“If you ask
young people what they could get for U.S. $200 or less, their answers would
probably include a tablet, a smart phone, or a designer bag. Not on the list, a
foreign maid - unless you live in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, or any
country in the Middle East. In the United States, maids are for the rich and
famous. Modern-day slavery in the western world commonly wears the face of a
prostitute, a trafficked child, or an illegal migrant exploited by his or her
employer. For third world countries, human slavery often has the face of a
domestic worker isolated from society and kept invisible inside private homes
of their employers.”
Susan V.
Ople is the founder of the Blas F. Ople Policy Center and Training Institute. The
center offers free legal help to human trafficking survivors. Ms. Ople was
recently named the U.S State Department’s Trafficking in Persons Hero of 2013.
The full account of Ms. Ople’s
article is available at
