Asian+Studies+Final+Jung+L

Human Trafficking

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Introduction

For centuries, new products have entered the markets and old products have left. As we advanced into the new century, there was a waterfall of new products hoarding into the market. However, as we created many new beneficial items, there were some negative and horrendous forms of products put in–humans. When humans became the one of the most valued products, not only did it rise to the pinnacle of the percentage rates on its own, it also took death rates to an entirely new echelon.

Starting from third world countries, this unspeakable behaviour is now spread all over the world. Over hundreds of cases daily, human trafficking has become an issue that still continues to create only negative effects in the world. Usually stimulated by trickery and lies, women and children are forced into labour and sexually exploited. Despite numerous efforts to stop this issue, no attempt has been sufficient.

Though not at the top of the list, Southeast Asia contains nations that have a dangerous stratum of trafficking going on. Furthermore, despite the crucial need of a resolution, some nations are not even meeting the bare minimum attempts. There is a lot of raising of awareness already prevalent throughout the world, however evidently it is not enough as numbers of cases are drastically rising each day. It is time for a change. Humans are not for sale.

China

China, being one of the largest nations in terms of population as well as geographically, it is inevitable that there is corruption within the nation. Needless to say, there is an indefinite amount of internal trafficking going on in China. These acts of internal trafficking usually are centered around the negative use of women. The women are used for sexual and labor exploitation.

Unlike South Korea, China involves both the exploitation of women and children. These children and women are trafficked from nations such as Malaysia, Thailand, the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, Europe, Canada, Japan, Italy, Burma, Singapore, South Africa, and Taiwan. These victims are recruited by false promises of employment. They are later coerced into prostitution or forced labour. The way children get involved in this hodgepodge of unfortunate events is due to the insolvent situations of their parents. Their parents are promised that their child will be used to make money and the money will be sent to them. However, the money is all kept by the traffickers, leaving the parents in their regressive insolvent situation, now without money and children; the children are faced with an ineffable series of actions that one could only imagine. (HumanTrafficking)

The women involved in this trafficking are usually sold as wives for disabled men. This selling usually takes in place in the poorer areas of the nation. In the more prosperous areas, the women are sold to commercial sex businesses, hair salons, massage parlors and bathhouses. (HumanTrafficking)

China also acts as a transitory passage for victims who are destined to be sent to Thailand and Malaysia. The entrance of this passage usually has a miscellany of different ethnicities. This potpourri is represented with people sent from Mongolia, Burma, North Korea, Russia, Vietnam, Ukraine, and Laos. (HumanTrafficking)

When thinking of the causes behind the exponentially increasing rates of trafficking, the All-China Women’s Federation was the first to speak. They suggested that due to the shortage of marriageable women, it demanded for the need of abducted women. Another cause suggested by the UN Inter-Agency Project on Human Trafficking stated that it may be due to poor rural residents in remote areas who lack the legal knowledge and self-protection capacity are prone to victimization.

One would think that after so much corruption within the nation, the nation would take charge in combatting this corruption; if one thought so, one would be making a colossal anomaly. China was put as a part of the Tier 2 Watch list back in 2007 by the United States Department of State’s Trafficking in Persons Report due to their failed efforts of combatting this issue. Furthermore, China does not comply with the Trafficking Victims Protection Act’s standards for the elimination of trafficking. Ever since 2005, their efforts have been stagnant with no sort of progression. Perhaps one could say it was more of a regression as now there are some village leaders who are trying to thwart the plans of police officers of rescuing victims. China also does not have a set law that criminalizes all forms of human trafficking, clearly showing that it would be hard for a trafficker to be persecuted. (HumanTrafficking)

However, a few years later, a law was enforced that prohibited forced prostitution, abduction, commercial sexual exploitation of girls under the age of 14. Anyone who was to commit this crime was to be sent to prison with a possibility of a death penalty. Furthermore, Chinese authorities worked in cooperation with Vietnamese, Thai, and Burmese authorities to rescue victims. The All-China Women’s Federation now provides counseling on legal rights, medical, and psychological treatment for women with funds provided by the government. However, these medical cares and shelters are merely temporary, and not a permanent place for victims to stay.

When Chinese victims are trying to return back to China from abroad, the government does not provide any sort of funds for them. Though this may seem unreasonable for some people, if we took the same approach as the Chinese government does, it may be somewhat reasonable. With a nation populated of 1, 339, 724, 852 individuals, and to fund all of the victims returning back to China would be radical and nearly impossible. Also, even if it were possible, the government system itself would not have enough money to fund all and more than directly affecting the government, it would indirectly affect the population as a whole. As the Chinese government runs out of money, tax percentages will rise and the population will face a crises.

In order to prevent further acts of trafficking, programs to raise awareness have been running. For example, in the Yunnan Province, authorities have held media outreach seminars to raise awareness of anti-trafficking strategies, victim protection, and relevant legislation. The United States Depart of State suggests that China take some drastic measures. They proposed the idea of prohibiting commercial sexual exploitation and all forms of forced labour against children under the age of 18. (UTC)

Japan

Due to its isolated geography, one would think that Japan would to have much selling and buying victims externally, however Japan is currently a country that takes on the role as a transit country, while still having an incredibly high rate of human trafficking. Japan acts a gateway for children and women from China, Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, and parts of Latin America. Both women and children are tricked into commercial sexual exploitation in strip clubs, sex shops, hostess bars, private video rooms, escort services, mail-order video services. These women and children are usually drugged and are awaken in the aforementioned places. Women migrate to Japan voluntarily to find work, however are tricked into exploitative conditions. When these women are not working, they are usually locked altogether in a tiny home with unfit conditions. While in these homes, the women are held for debt bondage for prices ranging from $26, 000 to $43, 000 for living expenses, medical care, etc.

Like China, Japan is also placed in the Tier 2 for not fully complying with the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. This refusal to comply meant that Japan was not agreeing to meet the minimum standards to be met for the elimination of trafficking. However, there are a number of laws already enforced in Japan. Some of these include the Criminal Code, the Labour Standards Law, the Prostitution Prevention Law, the Child Welfare Law, and the Law for Punishing Acts Related to Child Prostitution and Child Pornography. The victims are placed in existing subsidized shelters for victims of domestic violence. However, these shelters have received a lot of negativity towards them as they only offer counseling in Japanese. Perhaps the United Nations should work in co-operation with NGOs to help find volunteers who are willing to work in these shelters, providing counseling in different languages. ( HumanTrafficking)

In order to prevent further trafficking, numerous brochures are being handed out to raise awareness on helping people understand the fact that trafficked victims may be in dire conditions and will need as much help they can receive. Also, the brochures promote the linkage between prostitution and sex trafficking. The government recently donated two million dollars to the ILO to promote efforts against trafficking Thailand and Philippines. ( SAP-FL)

The United States Department of State recommends that the Japanese governments tarts spending more time investigating for any acts of forced labour conditions of workers, sexual exploitation of Japanese women and children, and the use of fraudulent marriage. The Polaris Project Japan, an NGO, recommends that Japan investigates for trafficking businesses, revise child pornography and criminalize those who sell and buy them. Japan now works with Thailand to prevent cases of trafficking in both countries. They have decided to educate Thai women to make sure they do not fall into this hole. Some of these people are under 18 and forced to travel under forged passports. As they are tricked into this trafficking business, the traffickers gain their profit, while the victims are arrested, detained, and deported for their illegal forced entries. (Bastone) This issue must be seen more seriously as with a bit of investigation, the government should be identify this case as a case of trafficking.

In conclusion, Japan seems to be on a lower echelon of extremes compared to that of Korea and China. However, it does have its problems that must be dealt with as the government seems to not be putting enough attention on this issue.

Korea

Though a rather small country, South Korea acts as a source, transit, and destination for human trafficking. The most dominant targets include women more than children. However, these women are quite young, and should perhaps be classified as “girls.” These girls are trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation and are sent all around the globe. Victims have been illegally sent to countries including the United States, Japan, Hong Kong, Guam, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Western Europe. As the traffickers choose their victims, these victims are sent to enter all the aforementioned countries illegally, without a legitimate passport. The victims are lead to believe that they are being sent to different nations for their own good, usually for economic opportunities abroad, an evident misconception and misleading.

However, South Korea does not only act as a source of victims, but also a passageway for victims from other nations. For example, South Korea has been a gateway for victims coming in from China to be sent to the United States. Moreover, South Korea has a lot of women brought from nations all over the world including Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, the People’s Republic of China, the Philippines, Thailand, and other Southeast Asian countries. All these women are forced to engage in sexual and labour exploitation. Some of these women are used to create a nuptial relationship with Korean men. For the disabled and old men, the women are used as a wife. These women are also engaged sex tourism. (HumanTrafficking)

In 2004, the “Act on the Punishment of intermediating in the Sex Trade and ASsociated Acts” was passed. This act aided in criminalizing sexual exploitation as well as in setting up the same boundaries for acts of rape as well. In the same year, the Labor Standard Act was also passed. This act focused on criminalizing forced labor. The penalty being up to five years in prison without any form of exoneration available. Furthermore, the Juvenile Sexual Protect Act was passed which criminalized the sexual exploitation done children. In 2006, the Republic of Korea conducted approximately 190 trafficking investigations. They were able to prosecute merely thirty six of them, with only twenty one out of the twenty five convicted traffickers imprisoned. South Korea also sent delegates to the United States to investigate crime groups behind trans-Pacific trafficking.

To this day, the South Korean government funds for 47 shelters, five long term group homes, and 27 counseling centers for victims. These victims are also eligible for medical, legal. vocational, and social support services. The government also offers G-1 visas or orders of suspension for victims who face hardship or retribution at home.

Methods of prevention South Korea is taking involves numerous Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) taking action. The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family (MOGEF) has been holding anti-trafficking seminars to spread the idea of equality amongst all sexes all over the world. These seminars also emphasized the cruciality of reporting any misconduct of the gender equality rule. The South Korean government also created an Employment Placement System. This system reached out to recruit foreign workers through various government-to-government channels to replace private labor agencies that recruit for trafficking. (Kloer, Amanda)

Even beyond the powers of South, the United States’ Department of Defense has taken action. The Department of Defense of Untied States Forces Korea (USFK) are working in collaboration to enact certain laws against human trafficking. They have set up a “zero tolerance policy” for illegal acts of prostitution and human trafficking. They have defined the word “trafficking” as a sort of violation of human rights. Currently the USFK-KNP are conduction town patrols to help regulate and surveillance any acts of trafficking executed. In order to monitor the effectiveness of the USFK, the USFK Inspector General is in control of evaluating the efforts of combat to make sure progress is being made. However, the direct definition of “progress” is not explicitly mentioned in the report made by the USFK, thus making it a bit skeptical. (Sharp)

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Self Evaluation

What did you contribute specifically to your project?

Considering this was an individual project, I would have to say I contributed almost everything. However, the ideas were not contributed by me, but rather from online sources. All the facts were found on the web, but all the writing and video making was all done by myself.

How successful do you think you conveyed your research to your audience?

I feel I was very straight forward and lucid in the way I conveyed my research to my audience. I did most of project in writing to show the hardcore facts. However, I was aware that a lot of people are subjected to laziness once they see words to read for information. Therefore, I created a video as well. The video, instead of informative about the facts, was more focused on showing the severity of this issue. The facts and numbers were provided through my writing in a lot of detail needed to show the level of intensity of this subject. However, the video was made in order to help quick glimpsers to realize just how big this issue is. At the end, I added a list of country names who are heavily involved in human trafficking, and if one sees the video, one would see that there are a lot of names, and would see that it is not just a problem in Southeast Asia, which was also one of my goals. I wanted readers and viewers to know that human trafficking, although only written about the cases in Southeast Asia, is actually a problem in the whole world that is still going on. Also, compared to many others' projects, many can see that my page is lacking of too many bright fancy colours. This was intentional as I think that colours tend to be way too distracting from the main point. Therefore, I tried to make it very straightforward and very striking, thus I took out all of the fancy and superficial approach to it by decorating it with colours.

What would have made your presentation more successful?

One thing I really wanted to do with this project was to have a presentation. As one can get more elaborative when one starts to talk about a topic instead of having to write about it and be confined to certain words. Within my presentation, I would have done an interactive psychological activity on the audience to help them see the horror that victims go through. Though I would not show them how human trafficking works specifically, I would have done analogous exercise to demonstrate the same level of pain that people are going through everyday. Also, I did not realize that in-text citations were needed, so I included a few but not that many. This would have made my work so much more reliable but I thought that having just citations at the ends of paragraphs were enough. Perhaps it was bit due to my lack of experience with using in-text citations, but I will ensure, for the future, I do not make this mistake again.

How successful do you think your technology-based materials were in conveying your research?

As we are now living in the 21st century, we have definitely advanced into a society almost solely based on technology. Therefore, in order to research and seek for certain information, people tend to simply run the search on a search engine online, instead of going to a library and searching for books related on the topic. I must admit that I prefer searching online instead of the library as well, as it is much faster. Therefore, I think my technology-based materials was very successful in conveying my research. If people ever want to look up a page focused on Southeast Asian human trafficking, my wikipage can pop up. Also, for my fellow classmates, who are all using their computers to look at other peoples' research reports, it would be very easy for the fellow classmates to look at my work and attain new information. So in this case, the computers have made producing and spreading my ideas and work very successful. Furthermore, I also used a lot of technology to produce a short movie, which definitely will help in successfully delivering the message behind my research project.

What would have made your technology-based materials more successful?

One thing I would have loved to do is having a live-stream running news channel online that I could embed onto my page that focused its reports on human trafficking. Also, as I stated before, a presentation would have made a better use of technology in making my research report more successful. The ideal thing to do, though very gruesome to look at, would have been to show real clips of people being trafficked and how they are treated. This would really help in getting people to take action.

What did you learn from this project? Submit any other comments after this question.

Through this project, I learned numerous things. First of all, being an active member in the Model United Nations program, it was not the first time I have dealt with this issue. However, never have I done such thorough research on what each country is doing to eliminate this problem. Yes, in the United Nations, we go through resolutions to help solve it, but if I remember correctly, I have only seen resolutions presented with ideas dealing with how to help those who have gone through the trafficking, instead of reaching out to get the government involved to help solve the issue. This probably explains the reasons why nations like China and Japan are placed on the Tier 2, as they are not trying the bare minimum to resolve this issue. In conclusion, I learned that, people learn to ignore things when they are constantly flashed at them, also known as habituation, however, once people realize how big the actual problem is, they realize how much they have been ignoring something that needed all the attention. I attempted this through the movie I created. I also learned much focusing can help you. I managed to do all my writing within one day. On Friday afternoon, I woke up from a nap, and turned off my internet and opened the file with all the notes I took from the websites, and I started to write, and I finished writing in about four hours. Overall, I am satisfied with how much effort I put in. The final thing I learned is how undeveloped the United Nations still is. When looking for some official documents, I came across numerous UN documents on this issue, however when I read them, and I think back on what I gained from it, there is not much I gained. This further supported my wish to be a member of the United Nations to help clear up the corruption present in it. This project further pushed me to pursue a lot of my goals, and really opened my eyes to a whole new side of human trafficking that I did not know of before.

Works Cited

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