US report finds 25 million people victims of human trafficking worldwide

By Michael Hernandez

WASHINGTON (AA) - Roughly 25 million people are victims of human trafficking worldwide, the US State Department announced Tuesday.

"The harm caused by this crime is vast," Secretary of State Antony Blinken said as he rolled out the agency’s annual report. "The United States is committed to fighting against trafficking because trafficking destabilizes societies, it under undermines economies, it harms workers, it enriches those who exploit them, it undercuts legitimate business, and most fundamentally, because it is so profoundly wrong."

Blinken pointed in particular to the humanitarian fallout from Russia's war on Ukraine, saying that the millions of Ukrainians displaced internally or forced to flee the eastern European nation face an increased risk of trafficking, making them "highly vulnerable to exploitation.”

Estrada, an anti-trafficking NGO, has received "thousands" of calls from Ukrainians in the five months since the war began, said Blinken. About 90% of the displaced are women and children.

This year's report saw the status of 21 countries upgraded due to increased efforts to combat human trafficking. But 18 were downgraded either due to outright efforts to participate in the criminal enterprise, or because they did not take significant efforts to combat the problem.

The congressionally-mandated report included a new section requested by lawmakers on state sponsors of trafficking.

That includes Russia, which the department said has demonstrated a "government policy or pattern of trafficking," including being "actively complicit" in forced labor from North Korean workers, said the report.

Alongside Russia are 10 other nations -- Afghanistan, Burma, Cuba, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, South Sudan, Syria, Turkmenistan and Yemen.

Russia is also included on a separate list of nations the State Department identified as "having governmental armed forces, police or other security forces, or government-sponsored armed groups that recruit or use child soldiers. Afghanistan, Burma, Iran, Yemen and six other countries are also included.

US law prohibits security assistance from being directed to those nations, as well as the commercial licensing of military equipment.