On
Friday, June 20, 2014, the United States challenged the Philippines to convict
more labor traffickers and curb corruption, among other things, as the country
failed to meet minimum standards to end the phenomenon. These recommendations
came after the country has retained its Tier 2 rating in its annual Trafficking
in Persons (TIP) Report for the fourth straight year. The TIP 2014 Report, a
basis for granting aid, is given to countries whose governments “do not fully
comply” with the Trafficking Victim Protection Act’s minimum standards, “but
are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those
standards.” According to the report, “The government of the Philippines does
not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking;
however, it is making significant efforts to do so.” In giving the Tier 2
rating the report cited a number of gains, including the increase in funding
for the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking to around $2.4 million in 2013
as well as the 31 trafficking convictions. In spite of this, the country did
not make “significant progress in ensuring victims could access specialized
services.” The report also took note of the “severely limited” protection for
male victims. Corruption at all levels of government, including in Philippine
diplomatic missions abroad, has been cited as enabling traffickers and
undermining the government’s overall efforts to combat trafficking. A key
finding is that the country “did not obtain any convictions for labor trafficking”
from April 1, 2013 to March 31, 2014, while in contrast the government
“convicted 31 sex trafficking offenders, compared with 25 during the previous
year.” The report also said, “The government continued to prosecute sex and
labor trafficking offenses and to impose stringent sentences on convicted sex
traffickers, but it did not make progress in convicting labor traffickers and
its overall number of convictions remained low compared to the size of the
problem.” While the Philippines retained its rating, Thailand, Malaysia and
Venezuela were dumped at the bottom of a list of countries accused of failing
to tackle human trafficking. This lower tier of designation could trigger US
sanctions. “The scale of human trafficking is staggering. The International Labor
Organization estimates some $150 billion in profits are generated annually for
private businesses from trafficking, of which $99 billion goes to the sex
industry.”
Full
account available at
http://www.rappler.com/nation/61173-us-philippines-trafficking-persons-report-2014