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May
2006
News
Added
May 31, 2006
Congo
Rape, Brutality
Ignored To Aid
Congo Peace
The young
woman's name is
Tintsi and she's
barely 20 years
old. She arrived
at the hospital
three weeks ago
on a stretcher
carried by
relatives who
walked 100 miles
to get here.
Doctors weren't
sure Tintsi
would ever walk
again.
Tintsi, like
everyone else in
this room, is a
victim of the
worst kind of
sexual violation
imaginable.
"Some of them
have knives and
other sharp
objects inserted
in them after
they've been
raped, while
others have
pistols shoved
into their
vaginas and the
triggers pulled
back," said Dr.
Denis Mukwege
Mukengere, the
lone physician
at the hospital.
"It's a kind of
barbarity that
only savages are
capable of."
He added that
"these
perpetrators
cannot be human
beings."
The alleged
perpetrators are
men in uniform,
part of the
Congolese army.
These troops are
a compilation of
various militia
groups that had
been fighting
each other for
years until a
truce was
reached two
years ago.
-
Jeff Koinange
CNN
May 23, 2006
Added
May 31, 2006
Mexico, Central
America
Don't Try
Crossing
Mexico's
Southern Border
Ever since he
crossed into
Mexico, José
Moisés has had
nothing but
trouble. Now the
30-year-old
Honduran
mechanic is
hunkered down
with other young
illegal migrants
in a rail yard
just north of
Mexico City,
waiting for
nightfall to hop
a northbound
freight. He
displays a pale
line encircling
his finger. He
used to have a
ring there, he
says—until
Mexican cops
slammed him
against a squad
car in the
southern border
state of Chiapas
and grabbed it.
"They took
everything,"
says Moisés.
"Here the
Central American
has no value."
As tough as the
United States
can be for
workers who slip
in from south of
the border,
Mexico is in a
poor position to
criticize. The
problem goes far
beyond the
predatory
gantlet of thugs
and crooked cops
facing
defenseless
transients like
Moisés. There's
ample precedent
in Mexico for
just about
everything the
United States
is—or
isn't—doing.
Calling out the
military?
Mexicans may
hate the new
U.S. plan to
deploy 6,000
National Guard
troops on the
border, but five
years ago they
cheered
President
Vicente Fox for
sending
thousands of
Mexican soldiers
to crack down on
their southern
frontier.
Tougher laws?
[U.S.
Latino]-rights
groups are
enraged over
U.S. efforts to
criminalize
undocumented
aliens—yet since
1974, sneaking
into Mexico has
been punishable
by up to two
years in prison.
- Newsweek
June 5
2006 Edition
Added
May 27, 2006
Texas, US
Woman Stabbed 19
Times During
Encounter
Atlantic City -
A sexual
encounter gone
bad left a
Brooklyn, N.Y.,
woman seriously
injured early
Saturday
morning.
The woman told
police she met a
man driving a
small pickup
truck. The
two then went to
a parking lot on
North Georgia
Avenue near the
rear of the
church to have
sex, police
said.
While they were
in the cab of
the truck, the
man suddenly
produced a
sharp-edged
weapon and
stabbed the
woman more than
19 times in the
face, neck and
chest, police
said. The victim
was able to get
out of the
truck, and the
attacker drove
off.
The suspect is
described as a
Hispanic man
with a slender
build and narrow
face, with a
“bracelet”
tattoo on his
left wrist and a
small tattoo on
his left
forearm, police
said. His small
pickup truck is
in good
condition and
had a temporary
registration
sticker in the
rear window.
Anyone with
information on
the attack is
asked to call
Detective Hector
Reyes at (609)
347-5766.
- Elaine Rose
The Press of
Atlantic City
May 28, 2006
Added
May 27, 2006
Texas, USA
Police Search
For Rape Suspect
Undocumented
immigrant
accused of
impregnating
10-year-old girl
Pharr - Police
said they are
searching for a
21-year-old
illegal
immigrant
accused of
raping a
10-year-old
family member
and leaving her
pregnant.
Authorities were
alerted to the
case by a local
doctor, who
discovered the
girl's pregnancy
during a routine
medical exam
last Friday,
Pharr police Lt.
Guadalupe
Salinas said.
The girl was
subsequently
taken to the
Children's
Advocacy Center
in Edinburg
where she told
staff that her
21-year-old
relative, Pedro
Guzman Muñoz,
had raped her,
police said.
James Osborne
Valley Morning
Star
May 26, 2006
Added
May 27, 2006
Washington,
USA
Man Held In
Child Rape
Charges
A 22-year-old
Oak Harbor man
accused of
raping a
12-year-old
neighbor girl is
being held in
jail on $125,000
bail.
Prosecutors
charged Gilbert
Pena in Island
County Superior
Court May 8 with
four counts of
child rape in
the second
degree.
Sgt. Jerry Baker
with the Oak
Harbor Police
wrote in the
affidavit of
probable cause
that the mother
of the
12-year-old girl
discovered that
her daughter was
having sex with
Pena. He lived
in an apartment
near the woman
and her
daughter.
-
Jessie Stensland
Whidbey
News-Times
May 27 2006
Added
May 27, 2006
Oregon, USA
Teachers' Aide
Accused Of Rape
Had Criminal
History
Gresham -- A
teachers' aide
at a Portland
charter school,
who served 10
years for
murder, was
arrested last
week for rape
and sodomy of a
15-year-old
female student,
police said.
Daniel Alcazar,
27, who has
worked at The
Academy of
Alternatives
School since
December 2005,
was arrested May
18.
- Kristina
Brenneman And
Antonia Giedwoyn
KGW-TV
Oregon-Washington
May 27, 2006
Added
May 26, 2006
United States -
Honduras
United
Nations: Mexican
Women And
Children Face
Alarming Rates
Of Domestic
Violence
El Comité de
Derechos
Económicos
Sociales y
Culturales
(DESC), de la
Organización de
Naciones Unidas,
manifestó al
gobierno
mexicano su
preocupación por
los altos
índices de
violencia
doméstica que se
registran en el
país contra
mujeres y niños,
y que en varios
estados "la
definición de
incesto en las
leyes no protege
adecuadamente a
menores de
edad."
- La Jornada
Mexico City
May 26, 2006
See also:
Committee
Experts raised
questions
related to,
among other
things, child
labor, street
children,
violence against
children, the
situation of
indigenous
children, the
provision of
education in
indigenous
languages,
budgetary
allocation to
education and
health, measures
taken to improve
the conditions
of poor
children,
breastfeeding,
and children
with
disabilities.
-
United Nations
Press Release
United
Nations High
Commissioner on
Human Rights
Committee On
Rights Of Child
Examines Report
On Mexico
23 May 2006
Added
May 25, 2006
United States -
Honduras
FBI Sting
Arrests U.S. Man
For Sex
Trafficking
Honduran
Children
Lo detienen en
Miami por
ofrecer turismo
sexual con
menores en
Honduras.
Miami - A man
who allegedly
organized child
sex tourist
trips to
Honduras has
been arrested by
the FBI in Cocoa
Beach, Florida.
Gary Evans, age
58, was detained
in a joint
operation
between U.S. and
Honduran
authorities on
charges of
organizing a
trip for two
clients to
engage in sex
with two
adolescents, 14
and 16 years of
age.
The two clients
were actually
undercover FBI
agents.
According to a
communiqué of
the U.S.
Attorney's
Office for
Florida, agents
of the FBI
created a web
site on the
internet as a
hook to catch
people who offer
child sex
tourism.
Evans contacted
them and offered
to do a joint
business venture
by offering
trips to
Honduras and
Costa Rica.
A press release
from the office
of U.S. Attorney
Paul Pérez
stated: "Our
office pledges
to continue
seeking out
those who offer
child sex, and
those who travel
outside the U.S.
to commit these
horrendous
crimes.”
- EFE News
Service
May 25, 2006
Added
May 25, 2006
Florida, USA
Nicaraguan Child
Abuser Arrested
By ICE
Miami - A
40-year-old
Nicaraguan
national
convicted for
burning his
12-year-old
stepson with a
soldering iron
and beating him
repeatedly with
a belt buckle,
electrical wire
and broomstick
was arrested
here Thursday by
U.S. Immigration
and Customs
Enforce-ment
(ICE) detention
and removal
officers.
Freddy Perez was
convicted in a
Miami-Dade
County court on
Feb. 16, 1999.
He was sentenced
to five years
probation, along
with 150 hours
of community
service,
domestic
violence
counseling and
parenting
classes.
Perez, who
failed to appear
for his
immigration
hearing on May
11, 2006, was
ordered removed
in absentia by
an immigration
judge.
"This man left
irreparable
damage in his
stepson's life,"
said Michael
Rozos, field
office director
for detention
and removal in
Florida. "Those
illegally in the
country engaging
in horrible acts
such as these
should now that
you too will be
found and
arrested."
-
www.ICE.gov
May 22, 2006
Added
May 25, 2006
Colombia
Police Remove
425 Youth Under
Age 14 From Bars
In South Bogotá
La Policía
retuvo a 425
menores de edad
en chiquitecas
de Bogotá
A recent police
operation in the
south of
Colombia’s
capitol, Bogota,
removed 425
children from
three chiquiteca
[bar]
establishments.
Minors under 14
years of age are
prohibited from
entering bars.
A simultaneous
raid rescued
additional
children from
bars that were
not serving
alcohol at the
time of the
raids.
The police
actions were
organized by law
enforcement in
Bolívar City,
Restrepo and
iRafael Uribe
Uribe.
Alcoholic
beverages,
weapons and
marijuana were
found in these
locations.
The minors
rescued were
carried to the
police station
of San
Christopher, in
the south of
Bogota, where
they were handed
over to their
parents.
City councilman
Gilma Jimenez
stated to
Caracol Radio
that the people
who insist on
organizing these
[nightclub]
events for
youth, where
they are
enclosed in
shady
environments,
expose children
to many types of
danger.
- Caracol News
Bogota, Colombia
May 14, 2006
Added
May 25, 2006
India
One Third Of
Marriages In
India Involved
Girls Under
18-Years-Old
India seeks to
end child
marriages.
Pune - Shanta
was only 13 when
her parents
forced her to
leave school and
married her to a
man twice her
age. At 15,
while most of
her peers were
in school, she
gave birth. Now
17 and
emaciated,
Shanta is back
in her parent's
home after her
marriage
collapsed.
"I didn't even
understand what
marriage meant
at 13," she
says, her eyes
brimming with
tears, as her
2-year-old lolls
in the
background.
Shanta hadn't
even seen her
husband, let
alone known him,
before she tied
the nuptial
knot.
More than
one-third of all
brides in India
are below the
age of 18, an
estimate that
activists say
could be low, as
many marriages -
both child and
adult - seldom
get registered.
-
Anuj Chopra
The Christian
Science Monitor
May 25, 2006
Added
May 24, 2006
Mexico - United
States
Border /
Frontier
Dichotomy Colors
Debate
The most common
word for border
in Spanish is
“la frontera” —
the line that
divides one
nation from
another, with an
earlier
connotation of a
far extension of
the land. In
English the word
for “la
frontera” is
frontier — a
traditionally
loaded term in
U.S. history and
culture.
The frontier in
the United
States has most
often been a
temporary pause
at the edge of
Indian or
foreign lands, a
line that
promises
expansion when
the opportunity
presents itself,
or a line that
must be held
against the
savages.
What is at stake
on the
U.S.-Mexico
border is
defined
differently on
each side...
- Dan Lund
El Universal /
Miami Herald
May 22, 2006
Added
May 24, 2006
Mexico - United
States
NPR -
"Migrants Leave
Kids, Problems
Back Home"
When Mexicans
migrate to the
United States,
many leave their
children in the
care of extended
families. That's
causing problems
back in their
home
communities,
with children
doing poorly in
school, dropping
out or turning
to crime.
In the rural
village of San
Andres Nicolas
Bravo in the
province of
Malinalco,
Alexis Silva
Carreno, 14, has
nearly been
expelled from
school several
times. He says
his troubles can
be pinpointed to
the day in 2001
when his father
left for the
United States.
Alexis began
drinking and
hanging out with
friends who were
part of a local
gang led by
Mexican youths
who had grown up
in the United
States. He
started doing
drugs and was
eventually sent
to a state home
for troubled
kids...
- Lourdes Garcia
Navarro
National Public
Radio
United States
May 9, 2006
Added
May 23, 2006
Colorado, USA
Twelve-Year-Old
Escapes From
Sexual Predator
Castle Rock - A
12-year-old girl
told police she
escaped from a
man who sexually
assaulted her
Saturday night.
The girl told
police a man
grabbed her and
touched her
inappropriately,
but she was able
to get away from
him. The
incident
happened shortly
before 10 p.m.
Police are
crediting their
canine unit for
tracking down
the suspect in
his nearby
apartment.
Police arrested
Jose Carlos
Martinez-Lagunaz.
Martinez-Lagunaz
faces charges of
sexual assault
on a child and
false
imprisonment. He
is being held on
$100,000 bond.
- Sara Gandy
KUSA-TV
May 21, 2006
Added
May 23, 2006
Colorado, USA
Police Officer
Convicted Of
Sexual Assaults
New Haven
- A Superior
Court jury has
convicted an
East Windsor
police officer
of sexually
assaulting his
former fiancé.
The jury Monday
convicted Rafael
Crespo Jr., 30,
of two counts
each of
first-degree
sexual assault
and third-degree
assault.
Crespo has been
with the
department for
four years. He
was arrested on
Feb. 3, 2005, by
Yale University
police. Crespo
was accused of
raping and
assaulting his
former fiancé, a
Yale student,
several times
while off duty.
Crespo, who is
being held in
lieu of $500,000
bond, is
scheduled to be
sentenced July
21. He was
placed on unpaid
administ-rative
leave pending a
termination
hearing after
his conviction
Monday.
- Associated
Press
May 23, 2006
Added
May 23, 2006
Colorado, USA
L.A.'s Skid Row
Immigrant
Population Grows
Los
Angeles - A
shadow
population lives
among the
estimated 14,000
homeless on Skid
Row.
A growing number
of immigrants
are bedding down
each night in
parks, abandoned
buildings and
cardboard boxes,
finding refuge
in camouflaged
encampments
under freeway
overpasses and
bridges.
…The homeless
immigrant
problem dates to
the mid-1980s
when
unaccompanied
youths [escaping
war] from
Central America,
some as young as
9, started
entering the
country, said
the Rev. Richard
Estrada,
executive
director of
Jovenes Inc.,
an outreach
center and
shelter for
homeless
immigrant
youths...
-
Paul Chavez
Associated Press
May 21, 2006
Added
May 23, 2006
Mexico
Mexican Migrants
Heading North
Migration to the
United States
has long been a
fact of life for
many Mexicans.
In some
villages,
mariachi music
and feasts are
customary
sendoffs for
those heading
north. But
tighter border
security is now
keeping many
migrants away
from their homes
for longer
stretches,
making their
last moments in
Mexico more
somber
occasions.
-
Olga R.
Rodriguez
Associated Press
May 23, 2006
Added
May 22, 2006
Brazil
Arrestan Once
Policías En
Operación Contra
Pederastia
Once policías,
entre ellos dos
comisarios,
fueron
arrestados el
viernes en
Brasil en una
operación contra
una red que
prostituía
menores y al
mismo tiempo
extorsionaba a
los pederastas,
informó hoy la
prensa.
Eleven Police
Officers
Arrested In
Operation
Against Child
Prostitution
Eleven police
officers, among
them two
commissioners,
were arrested
Friday in Brazil
in an operation
against a
network that
prostituted
minors and at
the same time
extorted the
pedophiles.
A child
trafficking
criminal
organiz-ation,
located in the
city of
Curitiba,
capital of the
southern state
of Paraná,
offered services
over the
Internet to
pedophiles, and
set up
encounters in
hotels or
private
residences.
According to
Secretary of
Public Security
of the state of
Paraná, Luiz
Eduardo
Delazari, the
encounters with
minors were
routinely
interrupted by
police, with
filmed evidence
of the criminal
activity.
'Some clients
were taken to
police stations,
but most were
forced to pay
extortions,”
Delazari noted.
-
EFE News Service
Spain
May 20, 2006
Added
May 22, 2006
Peru
Nearly Ten
Thousand Girls
Are Exploited
Sexually In Peru
Cerca de diez
mil niñas
explotadas
sexualmente en
el Perú.
Lima - In Peru,
around ten
thousand girls &
adolescents are
commercially
sexually
exploited, an
activity that
puts at risk
their physical
health &
emotional
stability, and
causes unwanted
pregnan-cies and
school
abandonment.
That figure was
provided by
Carlos Ghersi,
investigator for
the Center of
Social Studies
and Publications
(Cesip), on the
International
Day Against
Commercial
Sexual
Exploitation of
Children (CSEC).
Ghersi, who
works in the
Lima city
neighborhood of
Comas promoting
a project to
fight CSEC,
calculated that
of the total
number of minors
exploited, 40
percent live in
the capitol city
of Lima. Ten
percent of
exploitation
victims are
males.
- RPP Noticias
Lima, Peru
May 20, 2006
LibertadLatina
Note:
Other expert
sources estimate
that the number
of sexually
exploited
children in Peru
totals 500,000.
-
Chuck Goolsby
May 22, 2006
Added
May 21, 2006
California, USA
Prepared Remarks
Of Attorney
General Alberto
Gonzales -Press
Conference
Regarding U.S.
Immigration
Reform
"Let me conclude
by emphasizing
that immigration
reform as law
enforcement cuts
across major
departmental
priorities I
have set forth
as Attorney
General:
Protecting us
from terrorism
and from violent
crimes and
gangs; stamping
out drug
trafficking,
especially
methamphetamine;
and defending
our civil rights
and wiping out
the modern-day
slavery of human
trafficking."
-
U.S. Dept. of
Justice
May 19, 2006
Added
May 21, 2006
Mexico, United
States
Government
Neglect, Free
Trade Fuel
Migration
Opinion
At the vast
municipal dump
in Tijuana,
thousands of
poor Mexicans
live and work in
indescribable
mountains of
rubbish.
In the deadening
search for
something to use
or sell, nobody
much cares about
U.S. President
George W. Bush´s
decision to use
6,000 National
Guard troops to
back-up the U.S.
Border Patrol on
the Mexico-U.S.
border.
That 2,000-mile
border will
continue to
push, pull, and
defy, as it has
in the past,
whatever
immigration laws
and policies he
and the U.S.
Congress might
enact.
This stinking,
rotting city-
within-a-city
literally churns
people northward
toward the San
Diego skyline,
easily visible
10 miles away
from one of the
garbage
hilltops.
Yet how all of
these people got
here explains
why millions of
mostly rural
Mexicans will
continue to push
across "la
línea," to work
in the United
States as
handy-men,
carpenters,
gardeners,
waiters,
pickers,
packers,
pluckers, and
nannies.
There are also
drug smugglers,
violent
criminals, and,
potentially,
in-transit
terrorists, all
trying to make
their way into
the United
States.
They join 12
million illegal
immigrants,
mostly from
Mexico, already
in the United
States, who have
mostly fled a
world of
dead-end
farming, rural
banditry, and
urban squalor
for the
Herculean goal
of any human
exodus, a better
life.
Short of mass
deportation,
nobody believes
they will be
sent back to
their country of
origin.
-
Tom Thompson
El Universal /
Miami Herald
May 21, 2006
Added
May 21, 2006
Mexico
Mexico Works To
Bar Non-Natives
From Jobs
Mexico City - If
Arnold
Schwarzen-egger
had migrated to
Mexico instead
of the United
States, he
couldn't be a
governor. If
Argentina native
Sergio
Villanueva,
firefighter hero
of the Sept. 11
attacks, had
moved to Tecate
instead of New
York, he
wouldn't have
been allowed on
the force.
Even as Mexico
presses the
United States to
grant
unrestricted
citizenship to
millions of
undocumented
Mexican
migrants, its
officials at
times calling
U.S. policies
"xenophobic,"
Mexico places
daunting
limitations on
anyone born
outside its
territory.
In the United
States, only two
posts - the
presidency and
vice presidency
- are reserved
for the native
born.
In Mexico,
non-natives are
banned from
those and
thousands of
other jobs, even
if they are
legal,
naturalized
citizens.
Foreign-born
Mexicans can't
hold seats in
either house of
the congress.
They're also
banned from
state
legislatures,
the Supreme
Court and all
governor-ships.
Many states ban
foreign-born
Mexicans from
spots on town
councils. And
Mexico's
Constitution
reserves almost
all federal
posts, and any
position in the
military and
merchant marine,
for "native-born
Mexicans."
Recently the
Mexican
government has
gone even
further. Since
at least 2003,
it has
encouraged
cities to ban
non-natives from
such local jobs
as firefighters,
police and
judges.
- Mark Stevenson
Associated Press
May 21, 2006
Added
May 20, 2006
California, USA
Westminster
Police Need Help
Finding Rape
Suspects
 |
|
Police
sketch
of one
of three
rape
suspects |
Los Angeles -
Westminster
police are
asking the
public's help in
identifying
three suspects
in the gang rape
of a woman, 43,
who was attacked
while visiting a
storage unit
last month and
hospitalized.
The woman, who
was taken to a
hospital for
treatment due to
the severity of
her injuries,
suffered head
trauma, an eye
contusion and
broken teeth,
police said.
-
CBS2.com
May 18, 2006
Added
May 20, 2006
Pennsylvania,
US
Two Teens Admit
Roles In Rape Of
15-Year-Old,
Accept Pleas
The victim was
left covered in
mud, blood and
manure after the
October, 2005
assault in
Chester County.
In separate
proceedings,
Chester County
Court Judge
Howard F. Riley
Jr. accepted
pleas to charges
of rape,
involuntary
deviate sexual
intercourse and
kidnapping from
Bolivar Barrios,
18, of Avondale,
and Jose
Vazquez-Bedolla,
17, of Kennett
Square. The
court earlier
this month
certified the
two teens,
alleged members
of the Sur 13
gang, to be
tried as adults.
“As the girl
was "choking and
crying," the
defendants took
turns
perpetrating
various sexual
assaults on the
ground and
against the
trunk of the
car, Callahan
said.
"They told her
if she didn't do
what they said,
she would never
see her family
again," said
Callahan.
- Kathleen Brady
Shea
Philadelphia
Inquirer
May 20, 2006
Added
May 20, 2006
California,
US
Hawthorne
Assault Suspect
Enters Plea
A 22-year-old
man pleaded not
guilty Friday to
kidnapping and
attempted rape
charges in the
assault of three
teenage girls in
Hawthorne.
William Ernest
Hernandez of
Hawthorne was
charged earlier
Friday with two
counts of
kidnapping to
commit rape, two
counts of
attempted
forcible rape
and one count of
attempted
kidnapping to
commit rape.
Hernandez, who
remains in
custody on more
than $3.1
million bail,
could face life
in prison if
convicted,
according to the
District
Attorney's
Office.
The victims, who
ranged in age
from 14 to 18,
all had personal
items taken.
- Denise Nix
Daily Breeze
Los Angeles
May 20, 2006
Added
May 19, 2006
California, USA
Suspect Arrested
After 3 Children
Sexually
Assaulted
Fresno - An
arrest has been
made in three
cases of sexual
assault near a
Valley school.
Police say three
girls were
assaulted around
Greenberg
Elementary, all
by the same man.
Fresno Police
Chief Jerry Dyer
says Jose Luis
Martinez
sexually
assaulted three
girls near
Greenberg
Elementary
School between
April 24th and
May 5th, getting
them to come to
his car, then
driving them
away from the
scene.
A Fresno State
criminologist
says when it
comes child
predators, the
longer they stay
on the streets,
the worse the
crimes can
become.
"This is the
learning curve
for them, and
the sooner
police catch
him, the better.
Because as he
practices and
does these
things, he
learns how to
avoid
detection," said
criminologist
Eric Hickey.
"Since there are
multiple victims
in this sexual
assault case,
this is commonly
referred to as
one strike and
you're out,"
said Dyer.
42-year-old Jose
Luis Martinez is
facing three
counts of lewd
acts with a
child under the
age of 14, as
well as other
sexual assault
charges.
- ABC30.com
May 10, 2006
See Also:
Sexual assault
suspect's family
shocked
Added
May 19, 2006
Puerto Rico
Man Pleads
Guilty To
Possession And
Distribution Of
Child
Pornography
Following An ICE
Investigation
San Juan - A
33-year-old
predator pleaded
guilty here
Monday following
a U.S.
Immigration and
Customs
Enforcement
(ICE)
investigation
that revealed
that he
possessed and
distributed
child
pornography.
Harry
Alejandro-Morales,
of Bayamon,
Puerto Rico, was
indicted on Jan.
12, 2006 by a
federal grand
jury. The ICE
investigation
into the case
was based on a
referral by the
ICE Cyber Crimes
Center.
On Feb. 17,
2005, ICE
special agents
executed a
federal search
warrant at
Alejandro-Morales'
residence and
seized a
computer and
other electronic
storage media
devices.
Subsequent
forensic
analysis of
Alejandro-Morales'
computer
revealed more
than 1000 images
depicting child
pornography. ICE
special agents
also discovered
that he
distributed the
child
pornography via
the Internet.
“These
monsters should
know that we are
looking for
them,” said
Lydia St.
John-Mellado,
special
agent-in-charge
of ICE in Puerto
Rico. “ICE
will continue
using all its
resources and
those of our
sister agencies
to bring to
justice those
who hurt the
most vulnerable
segment of our
society-our
children.”
- www.ICE.com
May 18, 2006
Added
May 19, 2006
Border Region,
USA
DHS Closes
Loophole By
Expanding
Expedited
Removal To Cover
Detained Migrant
Families
New facility In
Texas opens for
detained
undocumented
families
Washington, DC -
As part of the
Department of
Homeland
Security's (DHS)
Secure Border
Initiative,
Immigration and
Customs
Enforcement
(ICE) today
announced the
expansion of the
process known as
Expedited
Removal to cover
alien families
apprehended in
areas along the
nation's
southern,
northern and
coastal borders.
To house these
families, a new
500-bed facility
in Williamson
County, Texas
which is
specially-equipped
to meet family
needs opened
today.
-
www.ICE.gov
May 16, 2006
Added
May 19, 2006
Border Region,
USA
Mexico, Central
Americans
Condemn U.S
Border Fence
Plan
Mexico
City - Mexico
and four Central
American nations
condemned the
U.S plan to
build hundreds
of miles of
triple-layered
fencing on its
southern border,
saying it would
not stop illegal
immigration. In
a joint news
conference in
Mexico City late
Thursday, the
foreign
ministers of
Guatemala,
Honduras,
Nicaragua, Costa
Rica and Mexico
said that
building
barriers was not
the way to solve
problems between
neighboring
nations.
- Associated
Press
May 19, 2006
Added
May 19, 2006
Border Region,
USA
Immigrant
Smugglers Avoid
Prosecution
San Diego - The
vast majority of
people caught
smuggling
immigrants
across the
border near San
Diego are never
prosecuted for
the offense,
demoralizing the
agents making
the arrests,
according to an
internal Border
Patrol document
obtained by The
Associated
Press.
"It is very
difficult to
keep agents'
morale up when
the laws they
were told to
uphold are being
watered-down or
not prosecuted,"
the report says.
The report
offers a stark
assessment of
the situation at
a Border Patrol
station
responsible for
guarding 13
miles of
mountainous
border east of
the city.
Federal
officials say it
reflects a
reality along
the entire
2,000-mile
border: Judges
and federal
attorneys are so
swamped that
only the most
egregious
smuggling cases
are prosecuted.
- Associated
Press
May 19, 2006
Added
May 18, 2006
New Jersey, USA
- Mexico
Authorities
Arrest 66
Members Of Human
Slavery Ring
The major case
is the fourth in
recent years in
N.J., where
culprits and
victims blend
into the ethnic
mix.
Newark - From
the flats of
Moscow, the huts
of Tegucigalpa,
and the barrios
of Mexico City,
women and girls
as young as 14
have come to New
Jersey, many
expecting jobs
as waitresses or
hostesses.
What they got,
prosecutors say,
was virtual
slavery in
brothels or
similar bondage
in nightclubs.
Refusal meant
beatings - or
worse.
The arrest this
week of 66
people in what
authorities say
is a ring that
smuggled
Mexicans into
the United
States, and that
may have forced
the women to
work as
prostitutes, was
the fourth major
human-trafficking
case exposed in
New Jersey in
recent years.
Because of their
immigration
status, the
women are
unlikely to
complain to
police, and the
diverse ethnic
makeup of North
Jersey's
neighborhoods
makes it easy
for the
traffickers and
their victims to
blend in.
In the latest
New Jersey case,
Mexican brothers
Jose Luis
Notario Guzman,
50, and Jose
Ignacio Notario
Guzman, 46, were
charged with
operating an
illegal
money-transfer
operation that
sent the
proceeds of
prostitution
from Newark to
Mexico City
using couriers.
The older Guzman
also was charged
with conspiracy
to harbor
illegal aliens
New Jersey state
police pulled
over a van and a
car Sunday night
carrying women
who had worked
in brothels in
the Washington,
D.C., area,
leading to raids
Monday morning
in 15 locations
in Union City,
West New York
and Queens, N.Y.
No one has been
charged with
prostitution-related
crimes, but
immigration
officials say
they believe at
least some of
the women were
forced to work
in the brothels.
"The problem is
growing
rapidly," said
Walter Zalisko,
a retired Jersey
City police
lieutenant who
helped organize
a conference on
human
trafficking in
New Jersey in
1997. "There is
just so much
money to be made
in this
business. The
product - women
- is not
illegal, like
drugs or guns."
- Wayne Parry
Associated Press
May 3, 2006
Added
May 18, 2006
Latin America -
United States
U.S. Senate
Immigration Bill
May Allow 100
Million New
Immigrants
During Next 20
Years
If enacted, the
Comprehensive
Immigration
Reform Act
(CIRA, S.2611)
would be the
most dramatic
change in
immigration law
in 80 years,
allowing an
estimated 103
million persons
to legally
immigrate to the
U.S. over the
next 20
years—fully
one-third of the
current
population of
the United
States.
Much attention
has been given
to the fact that
the bill grants
amnesty to some
10 million
illegal
immigrants.
Little or no
attention has
been given to
the fact that
the bill would
quintuple the
rate of legal
immigration into
the United
States, raising,
over time, the
inflow of legal
immigrants from
around one
million per year
to over five
million per
year. The
impact of this
increase in
legal
immigration
dwarfs the
magnitude of the
amnesty
provisions.
The Heritage
Foundation
(A Conservative
Think Tank)
May 15, 2006
Added
May 18, 2006
Mexico,
United States
President Fox
Justifies Bush
Immigration
Proposals To
Mexican Public
El presidente
Vicente Fox
aceptó que
México tiene que
multiplicar su
compromiso en el
tema migratorio
al menos en dos
aspectos:
generar empleos
para que no haya
migración como
consecuencia de
la falta de
oportunidades y
trabajar en una
política que
garantice la
seguridad en las
fronteras.
Presidente
Fox...
|
"La
Guardia
Nacional
va por
el tema
del
narcotráfico,
del
crimen
organizado,
por el
tráfico
de
personas,
inclusive
por los
pederastas
y las
violaciones
a los
niños.
La
frontera
debe
tener
seguridad
y orden,
y
principalmente
está por
ahí el
tema del
terrorismo",
comentó |
President
Vicente Fox of
Mexico has
accepted that
Mexico must
increase its
efforts in
regard to
immigration in
two ares:
generating
employment so
that Mexicans do
not feel the
need to migrate;
and in
increasing
control of
Mexico's border
with the U.S.
President Fox...
|
"The
theme of
the
[U.S.]
National
Guard
[controlling
the
border]
is tied
to drug
trafficking,
organized
crime,
human
trafficking
-
including
by
pedophiles,
and the
rape of
children.
The
border
should
be
secure,
which is
where
the
issue of
terrorism
enters
into the
picture." |
|
-
Roberto
Rock and
José
Luis
Ruiz
El
Universal
/
Miami
Herald
May 18,
2006 |
Added
May 18, 2006
Mexico, Canada,
United States
Ex-Clinton Aide
Calls For Mexico
Marshall Plan
La Jolla,
California
- The United
States could
reduce illegal
immigration from
Mexico by
helping its
neighbor develop
its vast oil
resources, the
former chief of
staff for
President Bill
Clinton told an
industry
conference on
Wednesday.
Thomas McLarty
said the United
States should
partner with
Mexico, and to a
lesser degree
with Canada, in
a "Marshall
Plan" effort --
named for the
U.S. aid
offensive for a
ravaged Europe
after World War
Two -- that
could inspire
Mexico's work
force to remain
at home.
"In Mexico, we
need to consider
some type of
Marshall Plan,"
McLarty told a
Latin American
energy
conference in a
San Diego
suburb. McLarty
said the three
countries could
provide $20
billion in
development aid
over a 10-year
period.
"That sounds
like a lot of
money, and it
is," said
McLarty, who
served as White
House chief of
staff from 1993
to 1994 and is
now a
consultant.
"Consider that
the United
States spent
$100 billion in
Iraq in just
this past year.
Unless we help
out our
neighbors to the
south, and
especially
Mexico, we will
continue to have
this issue of
immigration
which will hurt
our relations."
-
Bernie Woodall
May 17, 2006
Reuters
Added
May 18, 2006
Mexico
Mexico - U.S.
National Guard
Deployment Won't
Stop Migrants
Mexicans dismiss
U.S. plans to
send National
Guard troops to
the border as
another futile
effort that will
just fuel an
already booming
drug- and
migrant-smuggling
industry.
-
El Universal /
Miami Herald
May 18, 2006
Added
May 16, 2006
Latin America
IDB Launches
Regional
Campaign Against
Human
Trafficking With
The Ricky Martin
Foundation And
The IOM
 |
|
Ricky
Martin -
"Call
and
Live"
Inter-American
Development
Bank
(IDB) |
El Banco
Interamericano
de Desarrollo
anunció hoy el
lanzamiento de
Llama y Vive,
una campaña
regional contra
la trata de
personas
destinada a
sensibilizar a
la opinión
pública sobre
este fenómeno y
promover líneas
de asistencia
telefónica para
la prevención y
la protección de
las víctimas.
“Llama y Vive”
(“Call and
Live”) campaign
will promote
hotlines in
Costa Rica, El
Salvador,
Nicaragua and
Peru
The
Inter-American
Development Bank
today announced
that it was
launching a
regional
campaign against
human
trafficking
called Llama y
Vive (“Call and
Live”) to raise
public awareness
of the problem
and promote
hotlines for
prevention and
victim
protection.
The campaign, to
be launched
initially in
Costa Rica, El
Salvador,
Nicaragua and
Peru, consists
of distributing
and
disseminating
print and
audiovisual
materials
featuring Puerto
Rican singer and
humanist Ricky
Martin. “We have
to reach the
masses, the
people, so that
they know that
anyone can be a
victim of
trafficking. It
is crucial that
governments be
involved and be
aware of what is
going on.
Without them we
cannot win this
battle,” Martin
recently
declared.
Llama y Vive is
the result of a
regional
partnership
between the IDB,
the Ricky Martin
Foundation and
the regional
offices of the
International
Organization for
Migration (IOM)
for Central
America and the
Andean Region.
In each country,
interagency
working groups
against human
trafficking
established as
part of the
ratification
process for the
United Nations
Palermo
Convention to
prevent and
sanction human
trafficking will
also join in the
campaign.
“The IDB has
decided to take
an active role
in the fight
against
trafficking
because the
phenomenon is
linked to
poverty and the
lack of
opportunities in
Latin America
and the
Caribbean,” said
IDB President
Luis Alberto
Moreno. “We want
to support those
governments that
are committed to
carrying out
specific
projects for
prevention of
trafficking,
effective
administration
of justice and
victim
protection,” he
noted.
- Inter-American
Development Bank
May 10, 2006
See Also:
IDB's 4 minute
video
mini-documentary
on sex
trafficking in
Latin America
featuring
comments by
Laura Langberg,
Specialist on
Trafficking in
Women and
Children at
Organization of
American States
(OAS), Berta
Fernandez,
Project
Development
Officer for the
Caribbean at the
International
Organization for
Migration (IOM),
and Estela
Cardenas,
director of
Fundación
Renacer (the
Rebirth
Foundation) in
Colombia.
Video (In
Spanish)
English-language
video
transcript.
Added
May 16, 2006
The World
Ricky Martin
Signs Agreement
With IOM To
Combat Child
Trafficking
Worldwide
 |
|
IOM
Deputy
Director
General,
Ndioro
Ndiaye
and
Ricky
Martin
Foundation
Sign
Agreement |
Geneva - The
International
Organization for
Migration (IOM)
and the Ricky
Martin
Foundation (RMF)
have signed a
global
cooperation
agreement aimed
at raising
awareness of and
combating the
sexual
exploitation and
trafficking of
children.
The global
agreement will
allow IOM and
RMF to put in
place joint
projects to
combat human
trafficking all
over the world,
with special
emphasis on
children and
minors.
IOM Deputy
Director
General, Ndioro
Ndiaye and RMF
President, Angel
Saltos, signed
the agreement
with Ricky
Martin as
witness a few
hours prior to a
concert in
Madrid during
his European
tour.
-
International
organization for
Migration
May 16, 2006
See Also:
Fundación Ricky
Martin apoya
niños migrantes.
La Organización
Internacional
para las
Migraciones
(OIM) y la
Fundación Ricky
Martin
anunciaron el
martes un
acuerdo de
cooperación
global que busca
combatir la
trata de niños y
la explotación
infantil
mediante
esfuerzos para
crear conciencia
social.
- Associated
Press
May 16, 2006
Added
May 16, 2006
New York, USA
Police Request
Help In Hunt For
Suspect
Albany - Police
are asking for
the public’s
help in finding
a man they say
raped a
12-year-old girl
earlier this
month.
The suspect is
Don Salvadore
Pacheco, 21, and
police believe
he’s in the Linn
County area.
Pacheco
befriended the
girl, who had
run away from
home on May 2,
according to
Police Capt.
Eric Carter.
Pacheco told the
girl he would
help her and
said that he was
a counselor,
according to
police.
Pacheco took the
girl to a
secluded area
near Hill Street
and 10th Avenue
S.E., where he
is alleged to
have attacked
her, Carter
said.
The suspect has
been “making
himself scare,”
Carter said, but
police believe
he’s still in
Linn County. A
warrant has been
issued for his
arrest on
charges of
kidnapping,
rape, sodomy,
sexual abuse and
unlawful sexual
penetration.
- Carrie
Petersen
Albany
Democrat-Herald
May 12, 2006
Added
May 14, 2006
Florida, USA
Former
Immigration
Agent Sentenced
In Sex Case
Orlando
- Frank
Figueroa, a
former high
ranking
immigration
official, was
sentenced to 363
days of
probation by an
Orlando judge
for allegedly
exposing himself
to a girl in a
mall.
Figueroa was
also ordered to
undergo a
psycho-sexual
evaluation by
Judge Leon
Cheek. Figueroa
has to pay a
$500 fine, and
perform 200
hours of
community
service. He was
ordered to stay
away from malls
or other areas
where teens
might gather.
After a lengthy
hearing,
Figueroa said he
was sorry for
the events that
took place that
day in the mall,
but under
continued
questioning by
the judge
stopped short of
admitting that
he had exposed
himself to the
girl.
The judge
withheld
adjudication.
Figueroa was
charged with
exposure of
sexual organs
and disorderly
conduct for
exposing himself
to a [teenage]
girl in the food
court at a mall.
After his Oct.
25, 2005 arrest
at The Mall at
Millenia,
Figueroa was
suspended from
his post as the
special agent
in charge of the
Tampa office
of Immigration
and Customs
Enforcement, the
law enforcement
arm of the
Department of
Homeland
Security.
He was one of
Florida’s
highest-ranking
federal law
enforcement
officers and the
former head of a
national program
formed to target
child sex
predators.
- TBO.com
May 12, 2006
Added
May 14, 2006
California, USA
'Savage'
Rapist Gets 80
Years
Oakland - A
judge today told
an Oakland man
that he will
probably die
behind bars for
a series of
sexual assaults
that included an
attack on a
teenager whose
first sexual
experience was
being dragged
into the bushes
while jogging in
Berkeley.
Alameda County
Superior Court
Judge C. Don
Clay sentenced
Israel
Bustamonte to 80
years in prison
and called his
crimes "brutal
and savage
acts," and the
mother of a
17-year-old girl
Bustamonte
attacked
condemned him.
"She is
virtuous," the
woman, whom The
Chronicle is not
naming to
protect the
victim's
identity, said
of her daughter.
"This was her
first experience
with a man. It
was her first
gynecological
exam. It was
painful and
difficult and
embarrassing.
"It was," she
added, "also the
first time she
had experienced
any kind of
violence."
The woman said
her daughter now
has problems
relating to men,
including her
father, and said
of Bustamonte's
conviction,
"Mom, it's not
going to undo
what happened."
Bustamonte, 26,
showed no
visible reaction
as an
interpreter
translated the
woman's comment.
On April 14,
Bustamonte
pleaded guilty
to 10 felonies
stemming from
attacks in which
four women were
robbed, beaten
and raped in
Berkeley and
Oakland. He had
faced 23 felony
counts of rape,
sodomy, sexual
assault, oral
copulation and
robbery.
Bustamonte's
guilty pleas
spared his
victims "the
trauma of having
to relive this
is open court,
the brutal acts
that he
committed," Clay
said.
The Oakland
attacks occurred
Feb. 19, 2005,
and Sept. 23,
2004, on
Harrison Street
near the Posey
Tube, and on
Dec. 18, 2004,
on Fifth Street
near Union
Street.
-
Henry K. Lee
San Francisco
Chronicle
May 12, 2006
Added
May 5, 2006
United States
International
Coalition: Young
Teen Girls From
Michoacan State
Are Sold To
Brothels In Rich
Countries
Explotan a niñas
michoacanas en
países ricos.
Teresa Ulloa,
regional
director of the
Coalition
against the
Traffic of Women
and Girls in
Latin America
and the
Caribbean (CATW)
has revealed
that 12
and 13-year-old
girls from the
Mexican state of
Michoacan are
regularly sold
to brothels in
rich
countries.
The most
important of
these wealthy
destination
countries are
the United
States, Canada,
Germany,
Holland, Japan
and Spain.
If the girl is a
virgin, she will
be sold for an
average of
$15,000.
The crisis in
girl trafficking
was discussed at
a
recent workshop
called “Building
Equality,”
organized by the
Michoacan
Women’s
Institute (IMM).
The meeting was
attended by more
than 80 women’s
activists, law
enforcement
authorities,
government
officials and
members of civic
institutions.
The forum
discussed
strategies for
building spaces,
programs and
actions that
promote gender
equality.
Presenters
emphasized the
importance of
sensitizing new
generations to
the idea of
gender equality.
In spite of the
fact that in the
2002 the federal
government
ratified the
protocol to
prevent and
sanction all
forms of
exploitation and
trafficking of
women, the topic
is not part of
the nation’s
political
agenda, the
penalties for
sex crimes are
very low, and
sex trafficking
is not
criminalized.
Mexico ranks in
fifth place a
source and
destination
country for
human
trafficking
victims.
The nation is
rated in 25th
place in
severity of
sexual
exploitation.
It is in fifth
place in the
production
of child
pornography.
Eighty seven
percent of
victims who are
taken from their
homes, whether
by relatives,
through
kidnapping
or by trickery,
are destined for
the sex industry
[many women are
sold into
prostitution by
their parents or
husbands].
Ninety percent
of the victims
are children and
women.
-
Nohemí
Vargas
and
Carlos Erandi
Rodriguez
CimacNoticias
News for Women
Mexico City
May 5, 2006
April
2006
News
All April 2006
News
Added
April 24, 2006
United States
U.S.
Immigration And
Customs
Enforcement
(ICE) Arrests
7,500 In
"Operation
Predator" As Of
April 2006
Operation
Predator is a
comprehensive
initiative
designed to
protect young
people from
alien smugglers,
human
traffickers,
child
pornographers
and other
predatory
criminals.
This operation
brings to bear
the broadest
range of law
enforcement
authorities in
the federal
government to
target those who
exploit young
people. Children
are one of the
most important
and vulnerable
assets to
America's
homeland. ICE
will do
everything in
its power to
protect them.
Operation
Predator draws
on the full
spectrum of
intelligence,
investigative,
cyber and
detention and
removal
functions of ICE
to target those
who exploit
children. In a
way unachievable
before the
creation of
Homeland
Security, ICE is
coordinating
once-fragmented
resources into a
united campaign
again child
predators.
Under Operation
Predator, ICE is
taking several
new steps to
identify,
investigate and
remove child
predators from
America’s
streets.
More than 85% of
arrests are of
foreign national
sex offenders.
Approximately
40% of these are
lawful permanent
residents.
Approximately
40% of these are
illegal aliens.
Nationwide,
approximately
42% of those
foreign
nationals
arrested have
been deported to
date.
Those arrested
represent
predators from
more than 100
nations.
Report
suspicious
activity to:
1-866-DHS-2-ICE
- U.S. ICE
April, 2006
April 2006 News
Mar. 2006
News
Feb.
2006
News
Jan.
2006
News
Dec. 2005
News
Nov. 2005
News
Oct. 2005 News
Sep. 2005 News
Aug. 2005 News
July 2005 News
June 2005 News
May 2005 News
April 2005 News |
|
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Feb. 08, 2010
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Feb. 08, 2010
Mexico
Dallas Morning News Editorial: Mexico's
Rock-bottom Moment
Excerpt
Against a two-decade timeline of
drug-trafficking outrages in Mexico, last Sunday's slaughter of 16
at a teenager's quinceañera party in Ciudad Juárez seems likely to
follow a familiar pattern. First comes stunned horror. Then comes
the national outcry to do something. Government officials get hauled
before the legislature for questioning. Someone resigns. Outrage
subsides. Life goes on, same as before.
The Mexican government's behavior
resembles that of an addict who's yet to hit that rock-bottom moment
of realization that things absolutely must change. Yes, President
Felipe Calderón has deployed thousands of soldiers and police
officers to border cities and targeted corrupt public figures for
prosecution. But that's clearly not sufficient.
Back in the 1990s, it seemed impossible
that Mexico could slide any further into the depths. Remember when a
Catholic cardinal was murdered by drug-cartel gunmen in Guadalajara?
Or the well-reported links between a president's brother and the
drug cartels? The army general named head of Mexico's drug
enforcement agency who was subsequently arrested as an operative for
a major cartel? The two northern governors implicated as operatives
in a major cartel?
The next decade brought unspeakable
levels of violence as rival cartels vied for territorial control.
Thousands died. A free-for-all atmosphere now prevails, especially
in Juárez.
"Mexico has abandoned us, betrayed us,"
José Luís Aguilar Rangel said as he looked down upon the coffins of
his son and nephew, two of the young victims of the Sunday massacre.
In late 2008, Mexico's federal human
rights commission reported that, on average,
prosecution and conviction occurs in only one out of every 100
crimes. That's for reported crime. In
90 percent of cases, people don't even bother. Rangel clearly
isn't alone in believing the government has abandoned him.
Yet, through it all, Mexican officials
consistently play down what's happening. It's worse in Guatemala,
they say. Just last month, Dallas Consul General Juan Carlos
Cue-Vega sought to minimize the border-area violence as mainly drug
thugs killing other drug thugs.
We don't buy it. Those Juárez teens had
nothing to do with the drug cartels. In December, gunmen killed the
mother, sister and aunt of a military hero who had been killed
participating in a drug raid. The terrorists made clear: Come after
us, and we'll go after your entire family.
" Where is the line drawn on
indiffer-ence?
If we cannot answer this question, the assassins can continue hiding
themselves under the cloak of a complicit population – [complicit]
either by conviction or by apathy," the Mexico City daily El
Universal commented...
Dallas Morning News
Feb. 05, 2010
See also:
LibertadLatina
Commentary
|
 |
|
From top left: Rigoberta Menchu, Esther
Chavez, Teresa Ulloa and Lydia Cacho |
A Rock-bottom Moment in U.S. Action to Combat Latin American
Human Trafficking and Slavery?
Let's draw the line on
indifference !
The February 5, 2010 editorial by the Dallas Morning News,
Mexico's Rock-bottom Moment, accurately
describes the atmosphere of government corruption and indifference
(at the federal, state and local level) that permeates Mexico and allows criminals to
engage in horrendous behavior with reckless abandon.
That reality does not only apply to the war on drug cartels. These
conditions of impunity also make it nearly impossible to effectively fight
modern human slavery and other forms of sexual and labor
exploitation.
We say 'modern' human slavery, but in Mexico, slavery,
from the time of the Spanish colonization, had actually
never stopped. Poor Indigenous and mixed-race (Mestizo) peoples, who
are racially marginalized in Mexico, have always been easy marks for
sexual and labor exploitation. This reality impacts children
especially hard.
In 1994, for example, a U.S. National Public Radio news report noted
that in Mexico's southern Chiapas state, the majority indigenous
population was expected to serve their whole lives as unpaid peon
farm workers on the plantations of wealthy Mexicans of European
descent, in exchange for nothing more than being given rice and
beans.
That is slavery!
The ability to rape and demand free labor of the Indigenous and
Mestizo poor in Mexico with impunity has been a 'right' of the
Spanish descended elites for 500 years.
As we have stated in previous comment-aries, our focus on the crisis
of gender oppression in Mexico came about because:
|
1) The oppression of women is
severe, and especially impacts
indigenous women and girls;
2) by extension, the sex trafficking
industry, fueled by the
multi-billion dollar drug cartels,
enslaves tens of thousands of women
and girls each year;
3) Mexico is Latin America's border
with the United States, causing the
great majority of migration and
human trafficking from the region
into the U.S. to be funneled through
Mexico;
4) With "60 plus" percent of the
human trafficking victims in the
U.S. being victims who are Latin
American, solving the Mexican crisis
holds the key to solving foreign sex
and labor trafficking in the U.S.,
and potentially in much of Latin
America;
5) Mexico has a brave and very articulate women's rights,
indigenous rights and anti-trafficking movement, lead by
many unseen leaders, and others who are more visible. they dare to
confront impunity in Mexico, despite the risk of government
sponsored intimidation, false imprisonment and murder
that they face for disrupting the status quo and the power of the
elites.
|
How can a Mexican Government that acts to support those who oppress
women be an honest partner in suppressing the power of sex and labor
traffickers?
How can a Mexican society that is based upon very strongly embedded
traditions of male supremacy (machismo) change to actually begin to
defend the basic human rights of women and girls, when its own
government fights reform to maintain the status quo?
How can a Mexico where influential business and political leaders
have corrupt ties to the sex trafficking 'industry' defeat those
forces?
How can activists make progress when international organizations
such as Amnesty International have identified the fact that human
rights activists face false imprisonment to halt their work, and,
together with activist journalists, face a very real threat of being
murdered?
These are the pressing questions that the women's rights movement
face and seek answers to.
This movement deserves the full moral and financial and
collaborative support of human rights, indigenous rights and women's
rights activists, and all people of moral conscience, from across
the world.
Most importantly, the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama
must stand up and very publicly demand that the State of Mexico stop
fighting against these human rights movements, and finally
adhere to their international commitments to respect the rights of
women and children.
The recent track record of the Calderón administration shows that it
is indifferent to the issue of human slavery, and will only take
minimal action to avoid getting a bad grade (and thus risk possible
U.S. sanctions) from the annual U.S. State Department Trafficking in
Persons report. Therefore, the movement to end slavery continues its
long struggle to force the Calderón government to change its
misogynist ways.
Among the leaders of Mexico's pioneering women and children's rights
movement are Teresa Ulloa, a pioneering women's rights
lawyer and Executive Director of the Coalition Against Trafficking
in Women for Latin America and the Caribbean (CATW-LAC). Ulloa has
been a clear voice for identifying the need to enact and enforce
anti-trafficking laws. She has identified the fact that 50 million
women and children are at-risk of falling into the hands of human
traffickers across all of Latin America. She has also declared that
5 million victims of human trafficking exist within Mexico. Ulloa
has also stated that an estimated 1.5 million persons engage in
prostitution in Central Mexico alone, and that 75% of those at any
given time are girls between the ages of 12 and 13. Ulloa's serious
research into these problems contradicts the research of others who
conclude that only 20,000 children are engaged in prostitution in
Mexico.
We also salute award winning journalist, author and women's center
director Lydia Cacho, who responded to the impunity in child sex
trafficking in the internationally popular tourist city of Cancun,
Mexico by writing a well-researched book that exposed the complex
links of collaboration between millionaire entrepreneur Jean Succar
Kuri and child sex trafficker and a network of other businessmen and
corrupt government officials. In response to the publication of
Cacho's book, in December of 2005 the child sex trafficking network
exposed by Cacho arranged with the governor of Puebla state, Mario
Marin, to have Puebla state police officers arrest Cacho and drive
her over 1,000 miles to Puebla state to face criminal charges of
defamation for the accusations made in her book. During the trip and
while in prison, state officers threatened Cacho with rape and with
death.
Eventually cleared of the charges, Cacho has recently faced
continuing threats to her life by armed suspects who shadow her
daily movements. She lives 24 hours a day with armed guards. While Cacho's
supporters in Congress demanded an investigation by the Supreme
Court (a role that the Court may play in state corruption cases
under Mexico's constitution), and
despite the fact that one Supreme Court justice assigned to
investigate the case found evidence to
warrant investigation of Governor Marin by the full Court, the Court's justices
decided that Cacho's treatment did not constitute a violation of her
basic rights.
In utter disgust at the Supreme Court's behavior in this case, the
Attorney General's special prosecutor for crimes against women,
Alicia Elena Perez Duarte, resigned.
Child sex trafficker Jean Succar Kuri is in jail
thanks to Cacho's efforts. However Puebla Governor Mario Marin and Succar Kuri's other
accomplices continue living undisturbed in complete freedom.
We posthumously salute Esther Chavez, Lydia Cacho's mentor and the
founder of the movement to publicize and demand action to end the
mass murder (femicide) of women in northern Mexico's Ciudad Juarez.
Chavez' tireless work to confront the apathy and impunity of
government officials was the training ground that taught a
generation of new leadership in the Mexican women's rights movement.
By extension, Esther Chavez' legacy guides all
of our efforts to dare to face into the wind and openly confront misogynist
terrorism across Latin America.
Like Esther Chavez, Rigoberta Menchu is a long time leader working
in defense of the basic human rights of indigenous peoples. A K'iche'
Maya woman from Guatemala, Menchu's work impacts conditions for
indigenous women and children in both Guatemala and Mexico. Winner
of the 1992 Nobel Peace Prize, Menchu was a 1997 candidate in
Guatemala's presidential elections.
Rigoberta Menchu and her family survived the 1970s-to-1990s
anti-Mayan genocide in Guatemala in which 200,00 people died,
including 50,000 women. Several members of Menchu's family were
murdered, and she, like hundreds of thousands of Mayan Guatemalans,
had to flee the attempts of the nation's government to mass murder
its indigenous citizens.
Today Menchu continues to promote indigenous and women's human
rights through the
Rigoberta Menchu Tum Foundation (La
Fundación Rigoberta Menchú Tum).
Menchu has been especially active in efforts to end the sex
trafficking of young indigenous girls in Guatemala and Mexico, where
they consitute one of the largest groups victimized by commercial
sexploitation of children (CSEC).
We also give high praises to the
CIMAC women's news agency. Their
large network of women reporters has persistently documented
the outrageous injustices confronting women and girls in Mexican society.
CIMAC is not
afraid to point the finger at government agencies and officials
where that is warranted, in addition to identifying major criminal
organizations and individuals who victimize
women and girls with impunity.
CIMAC's highly professional news team has described in accurate detail the
facts surrounding the issues of sex trafficking, rape and other
crimes against women, and the lack of
legislative and law enforcement action in Mexico to protect women
and girls from these atrocities.
On the single issue of the rape with
impunity of (mostly indigenous women and girls) by Mexican military
personnel, CIMAC has published more than
340 comprehensive articles
since 2007.
In July of 2008, CIMAC's offices were ransacked by 'unknown' vandals.
CIMAC's computers were destroyed or stolen. This act of intimidation
occurred days after CIMAC published an article that identified the
fact that high ranking military officers working at Mexico City's
equivalent of the Pentagon frequented the child prostitution
brothels that exist just down the street from military headquarters.
Letters of solidarity poured in from across the globe in response to
these criminal acts, which remain in impunity.
We especially applaud the fact that CIMAC for covering the mass
gender atrocities facing poor indigenous women in a Mexico where
such crimes are never, ever punished.
A Google search of the CIMAC News web site shows that:
* 120 CIMAC articles mention Rigoberta Menchu
* 170 CIMAC articles mention the late
Esther Chavez
*
120 CIMAC articles mention Teresa Ulloa
*
550 CIMAC articles mention Lydia Cacho
We also give kudos to CIMAC for publishing information from the
International Organization for Migration's office in Tapachula,
noting that the southern Mexican border with Guatemala is a lawless
zone where between 450 and 600 women and girl migrants from Central
and South America are raped each day. The same CIMAC article notes that the global NGO Save the Children has identified
southern Mexico as being the largest zone for the commercial sexual
exploitation of children in the entire world.
Thanks to the trailblazing work of these brave journalists and
activists, the criminals, the wealthy business owners and corrupt
public servants who cooperate with them can no longer hide under a
rock. The evidence is irrefutable that an ongoing mass gender
atrocity is taking place in Mexico, and neither the Mexican federal
government (lead by
a National Action Party which has openly
misogynist policies), nor the United States is taking any visible
action of significance to stop that violence.
Thanks to the heroic work of Rigoberta Menchu, Esther Chavez, Teresa Ulloa, Lydia Cacho, the
team at CIMAC and many other activists, the fact of the human
slavery crisis in Mexico and the rest of Latin America cannot be
denied by anyone.
These realities present a challenge to the global, and especially to
the U.S. based anti-trafficking movements. Do they remain silent on
this issue, or do they take appropriate action to give the crisis
facing Latinas a proper seat at the table of deliberations in this
movement?
The modern anti-trafficking movement was born
in the 1990s in response to the enslavement of thousands of Eastern
European and Russian women after the fall of the Soviet Union, and
focused today principally on the issues of the enslavement of
European, South Asian, East Asian and domestic minor U.S. youth.
The focus areas reflect, interestingly enough, the ethnicities of the the majority of the
activists in this movement.
All of those populations deserve attention. So do Latin American
victims. Latin American and Asian victims were trafficked into the
U.S. long before the anti-slavery sprung-up in Western nations (The
risk of being sex trafficked was known in the U.S. even in the
1950s).
Yet
more than ten years into the development of this movement, we have
yet to hear public pronouncements about the Latin American / Latina
immigrant human slavery crisis from the U.S. Federal Government, nor from
the academics nor major U.S. NGO heads in the U.S. who have pioneered the
effort to stop modern slavery.
During a number of major speeches on human trafficking that I have
attended, virtually every region of the world will be mentioned except
Latin America. Latina immigrant victims in the U.S. are
almost never mentioned. Academic papers, speeches and promotional
materials from the major anti-trafficking organizations are equally
lacking in coverage of the crisis facing Latin America.
In late 2009, for example, I called Public Radio's nationally
broadcast Diane Rehm Show based at WAMU, from American University
Radio, to talk with Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times reporters
Nicholas D. Kristof and his wife Sheryl WuDunn (a former Times
reporter), as they discussed their book
Half the Sky: Turning Oppression
into Opportunity for Women Worldwide.
In a reflection of the limited priorities of the majority of NGOs
and U.S. federal government voices in the anti-slavery movement,
Kristoff and WuDunn emphasized both in their book and during their
radio interview, that their coverage of the crisis in women's rights
as it exists in developing nations involved East Asia, South Asia
and Africa. They did not even mention Latin America.
When I stated that Mexico is a major crisis area for human
trafficking and that Save the Children had identified southern
Mexico as the largest region for commercial sexual exploitation of
children in the world, both authors responded by saying that, in
their view, India was the largest zone for sex trafficking in the
world and had to be tackled first. They admitted that they had not
looked at Latin America in researching their otherwise important
book on gender oppression.
In point of fact, the
sex trafficking networks began to
focus on Latin America in their search for large numbers of
women and children to enslave as law enforcement began to crack-down
on Asian sex trafficking several year ago. Latin America's crisis
is, arguably, just as large as that of India, where around 1 million
children are sex trafficked at any given time.
One of my main motivations for expanding the
LibertadLatina
project (we are now in our ninth year), was to respond to
the lack of publicly available factual information on the crisis in
Latin America. That information gap leaves Latin American relatively
isolated and without support from the global community (with the
active role of the United Nations being a welcome exception to that
fact).
I recall that about 7 years ago, a young Asian American man who had just graduated from college with a
major in Women's Studies, and who was then a volunteer at Polaris
Project, one of the leading anti-trafficking NGOs in the U.S., told me that "Latin America
doesn't have a human trafficking problem. My professors said that
Latin America didn't have a problem." This guy changed his
attitude
after I referred him to the
LibertadLatina
web site.
We would hope that such ignorance was a thing of
the past. But today in 2010, the U.S. based anti-slavery movement continues to discuss
anti-trafficking as a crime that impacts Europeans, Asians and U.S.
domestic minor victims only.
We really have to wonder what the
motivations are that drive that misguided thinking.
U.S. Ambassador-at-Large Luis CdeBaca,
the Director of the Office to Monitor and Combat
Trafficking in Persons at the U.S. State Department, is
the U.S. Government's leading voice on human slavery issues. He is
Mexican-American, and has prosecuted over 100 human trafficking
cases, many involving Latin American victims and perpetrators.
I n 2002
CdeBaca invited me to apply for a position as a victim
advocate working with his
team at the Justice Department's inter-agency Worker's Exploitation
Task Force. So it is with great respect that we implore
Ambassador CdeBaca to respond forcefully to the
critical
emergency
facing women and girls in Latin America and its Diaspora
in the U.S., a crisis that he is thoroughly familiar
with.
We also insist that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton,
Ambassador CdeBaca's boss, and U.S. President Barack Obama,
Secretary Clinton's boss, move into action forthwith to address the
defense of women and girls being exploited by the Latin American
networks who prostitute enslaved Latina victims in urban brothels and rural
farm worker camps in almost every county and city in America.
Ambassador CdeBaca, Secretary Clinton and President Obama, we insist
that you get together and collaborate to develop a public policy and
action plan to address the "60 plus percent" according to
Ambassador CdeBaca, of
human slavery victims in the U.S. who originated from Latin America.
Funding a few NGOs across the region (some of whom are known to
misuse their mandates), is not an adequate answer.
You can act to combat these problems without requiring an
earthquake to kick-start you in the right direction, which is a
process that we have seen of late in regard to Haiti.
We need everyone, the general
public, concerned NGOs, academics and other activists to contact the
White House, the U.S. State Department and their congressional
members to demand immediate action in regard to the Latin American
and indigenous aspects of the human slavery crisis.
Without our
efforts, the crisis will continue to grow out of control, putting
at risk and entire generation of young women and girls who deserve
the right to live in freedom from the tyranny of the gender hostile
environment that they live in today.
Write to you senators.
Write to your House of Representatives members.
Write to President Obama
U.S. Department
of State
2201 C Street, NW Washington, DC 20520. Main
Switchboard: 202-647-4000.
End Impunity Now!
Chuck Goolsby
LibertadLatina
Feb. 08, 2010
See also:
Trata de blancas
en Centroamérica
Human Trafficking
in Central America [and Mexico]
María de Jesús Silva [who's daughter Jackeline Jirón
Silva was kidnapped into sexual slavery at age 11 -
comments on her search across Central America and
southern Mexico for her daughter]: "I saw things that I never
imagined existed... The brothels are full of
children, sold by traffickers and abandoned by their
parents. I saw them prostitute them-selves and wished
that any one of them would have been my daughter. I
settled for caressing the hair of these girls, and I
imagined that in the 'next' brothel, I was going to
find my daughter. Everything that I have suffered
through is nothing compared to what my girl is going
through."
...According to Ana Salvadó, executive director for
Mexico, Latin America and the Caribbean for
Save the Children:
"the panorama for childhood in Latin America is
growing more bleak over time, and child trafficking
is growing rapidly in each of these countries..."
…Save the Children has identified the border region
between Guatemala and Mexico as being the largest
hot spot for the commercial sexual exploitation of
children in the entire world. Ana Salvadó: "It is a
bottleneck, because many children attempt to migrate
from Central [and South] America to the United States, and they
never get past [southern] Mexico…
…A study by the international organization
ECPAT…
...reveals that over 21,000
Central Americans, mostly children, are prostituted
in 1,552 bars and brothels in Tapachula, Mexico…
Traffickers sell these child victims to Tapachula's
pimps for $200 each.
More that 50% of these children are from
[indigenous] Guatemala. The rest are Salvadorans,
Hondurans and Nicaraguans.
They range in age from eight to fourteen-years-old.
...In 2006, the
International
Labor Organization conducted a survey of
adult attitudes in Mexico, Central America and South
America, where it is quite easy [for men] to engage in sexual
relations with children.
|
Some 65% of
respondents stated that they don't see any
problem, and they don't feel any sort of
conflict or fear in regard to having sex
with boy and girl children, and "they don't
feel that there is anything wrong with doing
it." |
...Mexico has been converted into a paradise for
pimps and a living hell for thousands of Central
American girl children like Jackeline Jirón Silva,
whose captors have prostituted her during the past
32 months. It is known that during half of that
time, Jackeline has been held in the southern
Mexican state of Chiapas.
-
Ana Lilia Pérez
Revista Contralínea
Oct. 22, 2007
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:
Human Rights Activists in
Mexico Under Attack
Activists suffer
imprisonment on fabricated charges to stop them from
doing their work
Amnesty International
Jan. 21, 2010
See Also:
LibertadLatina
Special Section
Journalist / Activist
Lydia Cacho is
Railroaded by the
Legal Process for
Exposing Child Sex
Networks In Mexico
See also:
The United States
Obama's Slavery Czar
Ambassador-at-Large Luis CdeBaca fights
human slavery for a living...
...Whether it was farm workers, or women in brothels, the
percentages continue to be overwhelmingly Latino.
Sixty-plus per cent of the
[trafficking] victims in the U.S. are Hispanic.” ...
Lynn Sherr
The Daily Beast
Nov. 24, 2009
See also:
Ransacking of Longtime Women’s News Agency in
Mexico City Raises Concerns About Motives
The devastation and disorder of a burglary and violent vandalism at
the women’s news agency CIMAC (Women’s Communication & Information)
offices in Mexico City last weekend suggest that it was more than a
common break-in, according to Lucía Lagunes Huerta, general director
of the organization. Manual Fuentes, a lawyer for CIMAC noted that
the evidence might be “leaving a message that CIMAC is vulnerable.”
On behalf of the news agency, Fuentes filed a burglary charge with
the Attorney General’s office of the federal district of Mexico.
CIMAC has covered women and women’s human rights issues throughout
Mexico, Central & Latin America and the world for 20 years,
including special in-depth articles about various unresolved cases
of femicide and sexual violence against women in Mexico as a
systemic violation of women’s human rights. This journalistic work
has included the hundreds of murders and disappearances of women in
Juarez, Mexico; the 14 cases of sexual assault charges of women
against soldiers on July 11, 2006 in Castaños in the northern state
of Coahuila; and charges of sexual assault and torture of 26 women
by Mexican police on May 3, 2006 in San Salvador Atenco (northeast
of Mexico City), all of which remain unresolved.
Fuentes said that in the legal documents filed about the burglary
against CIMAC, Erica Cervantes, a staff member declared that when
they arrived the morning of Monday, July 28th they found the locks
to their offices smashed and totally destroyed. Likewise, the
disarray in the office was extensive and unlike typical burglaries
was focused more on documents and files, including those containing
confidential information about special investigations and coverage
by CIMAC. Fuentes said, “it was obvious they were searching for
information and documents…this is something that is very serious
since CIMAC is dedicated to the denouncement and dissemination of
issues that affect women in the exercise of their human rights.” ...
FIRE – Feminist International Radio Endeavour
July 30, 2008
See also:
Modern-Day Slavery in Mexico and the United
States
...As Mexico and the U.S. are connected physically and through
criminal links, issues the Mexican government deals with will
subsequently impact the U.S. Many of the Mexican criminal networks
notable for narcotrafficking are also involved in human trafficking.
According to the Inter Press Service, “at least 20 networks are
involved in the trafficking of persons, with links to organized
crime rings involved in other activities like drug smuggling.”
Rampant corruption plagues the U.S.-Mexico border, where
high-ranking Mexican officials have been accused of taking bribes
from drug rings. According to Gary Hale, DEA intelligence chief for
Houston, the U.S. effort to end the drug war has forced these
criminal networks to seek “other crime activities to generate their
income.” Hale reports that, due to the U.S. government’s crackdown
on drug trafficking, crime rings income has decreased significantly.
As a result, many of the criminal networks have searched for other
activities, like human trafficking, to supplement their income.
Ambassador C. de Baca believes that focusing on eradicating human
trafficking could improve U.S.-Mexican efforts to combat other forms
of transnational crime. According to C. de Baca, human trafficking
“appears to be an area where the [Mexican government] is prepared to
cooperate with [the U.S.].” C. de Baca and others are hopeful that
the exchange of information on human trafficking cases will build
relationships between Mexican and U.S. officials that might help
further combat the drug war. ..
Megan McAdams
Council on Hemispheric Affairs
Dec. 21, 2009
United States: Migration and Trafficking in Women
A comparison study on migration and trafficking in women in the US.
Until recently, trafficking of women in the United
States was rarely acknowledged. It was not until Russian and
Ukrainian women began to be trafficked to the United States in the
early 1990s that governmental agencies and many NGOs began to
recognize the problem. As many critics, including us, have pointed
out, Latin American and Asian women were trafficked into the United
States for many years prior to the influx of Russian traffickers and
trafficked women. The fact that it took blond and blue-eyed victims
to draw governmental and public attention to trafficking in the
United States gives, at least, the appearance of racism.
Patricia Hyne
Coalitio Against Trafficking in Women (CATW)
2002
|
Added:
Feb. 08, 2010
Guatemala
 |
|
At the January 31st, 2010 commemoration
of the 1980 Spanish Embassy Massacre, Nobel Laureate Dr.
Rigoberta Menchu Tum kneels at a tapestry covered with
the names of many of those who were murdered by
government forces during the Guatemalan civil conflict. |
Exposición fotográfica y artística en
conmemoración del 30 aniversario de la masacre de la embajada de España
El día domingo 31 de
enero de 2010 diferentes organizaciones de derechos humanos de
Guatemala, montaron una exposición plástica en la Plaza Mayor de la
ciudad que incluyo una galería fotográfica de los acontecimientos
sucedidos hace 30 años. La actividad se abrió con una conferencia de
prensa presidida por la Dra. Rigoberta Menchú Tum.
Photographic and
artistic exhibition in the 30 commemoration of anniversary of the
massacre of the embassy of Spain
On January 31st,
2010, human rights organizations from across Guatemala presented an art
and photography exhibit to commemorate the 30th anniversary
of the Spanish Embassy Massacre in Guatemala City. The event began with
a press conference by moderated by Dr. Rigoberta Menchú Tum.
Distinguished human
rights defenders, including Aura Elena Farfan, Julio Solorzano Foppa,
Miguel Ángel Alvizures participated.
Gustavo Meoño and Mario
Minera related to the assembled crowd the history of the Spanish Embassy
Massacre, in which 37 Mayans, students and Spanish diplomats were
killed. The victims included Vicente Menchú, father of Dr. Rigoberta
Menchu.
Noting that, despite
the time that passed, this crime remains in impunity. The participants
called on the authorities to take action, open an investigation, and
punish those responsible for the murders.
The exhibition included
photographs that the events of the day of the massacre, as well as the
consequences of the government repression during the civil conflict. The
photos of some of the [45,000] persons who were made to disappear
[during the genocide] were shown.
A huge quilt with the
names of victims of the armed conflict was laid in the center of the
event grounds.
Guatemalan artist
Marlon García displayed some of his works, and collaborated in
organizing the exposition.
Rigoberta Menchu Tum Foundation
La Fundación Rigoberta Menchú Tum
Feb. 02, 2010
See also:
 |
|
An indigenous woman in Guatemala holds a sign
saying: Wanted: Jose Erain Rios Montt (the unseen part says,
"for genocide") - during the 28th anniversary of the
Spanish Embassy Massacre in Guatemala City, Guatemala in
2008.
General José Efraín Ríos Montt
is best known outside Guatemala for heading a military
regime (1982–1983) that was responsible for some of the
worst atrocities against civilians in the 36-year Guatemalan
civil conflict.
Photo: MiMundo |
About the Spanish Embassy Massacre
Starting in 1977, a large number of Maya
K’iche’ and Maya Ixil inhabitants from the municipalities of Nebaj,
Chajul, San Juan Cotzal and San Miguel Uspantan, all located in the
northern region of the Department of Quiche, began to organize under
the newly created Committee for Peasant Union (CUC). During the year
1979, a number of oppressive acts were carried out by the army
against the residents of these municipalities.
[That is - military campaigns by government
soldiers of mass-rapes and massacres carried out against entire
villages of innocent civilians].
In response to such repression, Maya
Ixil and Maya K’iche’ peasants, many of them members or local
leaders within the CUC, travelled to Guatemala City so as to
denounce both at national and international levels the human rights
atrocities which were taking place in their communities.
Once in Guatemala City, the peasant
delegation visited a number offices and personalities seeking help
in divulging their accounts. But their effort was in vain. At the
National Congress, access was denied to them. The press also refused
to cover the story.
The delegation, however, did receive
support from students at the University of San Carlos (USAC),
militants from the Robin Garcia Student Revolutionary Front (FERG),
some labor unions, as well as a few social organizations... In the
end, they decided to occupy an Embassy.
A public declaration from the indigenous
communities which peacefully occupied the Spanish Embassy, dated
January 31, 1980, states: “...We have been left no other choice but
to occupy the Spanish Embassy as the only resource to make our pleas
known at both local and international levels.”
The military government of General Lucas
Garcia decisively selected to remove the protesters “by any means”.
Hence, after only a few minutes after the occupation took place,
dozens of police and state security agents surrounded the Spanish
Embassy grounds.
Immediately after knocking down the
door, [the security forces] made use of a flamethrower, or similar
gas-emitting device, against those found inside the ambassador’s
office; most were struck by the flames from the waist up and
propelled backwards, hence causing a pile-up effect.
Dark smoke was seen come out of the
windows, and all 37 people present were burned alive.
The case of the Spanish Embassy Massacre
serves as precedent and proof of the intensive and excessive
political repression applied by the Government of Lucas Garcia in
1980. It clearly reflects the situation lived during such time where
political opposition, demands for social justice, and the
denouncement of human rights violations were completely disallowed.
In addition, it also reflects the state of terror in which Guatemala
society lived under at that time.
Twenty-eight years after the event, a
number of activities were carried out to commemorate those
massacred: a demonstration in front of the Constitutionality Court
(CC), a forum focusing on the topic of Impunity, as well as a vigil
in front of the current Spanish Embassy.
Spanish Embassy Massacre: 28th Anniversary
MiMundo
Feb. 27, 2008
See also:
Rigoberta Menchú in Nicaragua
On October 16, 1992, Rigoberta Menchú
Tum, heir of the Maya-Quiché people of Guatemala, was awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel Committee recognized in Rigoberta
Menchú "a symbol of peace and reconciliation 500 years after
Christopher Columbus' arrival to America," underscoring that she is
a "vivid symbol of peace and reconciliation despite the ethnic,
cultural and social divisions in her country, the American continent
and the world."
Only a week before, Rigoberta Menchú had
been in Nicaragua to attend the III Encounter of the Continental
Campaign of 500 Years of Indigenous, Black and Grassroots
Resistance, held in Managua from October 7-12. During her stay, she
was given an honorary doctorate in Humanities from the Central
American University (UCA). The UCA paid homage to her "contribution
to the defense of human rights and the indigenous peoples of Latin
America, particularly in her country, for more than 15 years,"
describing her as "a dignified and distinguished representative of
the indigenous peoples of our continent."
Rigoberta Menchú's personal
denunciations of the marginalization of the continent's indigenous
peoples, of which she and her family have been victims, praised UCA
rector Xabier Gorostiaga, have "contributed to educating
international public opinion about these very serious problems." He
noted that she has become "a genuine representative of the
indigenous peoples and popular majorities of Central and Latin
America, reclaiming the right to freedom and to the life of our
cultures, principles shared by the Society of Jesus and the Central
American University of Nicaragua."
Father Gorostiaga also recognized that
Menchú has been a "Christian leader in her indigenous community,
daughter and sister of martyrs, participating since age 10 in
pastoral activities, deeply dedicated to an evangelizing mission in
favor of the most oppressed and to the formation of an autochthonous
church in Guatemala."
Central American University
Dec.,
1992
See also:
LibertadLatina
Special Section
About the genocide and femicide confronting
women and girls in Guatemala
Added:
Feb. 08, 2010
Florida, USA
Advocates Hope to Rescue Underage Super Bowl
Sex Slaves
Super Bowl XLIV
Two dozen volunteers from around the
country gathered inside a Miami conference room earlier this week to
prepare for the Super Bowl.
They're not here for the game, though.
They will spend several days fanning out through the city to rescue
underage girls who have been trafficked to South Florida as sex
workers.
``The Super Bowl is obviously a really
big deal for prostitution,'' Sandy Skelaney, a program manager at
Kristi House, a program for sexually abused children, told the
group.
``We have a bunch of girls being brought
down by pimps.''
Just as police, hoteliers, restaurateurs
and retailers have prepared for the big game, so too have children's
advocates. For weeks, volunteers have printed fliers, prepared
scripts and organized outreach teams in an effort to identify --
and, with luck, rescue -- girls who are being forced into
prostitution.
Last year, when the Super Bowl was held
in Tampa, the state Department of Children & Families took in 24
children who were brought to the city to serve as sex workers, said
Regina Bernadin, DCF's statewide human-trafficking coordinator.
``Miami is known as a destination city
for human trafficking, and sporting events are generally recognized
by the experts as magnets for prostitution,'' said Trudy Novicki,
who heads Kristi House...
Throughout the year, Miami-Dade police
hold between 15 and 20 operations targeting underage prostitution.
For major events, such as the Super Bowl, the department works with
the FBI's Innocence Lost Task Force.
``At large events such as this, we
increase our presence . . . with the ultimate goal being that no
children are sexually exploited,'' Maj. Raul Ubieta, who works with
the department's Strategic and Specialized Investigations Bureau,
said through a spokesman...
The outreach workers are organized into
eight teams, divvying up the Spanish-speakers and trying to have one
man each. In teams of two, three or four, the volunteers -- who came
from as far as New York City and Alabama -- spread out across
Miami-Dade -- from South Beach to Hialeah to Downtown Miami....
Marbin Miller And Jennifer Lebovich
The Miami Herald
Feb. 5, 2010
Added:
Feb. 08, 2010
North Carolina, USA
Human-Trafficking Ring Busted in Wilson
Wilson County Sheriff
Wayne Gay says that investigators arrested a man Thursday for
allegedly running a prostitution ring with ties to human
trafficking, according to media reports.
WITN News reports that
Felipe Ramirez Chavez faces a misdemeanor charge of maintaining a
place for prostitution. Chavez was being held in the Wayne County
Jail Saturday under a $1,000 bond and has also been placed placed
under a detainer by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Gay told WITN that a
few weeks ago, acting on tips about a prostitution ring, deputies
raided a house on U.S. Highway 301 and found one woman. Information
from that raid led them to arrest Chavez at his residence at 2101
Fair Place in Wilson.
Two women were found at
Chavez's residence, but investigators believe that three or four
women lived there, Gay said.
The sheriff said he
believes this prostitution ring is unique in the county.
Chavez's first court
appearance was set for March 5.
WRAL
Feb. 6, 2010
Added:
Feb. 06, 2010
Missouri, USA
|
 |
|
Flor, 37, talks about her experience as a
labor trafficking victim: "I thought slaves were only in
the past, just in history. It happens every day."
From:
A New Slavery: Border Crossing -
Photo Gallery -
The Kansas City Star
Photo: Keith Myers / Kansas City Star |
Kansas City Star’s Human Trafficking Series
Wins Award in Kansas
The
Kansas City Star’s series on human trafficking in America has won
the 2009 Burton W. Marvin Kansas News Enterprise Award.
The
award was presented Friday to reporters Laura Bauer, Mike McGraw and
Mark Morris during the annual William Allen White Day festivities on
the University of Kansas campus.
“We
are again happy to honor quality journalism in Kansas,” said Ann
Brill, dean of KU’s journalism school. “The winners this year
represent the impact that great storytelling can have in a
community.”
The
five-part series, published in December, found that the U.S.
government is failing to find and help thousands of human
trafficking victims. According to the judges, the series reflected a
“commitment to serving the public and demonstrated initiative on
acting on that commitment.”
The Kansas City Star
Feb. 05, 2010
See
also:
The Kansas City Star’s week-long human
trafficking series from December of 2009
The Kansas City Star
Dec., 2009
See also:
LibertadLatina
Note
We would like to applaud the Kansas City Star for their December,
2009 special series of articles on human trafficking. Their work was
one of the few mainstream English language print articles in recent years that focused on the fact that
Mexico, Guatemala and other regions of Latin America confront a
major sex and labor trafficking crisis. They also highlighted the
fact that Latin Americans comprise the majority of human trafficking
victims in the United States.
End Impunity Now!
Chuck Goolsby
LibertadLatina
Feb. 06/07, 2010
Added:
Feb. 06, 2010
Haiti
Port-au-Prince - Former U.S. President
Bill Clinton urged the U.S. and Haitian governments on Friday to
resolve the case of 10 American missionaries accused of trying to
take children illegally out of quake-hit Haiti.
Clinton, named by the United Nations to
coordinate relief efforts for survivors of the devastating Jan. 12
quake, made the appeal during a visit to the shattered Haitian
capital, Port-au-Prince, his second since last month's disaster.
The accused U.S. missionaries, most of
whom belong to an Idaho-based Baptist church, were arrested a week
ago and charged on Thursday with child kidnapping and criminal
association.
Haitian authorities say the group tried
to take a busload of 33 Haitian children across the border into the
Dominican Republic without any papers proving the minors were
orphans or any official permission to take them out of the country.
The missionaries deny any intentional
wrongdoing and say they were only trying to help children left
destitute by the Jan. 12 earthquake, which killed more than 200,000
people, injured some 300,000 and left over a million more homeless.
The Americans' case is diplomatically
sensitive and aid groups complain it has distracted media and world
attention away from the struggle to feed and shelter hundreds of
thousands of Haitians camped out in wrecked streets.
"What's important now is for the
government of Haiti and the government of the United States to get
together and work through this," Clinton told CNN in Port-au-Prince.
He said he understood the Haitian
government's efforts to try to protect its children from possible
child traffickers and unlawful adoptions following the catastrophic
quake.
But he also said the missionaries could
be telling the truth when they argued they simply wanted to help the
children and did not mean to violate any laws. Evidence has emerged
that many of the intercepted children were not orphans but were
given up by parents who wanted them to have a better life [Note that
the missionaries at-first stated to the press that all of the
children were orphans -
LL].
"The government of Haiti ... (is) not
looking for some big fight here. They just want to protect their
children and they also want to make sure they have a good inventory
so they don't send children away that maybe have an aunt or an uncle
that have an income," Clinton said...
Reuters
Feb. 5, 2010
Added:
Feb. 06, 2010
Texas, USA
Deputies Investigating Alleged Abduction, Sex
Assault
Houston -- A nine-year-old girl
was approached and nearly abducted at an apartment complex in
southwest Houston Saturday. Her family is thankful she's safe, but
police haven't found the man who investigators say tried to lure her
away.
The Precinct 5 Constables Office was
called out to the University Apartments on Beechnut near Fondren at
around 2pm. When they arrived, they found the shaken nine-year-old
girl. She told authorities the man lured her to the back of the
apartment complex by asking her to help him find his cat.
When he got back there, authorities say
the man made a sexual advance on the girl and tried to get her into
his truck.
Fortunately, she managed to escape and
ran and reported the incident. Neighbors meantime, are mad.
"What I think about it is that if I see
him, you won't have to worry about him," said neighbor Joe York.
"You'll never have to worry about him again."
"It's kind of worries me because you
know it can happen to anybody," said neighbor Erik Benitez. "Just
like it happened to a little kid, it could happen to any grownup."
The suspect is described as an Hispanic
man between 35 and 40 years old. He was last seen driving a blue
Toyota truck. Deputy constables, as well as Houston police officers,
searched the neighborhood Saturday afternoon, but he was not
located.
We are told HPD's juvenile sex crimes
unit has been notified. Anyone with information is encouraged to
call Crime Stoppers at 713-222-TIPS.
KTRK
Jan. 24, 2010
Added:
Feb. 06, 2010
Florida, USA
|
 |
|
Composite image of suspect |
Deputies Investigating Alleged Abduction, Sex
Assault
The Charlotte County Sheriff's Office is
asking for help with their investigation of reported abduction and
sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl in the area of Palmetto Circle
in Port Charlotte.
Deputies took the call about the alleged
abduction shortly after 9:30 p.m. Thursday. The girl said she was
walking by herself and that two men forced her into their car.
The girl says both of the men were in
their mid twenties.
She said one of the men was Hispanic and
described him as tall and skinny with black spiky hair and wearing a
red shirt.
She told deputies the other man was
white and wore glasses. The girl described that man as tall and
thin, wearing a white T-shirt and jeans.
She said both suspects speak English
with a Spanish accent.
The vehicle is an older white 4-door
car, with dark tinted windows, and a reflective stripe down the
side.
If anyone has information about this
case, please call Detective Ian Alvarez at (941) 575-5361 or Crime
Stoppers at 800-780-TIPS.
WBBH
Feb 05, 2010
Added:
Feb. 05, 2010
Georgia, USA
|
 |
|
Thomas E. Perez
Assistant Attorney - General - Civil Rights Division -
U.S. Department of Justice: "...Human
trafficking will not be tolerated in the United
States..." |
Citizen of Mexico Sentenced for Role in
Federal Sex Trafficking Conspiracy
Atlanta - Miguel Rugerio, 28, a Mexican national, was sentenced to
federal prison today by United States District Judge Clarence Cooper
on charges of conspiracy to commit sex trafficking and related
immigration offenses, and of transporting one of the victims of the
conspiracy, a young Mexican woman identified as “N.M.,” in
interstate and foreign commerce for purposes of prostitution.
Acting United States Attorney Sally Quillian Yates said of today’s
sentencing, “This defendant lured young women from Mexico with the
promise of money and legitimate jobs and then forced them into
prostitution and repulsive living conditions. He is now going to
federal prison for five years and then will be expelled from the
United States.”
In
Washington, D.C., Thomas E. Perez, Assistant Attorney General for
the Civil Rights Division, said, “This defendant deprived vulnerable
victims of their freedom, their dignity and their civil rights.
Today’s sentencing should send a clear message to would-be
perpetrators that human trafficking will not be tolerated in the
United States.”
“Few
crimes are more repugnant than sex trafficking helpless and innocent
victims,” said Kenneth Smith, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S.
Immigration and Customs (ICE) Enforcement Office of Investigations
in Atlanta.
“This
sentencing is gratifying given the horrible conditions the victims
in this case were forced to endure. While we can’t erase the
suffering these women experienced, by aggressively investigating and
prosecuting these cases, ICE and its law enforcement partners are
sending a powerful warning about the consequences facing those
responsible for such schemes.”
FBI
Atlanta Special Agent in Charge Greg Jones said, “Today’s sentencing
of Mr. Rugerio provides further opportunities for law enforcement
agencies such as the FBI, as well as the many and varied victim
assistance based agencies, to highlight the growing crime problem
known as human trafficking. Mr. Rugerio will now have five years in
federal prison to consider the exploitation and victimization of
those that he brought in to the U.S. under false pretenses for
purposes of prostitution.”
Chicago Press Release
Feb. 04, 2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
The United States, The World, Haiti
Ambassador Luis CdeBaca:
…I’m the Ambassador-at-Large for the Office to Monitor and Combat
Trafficking. Today, Secretary Clinton will chair the President’s
interagency task force. She’ll be joined by other members of the
task force, including the Attorney General, the secretaries of
Labor, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services; the USAID
Administrator, the Director of National Intelligence, as well as
representatives from the White House, Department of Defense,
Education, Agriculture, and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity
Commission.
This meeting,
which… is mandated under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, is
the first held under the Obama Administration. In today’s meeting,
we will look forward to a very candid and progressive discussion
that highlights the work that each agency is conducting individually
as well as collectively to combat modern slavery. In addition, it’s
a chance to preview the anti-trafficking efforts in the days, weeks,
and months ahead as we work together to make measured progress
against every form of exploitation, including forced labor, peonage,
and sexual servitude, in response to the President’s declaration of
January as Human Trafficking and Slavery Awareness and Prevention
Month.
[In regard to child trafficking in Haiti:]
Ambassador CdeBaca: We have begun to
– we’ve actually got funding out the door already to a group called
Heartland Alliance that’s part of the child cluster that’s one of
the more experienced U.S. counter-trafficking organizations. They
work with a lot of the trafficking victims in the Midwest. They’re
out of Chicago. But they also do counter-trafficking projects for –
with grant money from us around the world. And they’re stepping up
their activities in Haiti…
Ambassador CdeBaca:
…There’s been reports, that I think have been reported on in the
news as well, of men coming into some of the camps, using offers of
food or water to get girls to leave with them in trucks. Now,
obviously, we don’t have any hard evidence as to what’s happening to
those girls once they leave with those men, and so that’s why the
term “the notion of” trafficking…
What we’ve done in
the last three weeks is we’ve repositioned a number of those
projects. In the Dominican Republic, for instance, we’re working
with the Solidarity Center so that we can try to turn that project
around a little bit and have it catch, if there are folks that are
coming over the border in search of jobs, in search of work, that
they know their rights, that they know that they shouldn’t put
themselves into a situation where they can be exploited.
So we’re working on
the Dominican side with that project, and then we’re also moving
money into Haiti as far as trying to build up those child protection
brigades, as far as working with the groups such as the
Jean Robert Cadet Restavek Foundation
and others to try to make sure that we can have some things in place
to protect those children.
Question:
You asking for more money for Haiti? You said that previously you
had about $500,000 a year in projects. And I know you guys have –
don’t have yet an exact sum for assistance for Haiti. But do you
plan to ask for additional money to combat these kinds of – to
combat trafficking in Haiti?
Ambassador CdeBaca:
Well, we have 500,000 to begin with. We will reposition about
another a million, taking that from other projects, frankly. And so
we need to look at how we make sure that those projects, which – the
money of which hasn’t gone out the door yet. And those countries
don’t necessarily (inaudible) or not, now that we’re looking at the
Haitian side.
Obviously, we’re
looking at what the long-term funding needs are. We have about $20-,
$22 million in grant funds that we administer in the Trafficking
office. We work with our partners at USAID and at the International
Labor Affairs Bureau over at DOL, and we are shaking the trees right
now to figure out what money there is in this year’s budget, as
opposed to looking into the next year...
[The linked web page contains a video
recording of this presentation.]
Luis CdeBaca
Director, Office To Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons
U.S. Department of State
Feb. 3, 2010
See also:
Changing Views: Government Promises Action
The Obama administration is weeks away from announcing a new surge —
this one aimed at escalating the war on human trafficking in
America.
“In January we are going to be announcing a major set of
initiatives,” Janet Napolitano, secretary of the Department of
Homeland Security, told The Kansas City Star.
Napolitano disclosed the administration’s plans at the conclusion of
The Star’s six-month investigation exposing numerous failures in
America’s anti-trafficking battle.
Although details of the plan were not released, advocates and other
experts said they’re cautiously optimistic that this is the best
chance in years to address many of the problems revealed in the
newspaper’s five-part series. They’re also hopeful that the
administration, which has reached out to them and asked what changes
are needed, will correct structural flaws in the broken system.
“It is
time to go back to the drawing board and promote a more seamless,
coordinated plan,” said Florrie Burke, a nationally known advocate
for trafficking victims.
Other
experts said it’s also time for congressional oversight hearings on
the flagging decade-long struggle, and time to centralize an
anti-trafficking effort that is thinly spread across a vast
bureaucracy plagued by inter-agency wrangling and a lack of
coordination.
Part of: Human Trafficking in America | A Star series
Mark Morris, Mike Mcgraw And Laura Bauer
The Kansas City
Dec. 15, 2009
See also:
LibertadLatina
Commentary
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Chuck Goolsby |
We note for the record that the Obama Administration indicated in
December of 2009 that they would be presenting a major new
initiative to combat human trafficking during January of 2010. As of
February 3rd, 2010, that announcement had not yet happened.
It is
not hard to understand that an escalation in attempts at terrorism
within the U.S., as well as the Haitian earthquake emergency are
likely to be among the factors that have pushed back such an
announcement. It is concerning, though, that we see no sign in the
February 3, 2010 news conference comments of Luis CdeBaca, Director of the U.S.
State Department's Office To Monitor and Combat Trafficking in
Persons, that the Obama Administration is on the verge of
rolling-out
any such effort.
We hope that, whenever this action is taken (and even if it never
comes about), the Obama
Administration recognizes that, as Ambassador CdeBaca stated in a
December, 2009 press interview with the Kansas City Star, some 60%
of trafficking victims within the U.S. are from Latin America, and
a great many victims are trafficked across the Mexican / U.S.
border.
Currently, the attention to Haiti's emergency is very much in order. We note
that the world press has sounded the alarm bell about the risk of
child sex trafficking in the wake of the Haitian earthquake like
never before.
While the press, assisting governments and NGO organizations work
through the ongoing crisis in Haiti, we ask the world to also
remember that hundreds of thousands, if not millions of children and
young women face an equally urgent risk of kidnapping, rape and sex trafficking
across Latin America and the Caribbean. Yet neither the U.S. federal
government nor the NGO community nor most major news entities in the English speaking world have
strongly acknowledged, nor have they reacted effectively to that harsh reality.
We hope that the press and the NGOs who get invited to attend events
such as the February 3rd Preview to the Annual Meeting of the
President's Interagency Task Force to Monitor and Combat Trafficking
in Persons dare to ask the hard questions, as some reporters at the
event asked in regard to Haiti (see the linked event transcript).
The same questions need to be asked about U.S.
government policy and action in defense of human trafficking and
exploitation victims across the Americas, and indeed the world.
We are most concerned at this time about the deafening silence in
regard to Latin America's enormous problems with human exploitation
and slavery. That silence has existed not only during President
Obama's term, but it also occurred during the administration of
President George W. Bush.
When prominent academics, government leaders and press writers and
authors speak publicly about human trafficking, the focus is
invariably on the crisis in Europe, Asia, and to a lesser extent
Africa and domestic minor sex trafficking victims in the U.S. All of
these communities deserve, and have gotten attention.
Those who have not gotten attention are the women and children of
Latin America and the Caribbean where, as leading anti-trafficking
activist Teresa Ulloa, director of the Coalition Against Trafficking
in Women (CATW) for Latin America and the Caribbean (CATW-LAC)
notes, an estimated 50 million women and children are at-risk of
falling into the hands of human traffickers. As Ulloa further
states, some 5 million victims exist in Mexico alone.
Given that 60% of the trafficking victims in the U.S. are Latin
Americans, where is the U.S. government's attention to their crisis?
'Little Brown Maria Trapped in the Brothel' deserves our help
now!
Ignoring the issue allows the drug cartel financed
mega-traffickers to laugh all the way to the bank, because they know
that at least today, Uncle Sam is not even thinking about coming
after them. Nor, apparently, is Uncle Sam planning to defend and
rescue 'Maria' anytime soon.
We insist upon a change to that way of thinking. Does the fact that
poor indigenous and African descendent victims in Mexico and the
Dominican Republic are people of color really mean that CNN, U.S.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and anti-trafficking NGOs who
receive federal funds can't ring the alarm bell and help put out the
fire, and must continually ignore this raging emergency?
We insist, among dozens of other items on our
to-do list, that the U.S. Government demand that Mexico and Japan
ACT NOW to rescue and restore the estimated 3,000 to 4,000
indigenous children who have been kidnapped with impunity by the
Japanese Yakuza mafias and taken to Japan to be sold as 'geishas' in
sexual slavery.
Giving attention to Haiti is a good start. Of course, hundreds of
thousands of trafficked children existed in Haiti before the
earthquake.
Where was the press then?
Writing from the middle of an anti-trafficking movement that is
maturing... but slowly!
End Impunity Now!
Chuck Goolsby
LibertadLatina
Feb. 04/05, 2010
See also:
The United States
Obama's Slavery Czar
Ambassador-at-Large Luis CdeBaca fights
human slavery for a living...
...Whether it was farm workers, or women in brothels, the
percentages continue to be overwhelmingly Latino.
Sixty-plus per cent of the
[trafficking] victims in the U.S. are Hispanic.” ...
Lynn Sherr
The Daily Beast
Nov. 24, 2009
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti
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Haitian music star Wycelf Jean
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Wycelf Jean Reacts To Human
Trafficking Arrests In Haiti
In light of the tragedy in Haiti, a new problem is rising in
the capital of Port Au Prince, human trafficking.
Ten Americans were arrested Sunday on charges of human
trafficking after Haitian officials say they tried to take
33 Haitian children ranging in age from 2 months to 12 years
to the Dominican Republic without proper documentation and
permission.
Now outraged about the turmoil racking his country, Wyclef
Jean released a series of angry tweets denouncing the
traffickers saying, “My message to the child traffickers n
Haiti I give you my word we will hunt you Down one by one,
and you will be judge[d] with no Mercy!”
The civilians accused of trafficking are part of a Baptist
church in the U.S. and maintain that they were trying to
save abandoned and orphaned children and planned to relocate
them to safety.
They are being held at a government building until officials
determine if they should go before a judge.
Haiti's government has halted all adoptions for the time
being unless the adoption plans were set in motion before
the quake.
Danielle Canada
HipHipWired.com
Feb. 1, 2010
See also:
Wyclef Jean Volunteer Killed By
Haitian Car-Jacker
Hip-hop star Wyclef Jean was forced to deal with another
tragedy while helping desperate survivors of the Haiti
earthquake, after a volunteer for his
Yele Haiti
foundation was shot dead in a car-jacking.
The former Fugees star and native Haitian rushed to his
homeland when the massive tremor hit the nation earlier this
month, ravaging the poor country's infrastructure and
killing more than 150,000 people.
But Jean and his team of volunteers had to contend with more
than just the devastation left by the earthquake, they
witnessed the desperate lengths Haiti's people were going to
in a bid to survive - which ended in terrible consequences
for one young helper.
He explains, "Jo Jo was shot and killed on the second day we
were there. He was the victim of a car-jacking. I left him
alone for two hours and he was driving in the city.
"A guy stopped him and told him to get out of the car. No
one knows quite what happened next but he was shot twice and
killed instantly. The jacker didn't even want the car, he
just wanted to take the fuel."
And Jean is adamant he will never be able to forget the
horrific scenes he witnessed.
He says, "It looked like the apocalypse - there were bodies
everywhere. It's a sight that will stay with me for ever.
It's something you just can't put into words. I filmed
everything with a video camera because I was convinced
people would not believe what we told them."
www.StarPulse.com
Jan. 31st, 2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti, Puerto Rico
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Ricky Martin arrives at the 52nd Annual
GRAMMY Awards held at Staples Center on January 31, 2010 in
Los Angeles, California.
Photo: Larry Busacca, Getty Images for NARAS |
Ricky Martin Has Haiti on His Mind
Amid the glamour of the red carpet, Ricky Martin's mind was
on Haiti.
The singer, who has been campaigning against human
trafficking for several years, just returned from the
island.
"Situations like this, unfortunately, people take advantage
and they start traffic human beings," he said. "It's very
intense down there, kids crying in the street, corpses
everywhere. It's going to take a while for things to get
back to normal."
Martin plans to start working with Habitat for Humanity to
start rebuilding homes in Haiti.
Marco R. della Cava
USA Today
Jan. 31, 2010
See also:
The Ricky Martin Foundation
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Missouri and Kansas, USA
Two Agencies Won't Seek Federal Funds in an
Effort Against Human Trafficking
Two local agencies - the Independence Police Department and Hope
House - received three-year Justice Department grants in 2006 but
will not reapply, officials said. The grants expired at the end of
last year.
It is unknown whether other local agencies will apply for grants,
according to Justice Department officials. New grants will be given
later this year.
Independence police didn’t reapply because detectives must focus on
other crimes, said Maj. Ken Jarnigan. Two detectives assigned to
human trafficking are now fighting cyber crimes, he said.
“It was a juggling act; which priority do we focus on?” Jarnigan
said. “We felt like our department and citizens would be better
served by them doing cyber crimes rather than human trafficking. In
a perfect world we would have tried to do both.”
Hope House CEO Mary Anne Metheny said in a statement that the
shelter would continue to provide services for victims eligible for
existing programs.
“However, we will no longer offer human trafficking training or
facilitate the coalition against human trafficking,” Metheny said.
The Kansas City Star reported in December that the U.S. attorney’s
office had stopped referring human trafficking victims to Hope House
after the shelter reportedly failed to fulfill some of its
obligations under the grant.
Although trafficking is considered a coastal phenomenon, more
alleged traffickers — 36 in the past three years — have been
prosecuted by federal authorities in western Missouri than anywhere
else in the nation. One Kansas City case, involving Giant Labor
Solutions, is thought to be the largest labor trafficking ring
uncovered in U.S. history.
But the absence of federal money for the human trafficking task
force won’t change what local authorities are doing, said U.S.
Attorney Beth Phillips.
“The task force is still fully functioning,” Phillips said. “It’s
still meeting and investigating and prosecuting cases. Human
trafficking investigations remain a priority of our office.”
Laura Bauer and Mike McGraw
The Kansas City Star
Feb. 02, 2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti
Bandas de Violadores Aterran a las
Haitianas
Bands of Rapists Terrorize Haitian
Women
Los criminales
recorren como alimañas los campamentos de desplazados para elegir a
sus víctimas. La policía se confiesa incapaz de proteger a las
mujeres.
When night falls,
criminal men with lanterns roam the refugee camps in search of their
victims. The police confess that they cannot protect all women...
www.publico.es
Feb. 03,
2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti
Aumenta a un Millón la
Cifra de Niños Huérfanos
Earthquake Pushes Number of Haitian
Orphans to 1 Million
El número de niños
huérfanos tras el terremoto que devastó Haití se ha duplicado y
alcanza actualmente el millón de afectados, según un informe de la
Comisión Europea.
El Universal
Mexico City
Feb. 03,
2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti, The Dominican Republic
Haitiana Recupera Hijo Robado en Cabo Haitiano y
Vendido en Dominicana
Haitian Woman Recovers Her Child,
Kidnapped in Cape Haitien. Child had been sold in the Dominican
Republic
Tras ser
secuestrados en Haití, muchos menores son vendidos para luego ser
explotados en las calles de República Dominicana, como pedigueños o
en actividades de prostitución, como fuera el caso del hijo de
Cariné Oguí Pié, quien recuperó en esta ciudad, al norte de
Dominicana, a su hijo de siete años, que fuera robado en Cabo
Haitiano y trasladado, vendido y obligado a trabajar en las calles
santiagueras como mendigo.
La Nacion Dominicana
Feb. 03,
2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti
Niños Haitianos Pululan
por las Calles
Haitian Children Mass in the
Streets
La procuradora del
Tribunal de Niños, Niñas y Adolescentes de Santiago, Antia Beato,
estimó ayer necesario que instituciones públicas y privadas realicen
esfuerzos conjuntos para resolver el drama que representa la
cantidad de menores de origen haitiano que pernocta en las calles de
esta ciudad, al ser traficados desde su país.
www.listindiario.com.do
Feb. 03, 2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Haiti
Miles de Haitianas, Sin Servicios Salud y Con Mayor Riesgo de
Violencia Sexual
Thousands of Haitian Women Lack Health Services and Risk Sexual
Violence
Miles de haitianas
no pueden acceder ni a los servicios de salud reproductiva ni a sus
métodos habituales de planificación familiar y afrontan un mayor
riesgo de violencia y de explotación sexual.
EFE
Feb. 02, 2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Indonesia
Red de Prostitución Infantil que
Operaba por Facebook fue Desmantelada
A
Prostitution Network Selling 15- and 16-year-old Girls, Operating on
FaceBook, is Taken Down by the Police in Jakarta.
La Policía de
Indonesia arrestó a dos supuestos proxenetas que administraban la
organización.
EFE
Feb. 03,
2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Spain
Las Niñas Agredidas en el
Bus Escolar, Invitadas a Irse de su Instituto
Two 12-year-old Girls Sexually
Assaulted on School Bus are Invited to Leave their School
Una ya ha sido
trasladada a un centro concertado.
La otra víctima de la agresión no puede pagarlo y convive a diario
con cuatro de sus agresores.
www.20Minutos.es
Feb. 03,
2010
Added:
Feb. 04, 2010
Spain
Una Madre se Enfrenta a
30 Años por Prostituir a Sus Hijas, Menores de Edad
A
Mother Faces 30 Years in Prison for Exhibitionism and for
Prostituting Her Underage Daughters
El padre también se
sentará en el banquillo por mantener supuestamente relaciones
sexuales delante de las pequeñas
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