Editorial: Why Do So Many Men Still Think the Sex Trade is Fine?

From columnist Catharine Bennett of the London Observer:

The trial of Steve Wright confirms how dangerous prostitution is but legalising it would do nothing to aid the plight of women involved...

Following the example of Lord Longford, who established that, where sex is concerned, adjustments to British legislation should always be preceded by an inspection of foreign arrangements, Home Office minister Vernon Coaker toured various Stockholm addresses, investigating the impact of Sweden's decision to criminalise men who pay for sex. Whether it was a question of thrift, or a natural reluctance on Mr Coaker's part to re-enact highlights from Lord Longford's Scandinavian excursion, the Swedish researches were completed in a day, which must barely have left time for the minister and his team, including Vera Baird and Barbara Follett, to 'cooee' up a few brothel stairs and reach the conclusion that, although some Swedish people think the scheme has worked, other Swedish people think not.

The next stop on the comparative prostitution tour will, I understand, be the Netherlands, where some people think it's enlightened to have women eye-catchingly displayed as wares in shop windows, but other people don't. After that, the itinerary is unclear, though it seems unlikely the ministers will get as far as New Zealand: a pity since the islands are currently advertised by pro-legalisers as sex-trade heaven, even better than Amsterdam, where accredited sex operatives now take genuine pride in their work and clients, too, are an example to all, their connoisseurship finally liberated from those doubts which, to judge by the statistics, still deter a number of British men from trying the wide range of reasonably priced goods on offer...

READ THE FULL EDITORIAL AT Guardian.co.uk

Dubai: Shelter for Abused Women and Girls Opens in Abu Dhabi

Ravindranath/Gulf News
Dr Anwar Gargash, Minister of State for Federal National Council Affairs and head of NCCHT.

ABU DHABI, DUBAI - A new centre in Abu Dhabi will soon serve victims of human trafficking and exploitation in a collaborated effort to protect and shelter abused women and children in the country.

The Red Crescent Authority (RCA) in collaboration with the National Committee to Combat Human Trafficking on Sunday announced the opening of the shelter in Abu Dhabi.

The centre will serve as a safe haven for the victims, where they will be provided with medical care, counselling and social support.

The UAE National Committee to Combat Human Trafficking was established under Federal Law 51 2006 to address the crime of human trafficking.

It represents the first law of its kind in the Arab world to address the practice of human trafficking and demonstrates the UAE's commitment to international treaties and standards...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT GulfNews.com

Video Interview with CD Exec Director

Below is a video interview from 2002 featured on the Ken Aaron show. He interviews Sandra Hunnicutt, Executive Director and founder of Captive Daughters.

UAE: Fighting Human Trafficking

DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES - Dubai: Many uneducated women of different nationalities move here to work and earn their living as domestic helpers, nannies, sales women, cashiers and many other jobs which do not need the woman to be a post graduate or holder of any educational certificate.

Those women are usually from poor families and they decide to come here to support their families back home.

However, some of those women could land in trouble here after being cheated by people of their own nationality back home in their own countries who promise them to come and work in the UAE and earn a lot of money but some times and in some cases those women land in problems such as being forced into prostitution which is considered a kind of human trafficking - a severely punishable crime in the UAE...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT GulfNews.com

Morocco: Report Addresses Sex Tourism in Morocco

Tourism industry goodwill ambassador Khalid Semmouni has proposed that all tourists involved in paedophilia in Morocco be banned from the country.

MAGHAREB, MOROCCO - The International Coalition for Responsible and Respectful Tourism published a report early this month on the resurgence of Morocco's sex tourism industry, uncovering numerous causes of the phenomenon and proposing solutions.

The report, compiled by coalition goodwill ambassador Khalid Semmouni, indicates close links between sex tourism, globalisation and the opening of borders, adding that people are attracted by what they perceived as exotic.

Poverty and exclusion are also among the causes, and have contributed to the prevalence of prostitution in Morocco.

Other causes cited by the report include the violation of children’s socio-economic rights; a lack of public education on sex and human rights, especially for children; the disintegration of family structures; domestic abuse and a lack of responsibility on the part of schools.

The report also mentioned the lenience of Morocco's legislation on child rape and the lack of a national action plan to protect children from violence...

READ THE FULL REPORT AT Magharebia.com

Syria: Iraqi Refugees Turn to Sex Trade

Damascus, Syria

DAMASCUS, SYRIA -- A score of young Iraqi women in tight, shimmering gowns shuffle across the nightclub dance floor under the hungry eyes of Gulf Arabs at nearby tables.

The band blasts out Iraqi songs into the early hours as the watching youths join the dancing or summon girls to sit with them -- there is little pretence about what gets transacted at this neon-lit nightspot half an hour's drive north of Damascus.

The dancers, some in their early teens, do not want to talk, but one said she had no other way to support her family. "My father was killed in Baghdad and our money is finished," muttered the dark-haired girl in a black and silver dress.

The United Nations refugee agency UNHCR calls it "survival sex", a desperate way to cope for Iraqi refugees whose savings have run out since they escaped the violence at home.

The idea repels many of the 1.5 million Iraqis in Syria, but the struggle to make ends meet has forced some to share tiny apartments with other families in the slums of Damascus, put their children out to work or marry off teenaged daughters...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT Reuters.com

UK: Rescued Girls Snatched Back into Prostitution

Twisted fate: children rescued from people-traffickers in the UK are being 'snatched back and forced into prostitution'

UNITED KINGDOM - Hundreds of children rescued from traffickers are being snatched back and forced into prostitution, officials have warned.

A United Nations survey found that out of 330 youngsters saved from criminal gangs in the UK, well over half subsequently went missing from local authority care.

The fear is they were followed and recaptured by their traffickers.

The figures were highlighted by the Conservatives yesterday as they demanded tougher Government action to deal with the horrors of people-trafficking - an industry worth an estimated £5billion a year.

In Britain up to 25,000 foreign women and girls are trapped in a modern form of slavery - smuggled into the country, threatened with violence and forced to work as prostitutes.

Most come from poor countries in search of a better life but find themselves trapped by their debts to gangs and unable to seek protection because they are illegal immigrants.

One prostitute can make more than £100,000 a year profit for her "pimp"...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT DailyMail.co.uk

Sweden: Customers, Not Prostitutes, are the Criminals

SWEDEN - Later this month the Home Office minister Vernon Coaker will travel to Sweden to examine the country's prostitution laws. The government is considering adopting the Swedish model, where it is a criminal offence to buy sex. This has shamed many men, and led to fewer women working on the streets, but concerns remain over trafficking and driving the trade underground

The white envelope that arrived at the family home would have been innocuous enough, were it not for the emblem in the top left corner. For the married father-of-two to whom it was addressed the words Polismyndigheten i Stockholms län - Stockholm County police - were the first clue that his visit to a prostitute had not been as discreet as he might have imagined...

READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT Politics.Guardian.co.uk

UK: Tourism Built on Sexual Exploitation

UNITED KINGDOM - Selling sex to male foreigners is an all too common occupation for many young women in poor and developing countries. Prostitution is a horrible job - we know this from the countless stories from the women involved. Women in popular sex tourist destinations such as the Philippines have spoken out about how women are sold from childhood in order to meet the massive demand from western men for cheap sex on tap with "exotic" females. But now there is an emerging market in the "girlfriend trade", where men do not just buy sex, but have a woman thrown in for the duration of their stay...

READ THE FULL EDITORIAL AT Guardian.co.uk

UN: Compendium of Resource Materials Online

UNITED NATIONS - Online at the UN's GIFT (Global Initiative to Fight Trafficking) is an excellent list of Best Practices in governing and suggested enforcements for the handling of illegal international trafficking.

The Best Practices compendium is here: UN GIFT

Additionally, an excellent list of Publications on Trafficking for Sexual Exploitation.

NY: NOW Aims for "Trafficking Free NY"

NEW YORK - Sonia Ossorio is the president of NOW-NYC, a position she has held since elected in 2004:

I know a woman from South America who spent her first night in the Big Apple in a brothel overlooking Roosevelt Avenue in Queens. With a timer at her side she “serviced” 19 men – a veritable United Nations parade of taxi drivers to restaurant workers who literally queued up for a turn to have 15 minute sex sessions with the women at this brothel.

If you never had a picture of what the low-budget, factory-style prostitution that makes up much of the local NYC sex industry, this is it – up close, uncomfortable and a mockery of sex and all it stands for – pleasure, sharing, sexual empowerment and women’s liberation.

At the beginning of each shift, the women are given a produce box top with two rolls of paper towels, a bottle of lube, alcohol and a baggie filled with unwrapped condoms. The condoms are prepped much like vegetables at restaurants before the rush hits. There are tips that go to the men who stand on the corners as dusk sets in and pass out business cards for the brothels and give directions to the houses where sex can be bought $30 for 15 minutes. The price went up this year from $25...

READ THE FULL COMMENTARY AT Feministing.com