Playing Child Trafficking and Women in Poverty

Below is an example how war and "natural disasters" bring child traffickers to the scene:

THE massive dislocation of families owing to the raging armed conflict in Mindanao has spurred the trafficking of children, a legislator said on Sunday.

“A growing number of young girls and boys whose families have been displaced by constant armed strife have become extremely vulnerable to trafficking by illegal-job recruiters and all sorts of predators,” Nacionalista Party Rep. Emmylous Taliño-Mendoza of North Cotabato said.

Many of the underaged victims risk maltreatment and exploitation as sweatshop laborers, street slaves and child prostitutes under the employ of gangsters or illegal workers abroad.

“Sadly, the condition in many parts of Mindanao that are being tormented by armed clashes has become highly conducive for child traffickers,” Taliño-Mendoza said.

She appealed to the Department of Social Welfare and Development, as well as operators of passenger buses, interisland vessels and airlines, to exercise greater vigilance and take extra precautions against child traffickers.

“One practical way to discourage trafficking is for domestic passenger carriers to check the identity and age of every traveling minor, and to ascertain whether the child is accompanied by a verified family member or relative, or by a person who is not related to the minor,” Taliño-Mendoza said.

She said unrelated adults chaperoning traveling youngsters should be checked, and their identities should be recorded and verified. A leading nongovernment group closely monitoring human trafficking in the country has corroborated Taliño-Mendoza’s apprehension.

Human traffickers are definitely preying on children dislocated by rebel attacks and the operations of government troops running after them in Mindanao, according to the Visayan Forum Foundation Inc.

The foundation said syndicates have been prowling evacuation camps for potential young laborers for overseas deployment.

It added that 34 minors have already been rescued by social workers from traffickers that sneaked them out of conflict zones in Mindanao and tried to deploy them to the Middle East on spurious travel papers.

The Visayan Forum works for the welfare of women and children who are victims of trafficking, as well as marginalized migrants, especially those employed in the invisible and informal sectors, like domestic help. The foundation runs two shelters in Davao City.

Since 2001, the foundation has rescued and aided more than 32,000 victims and potential victims of trafficking, and has assisted in the filing of 66 criminal cases on behalf of 166 victims.

The National Disaster Coordinating Council said that since August, more than 600,000 noncombatants, including over 40,000 children, have been displaced as a result of military-rebel clashes and armed incursions by wayward Moro Islamic Liberation Front factions across three regions in Mindanao.

Some of the evacuees are in 123 evacuation centers, while others have sought refuge elsewhere, mostly in the homes of relatives and friends in other nearby towns. 

Besides Cotabato, the three other provinces bearing the brunt of the armed conflict are Lanao del Norte, Maguindanao, and Shariff Kabunsuan.

Since August, the fighting in Northern Mindanao, Central Mindanao, and the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, has also caused more than P1.2 billion-worth of damage to farms and fisheries, industries and public infrastructure.  [From:  "Child traffickers prowl Mindanao evacuation centers", Rene Acosta, Buisness Mirror, November 23, 2008, http://businessmirror.com.ph/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2359:child-traffickers-prowl-mindanao-evacuation-centers&catid=26:nation&Itemid=63]