What is Human Trafficking?

What is Trafficking in Persons?

Source : UN Protocol To Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children

The definition of trafficking in the Protocol is the first international definition of trafficking.

” ‘ Trafficking in persons’ shall mean the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harbouring or receipt of persons, by means of the threat or use of force or other forms of coercion, of abduction, of fraud, of deception, of the abuse of power or of a position of vulnerability [interpretative note (63)] or of the giving or receiving of payments or benefits to achieve the consent of a person having control over another person, for the purpose of exploitation. Exploitation shall include, at a minimum, the exploitation of the prostitution of others or other forms of sexual exploitation, forced labour or services, slavery or practices similar to slavery, servitude or the removal of organs;”

The difference between Smuggling and Trafficking

It is important to distinguish between smuggling of migrants and trafficking in persons.

Smuggling of migrants and human trafficking both involve moving human beings for profit.

Smuggling means facilitating the illegal entry of a person into a country, in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit, of the illegal entry of a person into a country of which the person is not a national or a permanent resident”.  It contains the following elements:

• the procurement of illegal entry
• into a country of which the person is not a national or a permanent resident
• to obtain direct financial or other material benefit.

However, in the case of human trafficking, two additional elements beyond smuggling must be present :

•  there must be some improper form of recruitment, such as coercion, deception or some abuse of authority;
•  the activity must have been undertaken for some exploitive purpose, although that purpose need not necessarily have been fulfilled.