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Russia Gets an Upgrade
In its annual human-trafficking report, the U.S. State Department
moved Russia up from Category 3 to Category 2
By Ilya Baranikas
June 29, 2004
This year the U.S. State Department has for the third time published its annual
report on international trafficking in persons, which, according to Secretary
of State Colin Powell, "leaves no land untouched, including our own," although
it is "incomprehensible" that this should be possible in the 21st century in
the first place.
The U.S. State Department first took up assessment of international slave trade
after the U.S. Congress passed, in 2000, the Victims of Trafficking and
Violence Protection Act. With pedanry typical of U.S. bureaucracy, the State
Department classified all countries into three categories: Category 3 comprises
states with the most appalling track record; Category 1 are those at the
forefront of combating trafficking in persons while Category 2 are countries
that are still bad but trying to mend their ways. There is a financial
incentive to encourage the get-better aspiration: In the past two years the
U.S. administration has provided 92 countries with a total of more than $100
million worth to help prevent and combat trafficking in persons.
Recently John Miller, senior advisor to the secretary of state and director of
the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, gave a briefing for
foreign news media. He cited some striking statistics: Every year, between
800,000 and 900,000 women, men, and children are transported across state
borders to be sold into the sex industry or any other industries where they are
doomed to slave status. These statistics do not include national, or domestic,
slavery - that is to say, exploitation of slave labor within a particular
country.
Slavery as a Health Department Problem
Does America itself serve as a model to others? It generally does. In 2001-02,
the U.S. Department of Justice prosecuted 79 slave traders, opening 127
criminal cases. The Department of Health and Human Services distributes grants
among trafficking victims to help destitute and traumatized people get
temporary housing accommodation, psychiatric aid, legal advice, and so forth.
The Department of Homeland Security's Bureau for Citizen and Immigration
Services introduced special visas for trafficking victims: They are given an
opportunity to live and work in the United States for three years until their
cases have been investigated and examined in a court of law.
Nonetheless, America has yet to eradicate human trafficking in its own
territory. Say, almost every Russian-speaking immigrant living here has at one
time or another employed illegal baby-sitters from the former Soviet Union.
These women are brought here on guest visas that do not allow them to work,
have their passports taken away and placed with families, mainly "New Russian"
families, because most baby sitters do not speak English. The lion's share of
the money they earn they have to give to their "minders," and God forbid that
they should start claiming their rights or try cheating. The same applies to
girls from the CIS who have been brought here to work in "salons," illegal
construction workers, etc.
Upgrades Questioned
According to John Miller, as of this year the United States has reviewed its
rating of a number of countries. Whereas last year there were 19 countries in
Category 3, this year there are 15. Not all changes in the Washington table of
ranks get a sympathetic response from human rights organizations. Thus some
rights movements consider the "upgrading" of such countries as Cambodia,
Indonesia, Lebanon, Qatar, Belarus, and Russia to be unfair, saying that
prostitution in these countries only keeps rising while all of them have been
graduated from Category 3 - in effect a blacklist - to Category 2, which
comprises the overwhelming majority of normal states. Category 3 is a blacklist
category because these countries will have U.S. assistance cut back unless they
clean up their act before October 1, 2003. This year's blacklist includes
Turkey, Greece, Cuba, North Korea, Belize, Bosnia, the Dominican Republic,
Haiti, Myanmar (Burma), Sudan, Liberia, Surinam, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and
Georgia.
Lithuania is the only FSU country in Category 1. Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and
Tajikistan, together with Russia and Belarus, have graduated from Category 3 to
Category 2.
Expediency Prize for Arabs
The annual report contains plenty of elements based on considerations of
expediency. Take for instance the miraculous transformation of two Arab
countries from backward to front-line: Saudi Arabia and the United Arab
Emirates have advanced from Category 3 to Category 1, and are now ranking on a
par with such states as Great Britain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Sweden,
and Germany. Obviously, Washington chose not to aggravate the anti-American
sentiments in these states that are already running high in the wake of the war
in Iraq.
As for such deadbeats as Cuba, North Korea, and Sudan, they don't give a damn
about the U.S. classification one way or the other: They bear the "state
sponsors of terrorism" stigma anyway, and are therefore under sanctions and not
entitled to any aid.
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