PNG officials involve in human trafficking

A report released by the US State Department says Papua New Guinean government officials are facilitating human trafficking through bribery and trading victims for political favours.

The US State Department’s Trafficking in Persons 2013 report strongly criticises PNG and keeps it at the lowest ranking of "tier three" in an annually-released index.

The report describes PNG as a place where local and foreign victims are trafficked for sex work, child labour, or manual labour at mining or logging camps.

It says Asian crime rings, foreign logging companies and foreign business people have brought foreign women into PNG on fraudulently-issued tourist or business visas.

"Subsequent to their arrival, many of the women, from countries including Malaysia, Thailand, China, and the Philippines, are turned over to traffickers who transport them to logging and mining camps, fisheries, and entertainment sites," the report said.

"[They] then exploit them in forced prostitution and domestic servitude."

The US State Department has reported that PNG officials are directly involved in the trade for several years.

"Government officials continued to facilitate trafficking by accepting bribes to allow illegal migrants to enter the country or to ignore victims forced into prostitution or labor, and by trading female trafficking victims in return for political favours or votes," the report said.

Girls, women bartered to settle tribal conflicts

The concern appears to be separate from US criticisms of girls and women being used by tribal groups to settle conflicts, or as barter for guns and political advantage.

Requests for more information about PNG government officials' involvement in human trafficking have been made to the US State Department, but have not yet been received.

The annual Trafficking in Persons report is compiled from questionnaires submitted by government and non-government groups.

In the past 18 months a new trend has emerged in PNG, with underage girls being employed in night clubs as hostesses, dancers, and bartenders.

They are known colloquially as "Mosko girls".

"The vulnerability to human trafficking of Mosko girls - young girls who are employed in bars to provide companionship to male patrons and sell an alcoholic drink called mosko - emerged as a new trend around major cities in PNG in 2012," the report said.

World Vision's PNG national director Dr Curt von Boguslawski told Radio Australia’s Pacific Beat program the issue could come down to lack of youth employment.

"Urban drift, [the] high cost of living in centres like Port Moresby and the lack of employment of youth … is causing the need for these kind of activities," Dr von Boguslawski said.

The treatment of girls and women outside of PNG's big cities was among the criticisms in the US State Department report.

"There are reports of internal trafficking involving children, including girls from tribal areas as young as five, being subjected to commercial sexual exploitation or forced labor by members of their immediate family or tribe," the report said.

"Tribal leaders sometimes trade with each other the exploitative labor and service of girls and women for guns and political advantage."

The sale of daughters into forced marriages to settle debts leaves girls and young women vulnerable to exploitation, the report says, while polygamy affirms attitudes that women are owned by men.

Report reveals men also subjected to trafficking

Papua New Guinean and Chinese men have also been trafficked for labor at commercial mines and logging camps, according to the report.

"Employers exacerbate workers’ indebtedness by paying substandard wages and charging artificially inflated prices at the company store," it said.

"In such circumstances, an employee’s only option is to buy food and other necessities on usurious terms of credit."

There was no detail as to the scale of the problem or the companies involved in this debt bondage.

Another form of male exploitation involved boys, as young as 12, being used as "market taxis" in urban areas, carrying extremely heavy loads for low pay.

PNG does not have a human trafficking law, although specific offences covering trafficking in children, sexual exploitation and forced labour could be used to prosecute traffickers.

A draft law on human trafficking was endorsed by PNG's National Executive Council in 2011, but has not yet been passed.

The US State Department has urged PNG to enact its draft human trafficking law, strengthen law enforcement and do more to identify and help victims.

The tier three ranking in the annual index puts PNG in the company of nations such as Algeria, DR Congo, Central African Republic, China, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Guinea Bissau, Kuwait, Libya, Mauritania, Yemen, Sudan and Saudi Arabia.

The ranking opens PNG up for targeted US aid sanctions, although these can be waived by the US Government.

But the report notes one positive development, revealing thst PNG has trained 78 law enforcement and non-law enforcement government officers and 82 NGO representatives on human trafficking issues.

This task was carried out by PNG’s Department of Justice and Attorney General with the assistance of foreign funding.
ABC News