regions to urban, border, and tourist areas…

Child sex tourism continues to grow in Mexico, especially in tourist areas such as Acapulco and Cancun, and northern border cities like Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez. Foreign child sex tourists arrive most often from the United States, Canada, and Western Europe. Organized criminal networks traffic Mexican women and girls into the United States for commercial sexual exploitation. Mexican men, women, and children are trafficked into the United States for forced labor, particularly in agriculture and industrial sweatshops.

The Government of Mexico does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so…

Prosecution

The Government of Mexico failed to improve on its limited anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts against offenders last year. No convictions or sentences of trafficking offenders were reported by federal, state, or local authorities… There are concerns over the new law’s effective implementation, particularly that victims must press charges against traffickers, otherwise they will not be considered trafficking victims and will not be provided with victim assistance.

NGOs and other observers continued to report that corruption among public officials, especially local law enforcement and immigration personnel, was a significant concern; some officials reportedly accepted or extorted bribes or sexual services, falsified identity documents, discouraged trafficking victims from reporting their crimes, or ignored child prostitution and other human trafficking activity in commercial sex sites. No convictions or sentences against corrupt officials were achieved last year…

…Last year Mexican authorities identified 55 trafficking victims within the country: 28 females and 27 males; trafficking allegations related both to commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor…

U.S. Department of State: 2009 Trafficking in Persons Report

June 16, 2009


Added: June 20, 2009

The Americas

Mailiana Morales Berrios - Costa Rican anti-trafficking activist

Fighting Human Trafficking a Critical Part of U.S. Foreign Policy

U.S. hopes to cultivate more public-private partnerships to fight slavery

Washington - The Obama administration views the fight against human trafficking, both at home and abroad, as a critical part of the U.S. foreign policy agenda, says Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

At a June 16 event at the State Department marking the release of the ninth annual Trafficking in Persons Report, Clinton emphasized the need for more public-private partnerships to fight the scourge of modern-day slavery.

“The criminal network that enslaves millions of people crosses borders and spans continents,” Clinton said, “so our response must do the same.”

“We are committed to working with all nations collaboratively,” the secretary said...
The secretary also made the announcement that the State Department will rank the United States in its report to be released next year, even though the U.S. Department of Justice releases an annual report focused exclusively on the trafficking problem as it exists inside the United States…

Ambassador Luis C. de Baca, director of the State Department’s Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons... himself a federal prosecutor who has worked many trafficking cases, noted that the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime recently released its own report on global human trafficking and found that two out of every five countries have yet to achieve a single conviction of a human trafficker. “Prosecutions can be a blunt tool, but they do matter” in deterring traffickers, he said.

Heroes Honored

In addition to a number of U.S. senators and House members, two anti-trafficking activists were present at the June 16 State Department event: Mariliana Morales Berrios of Costa Rica and Vera Lesko of Albania.

Yasmine Alotaibi

America.gov

June 16, 2009

Public Awareness a Major Weapon in Fighting Human Trafficking

Washington — Around the world, people desperate for employment often find themselves tricked by human traffickers. An estimated 800,000 men, women and children are trafficked across international borders each year. Millions more are trafficked within their own countries.

This problem does not go overlooked by everyone, as some everyday heroes from a variety of nations take steps to end modern-day slavery...

For example, Canadian Benjamin Perrin founded The Future Group, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) committed to fighting human trafficking and the child-sex trade. By bringing together a team from across Canada, The Future Group works with foreign governments, other NGOs and businesses to address human trafficking and other global issues such as HIV/AIDS…

Costa Rican Woman a Pioneer in Anti-Trafficking Programs

…Over the last year, the Costa Rican government has made progress in addressing human trafficking crimes and helping victims. The government recently launched prevention campaigns as well as training efforts for government and law enforcement officials. Also, the government has begun to provide more victim assistance, although prosecution of human traffickers remains lacking.

Before the government began such efforts, Mariliana Morales Berrios was already fighting to protect trafficking victims. In 1997, she created the Rahab Foundation to help victims and their families find a new life, keeping the program running despite limited resources. Although she and her staff frequently face threats and attacks, they continue to help trafficking victims escape from their captors. In fact, since its founding, the Rahab Foundation has helped more than 3,000 victims and also trained more than 5,000 government leaders, law enforcement officials and tourism workers on human trafficking issues...

For these efforts, Perrin and Morales are being recognized by the U.S. Department of State in its annual report on human trafficking…

Yasmine Alotaibi

America.gov

June 16, 2009


Added: June 20, 2009

Mexico

Child Sex Tourism Growing in Border Cities Like Juárez, Report Says

Child sex tourism continues to grow in Mexican northern border cities like Tijuana and Juárez, according to a U.S. State Department report.

"Foreign child sex tourists arrive most often from the United States, Canada, and Western Europe," the report said.

People from Mexico also are trafficked into the United States for commercial sexual exploitation. Besides the northern border cities, the report said Cancun and Acapulco were popular child sex tourism destinations.

Each year, as many as 20,000 children are sexually exploited in these urban centers, officials said.

"Mexican men, women, and children (also) are trafficked into the United States for forced labor, particularly in agriculture and industrial sweatshops," the report said.

The U.S. federal government said corruption and lax enforcement were to blame for few human-trafficking prosecutions in Mexico.

The U.S. State Department released "The 2009 Trafficking in Persons Report" on Tuesday, and on Wednesday Mexican authorities announced the arrest of a Mexican federal immigration official assigned to Mexico City's airport on suspicion of human-trafficking.

Last week authorities in Costa Rica said they were investigating the trafficking of its citizens in Mexico.

Diana Washington Valdez

El Paso Times

June 18, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Mexico

"IMPUNITY" - Women victims of Police Assault at Atenco Protest at FEVIMTRA offices

"Women are not the Spoils of War!"

Exigen atenquenses a fiscalía agilizar juicios contra policías

Habitantes de San Salvador Atenco, particularmente 11 de las 26 mujeres que denunciaron haber sido víctimas de violencia sexual, física y sicológica por policías los días 3 y 4 de mayo de 2006 en ese municipio mexiquense, exigieron a la Fiscalía Especializada en Delitos Violentos cometidos contra Mujeres y Trata de Personas (Fevimtra) que ya consigne la averiguación previa que abrió y ejercite acción penal contra todos los uniformados que participaron en los acontecimientos, con el propósito de que sean sancionados por acción u omisión…

Women Victims of Sexual Violence at 2006 Atenco Protest March Demand That Special Prosecutor's Office for Crimes Against Women Expedite Proceedings Against Accused Policemen

Inhabitants of [the Mexico City suburb of] San Salvador Atenco, including 11 of the 26 women who reported being physically, psychologically and sexually abused by [male] police officers on May 3rd and 4th of 2006, have demanded that the [federal] Special Prosecutor's Office for Violent Crimes Committed Against Women, and Trafficking in Persons (FEVIMTRA) act upon the results of their preliminary investigation in the case, and bring the actors to justice for their actions and acts of omission.

During a demonstration in front of the offices of FEVIMTRA in Mexico City, the activists indicated that, "the Mexican authorities have once again demonstrated their inefficiency in prosecuting and punishing those responsible for the serious violations human rights that were committed in San Salvador Atenco. They were referring specifically to the fact that just recently, the only police officer to have been tried, convicted and sentenced for the assaults against women at Atenco was pardoned...

Full English Translation

Gustavo Castillo

La Jornada

June 17, 2009

See also:

LibertadLatina

Mexican Federal, State and Local Police Rape and Assault 26 Women Protesters in Atenco, Mexico - May 3/4, 2006


Added: June 19, 2009

Mexico

20000 Migrants a Year Kidnapped in Mexico En Route to US

Some 20,000 of the 140,000 illegal migrants en route to the United States via the Mexico border to find work and a better life are kidnapped each year and subjected to rape, torture and murder, crimes that usually go unpunished due to the corruption of the authorities, fear of reprisals and distrust of authorities, according to Mexico’s independent National Human Rights Commission.

Mexico City – More than 1,600 migrants, above all Central Americans en route to the United States to find work, are kidnapped monthly and subjected to humiliations that usually go unpunished due to the corruption of the authorities, Mexico’s independent National Human Rights Commission reported.

“The kidnapping of migrants has become a continuous practice of worrying dimensions, generally unpunished and with characteristics of extreme cruelty,” commission chairman Jose Luis Soberanes said Monday at the presentation of the report.

Between September 2008 and February 2009, the commission registered a total of 198 cases of mass kidnappings of migrants involving 9,758 people.

Motivated by the yearning to begin a new life in the United States, each year some 140,000 people cross Mexico’s southern border intending to traverse the country and then cross the U.S. border, according to official figures.

To achieve their dream, the migrants have to travel thousands of kilometers with hardly any money and trusting unknown people who promise to help them, but there exists a risk that they will be betrayed and wind up in the hands of people-trafficking networks.

Upon presenting its report on the kidnappings of migrants, the rights commission called attention to their “high vulnerability” and denounced the fact that the practice “is on the increase.”

The document prepared by the panel includes many shocking testimonials, like that of a Salvadoran woman who was locked up and raped numerous times during the 48 hours she was held.

Finally, the young woman was freed because her family, who lives in the United States, gave in to the threats of her abductors and paid part of the $4,500 they demanded as ransom.

“But my companion didn’t have anyone to help her and so they shot her and let her bleed to death in front of me to intimidate me,” the woman said...

The kidnappings are committed mainly by organized bands whose members remain unpunished for the crimes because their victims do not report them since they don’t know their rights, they are afraid of reprisals and don’t trust the Mexican authorities, which, according to the commission report, are complicit with the criminals in at least 1 percent of the cases.

Victims are usually kidnapped in groups along certain stretches of the railroad lines in southern Mexico, where migrants commonly hop on northbound freight trains.

The commission had to move Monday’s presentation of the report to a different office after receiving a bomb threat – which turned out to be false – at the original venue.

The threat, according to Soberanes, was a “message” from the “bands interested in having impunity continue” for their crimes.

EFE

June 17, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Guyana

Guyana will not prosecute people for trafficking in personss just to satisfy the US, says minister

Georgetown, Guyana - Minister of Human Services and Social Security, Priya Manickchand, has lashed out at the United States of America’s rating of Guyana for its Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report by the US State Department which places Guyana on Tier 2 watch list.

“Guyana objects completely to being placed on the Tier 2 watch list...we do not believe that we have trafficking on the scale that should attract the attention of the US, the report is inaccurate in some of its assertions: it did not given us (government) credit for all that has been done,” she stated...

“We prosecute every person who can be prosecuted under the Act who would have committed acts of trafficking, what we do not have is a large number of convictions. We cannot dictate what the courts do, we do recognize that there are some weaknesses in the entire judicial system in terms of how long matters take to pass through the system and in that regard, the government is at present engaged in improving the entire justice system through the Justice Sector Reform Strategy,” she explained.

GINA / Caribbean Net News

June 18, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

United States

Human Trafficking Rises in Recession

This particularly gory testimony, used by the US State Department to highlight the severity and widespread nature of human trafficking, is one of many alarming personal accounts included in their 2009 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report.

Time Magazine

June 18, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Jamaica

Jamaica cited for inadequate anti-human trafficking measures

Jamaica has again been ranked as a tier two country for human trafficking by the US State Department which has cited inadequate efforts to prosecute trafficking offenses and protect victims. In its ninth annual Trafficking in Persons Report released ...

RadioJamaica.com

June 18, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Costa Rica

Mejora en la lucha contra trata de personas

Costa Rica se supera en la lucha contra la trata de personas, según un informe del Departamento de Estado de los Estados Unidos.

Costa Rica has improved its standing in the 2009 U.S. State Department Trafficking in Persons Report. (Translation to follow)

Telatica.com

June 17, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

The United States

Alerta de que la -esclavitud moderna- está aumentando por la crisis

El Gobierno de EEUU amplió la lista de países con crecientes problemas de tráfico humano de 40 en 2008 a 52 este año, en que ha incluido a Nicaragua, Irak, Filipinas, Antillas Holandesas y los Emiratos Arabes Unidos.

U.S. Government: Modern slavery is increasing during the current economic crisis.

www.ABC.es

June 16, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Colombia

Autoridades desmantelan banda de trata de personas y detienen a 69 personas

En más de 60 allanamientos fueron detenidos 52 hombres y 17 mujeres de la red que solicitaba damas de entre 18 y 25 años de edad en avisos clasificados en los diarios y les ofrecía trabajo en bares y restaurantes y altos ingresos, para luego obligarlas a prostituirse.

Authorities in Colombia dismantle sex trafficking ring and free 69 women between the ages of 18 and 25. (Translation to follow)

http://web.presidencia.gov.co

June 16, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Canada

Penalties for sex trafficking in Canada lax - US report

Vancouver, British Columbia - A US report on human trafficking says Canada has the laws needed to prosecute human traffickers and sex tourists, but the penalties dished out by the courts are lax...

KBS Radio

June 16, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

The Dominican Republic

Washington: people trafficking still occurs Dominican Republic

The State Department's annual report, first under president Barack Obama's Administration, extends the list of countries with increasing human trafficking problems, from 40 in 2008 to 52 this year, among them Nicaragua, Iraq, the Philippine ...

Dominican Today

June 16, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

The Vatican

Pope Praises "Courageous Commitment" of Religious Against Human Trafficking

Pope Benedict has lauded the “courageous commitment in defense of human life” of religious sisters involved in helping victims of human trafficking. The Pope's praise was contained in a telegram sent Sister Louise Madore, President ...

Vatican Radio

June 15, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Latin America

Sub-Regional Operations Profile - Latin America

In Central America and Mexico, efforts to improve border security, guard against terrorism and counter human and drug trafficking have led to stricter controls on the movements of undocumented migrants. ...

UNHCR (press release)

June 15, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Utah, USA

Human trafficking underground in Utah communities

But even in Utah, human trafficking, one of the world's top three most profitable hidden industries, has reared its ugly head. Dewayne Hopkins, a 27-year-old Salt Lake City resident pleaded guilty in May to conspiracy to commit sex trafficking ...

BYU Newsnet

June 15, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Georgia, USA

Sex-trafficking fight goes beyond streets

Teenage prostitutes, according to a mayor's report on child sex trafficking, had begun working within a few steps of the familiar inscription from Matthew on the church's wall: “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you ...

Atlanta Journal Constitution

June 14, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Nevada, USA

March Calls For End To Child Sex Slavery

The group Shared Hope International partnered with Canyon Christian Church for the event, drawing attention to the disturbing crime of human trafficking. A candlelight vigil was also held after the march. ...

Fox5 KVVU

June 13, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

Latin America

OAS Assistant Secretary General: “the Future of Inter-Americ ...

In terms of the challenges, Ramdin offered that “there are still pending bilateral tensions and outstanding disputes among member countries” and that many of the traditional issues such as drugs and arms trafficking, discrimination, food security ...

ISRIA

June 12, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

The Vatican

Women religious organize conference to combat 'new form of slavery'

This morning at the Vatican's press office, organizers announced a forthcoming congress on the theme: “Female Religious in Network against Trafficking of Persons.” The congress will focus on fighting and preventing human trafficking...

Catholic News Agency

June 12, 2009


Added: June 19, 2009

The Vatican