Many Countries Denounce US Trafficking in Persons Report

After releasing the 2012 Trafficking in Persons Report, many countries denounced the U.S. North Korea condemned the U.S. for faking facts; Russia refused to accept the report’s content and pointed out that the U.S. provides its soldiers stationed abroad with prostitutes; Cuba also stated that the U.S. is a major destination for human trafficking.

On June 20, the U.S. Department of State published the “2012 Trafficking in Persons Report,” in which North Korea, Cuba and Iran are all listed as Tier 3 countries and Russia is categorized as a Tier 2 country.

The report claimed that North Korea is “a source country for people subjected to forced labor, forced marriage … [and] estimated to hold between 130,000 to 200,000 prisoners in political prison camps …” and therefore classified North Korea as a Tier 3 country. A North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson condemned the U.S. for fabricating North Korea’s human trafficking problems and said, “This is a serious political provocation against North Korea and typical expression of hostile policy.” According to the spokesperson, human trafficking does not exist in the socialist North Korea.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Alexander Lukashevich said on the day of the report’s release that Russia will never accept the U.S. “2012 Trafficking in Persons Report” because it is politically biased; the U.S. assessed Russia’s performance fighting against human trafficking solely on the basis of its domestic legislation.

Lukashevich told the media that Russia does not deny its own problems combating human trafficking, but it absolutely rejects another country’s arbitrary labeling and demands to comply with its domestic legislation. The U.S. criticized Russia completely in accordance with U.S. domestic legislation, and Russia “absolutely cannot accept it.” He said that this report is politically motivated and has a double standard: The U.S. believes that it has done an excellent job in combating human trafficking itself, while considering every country it dislikes to have serious human trafficking issues.

Alexander Lukashevich listed many problems the U.S. has in combating human trafficking. He said that the U.S. is the world’s largest destination country for human trafficking. Each year, 100,000 to 500,000 illegal immigrants are trafficked to engage in hard labor. The U.S. supplies its soldiers stationed in foreign countries with prostitutes yet remained silent on that in the report. In addition, each year 100,000 minors become child prostitutes, and many adopted children grow up forced to do slave-like jobs or work in the pornography industry. Lukashevich said that the U.S. expects other countries to emulate it while it has many problems of its own, so it is doubtful that the U.S.’ practices will result in any real effect.

Josefina Vidal Ferrero, head of the North American division of the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said that Cuba strongly rejects the U.S. once again including it on the list of countries with human trafficking problems. Vidal Ferrero said that the U.S. is one of the main destination countries for human trafficking.

Ferrero said in a statement published on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that “Cuba strongly rejects the new inclusion in the list of countries that do not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking in persons and are not making significant efforts to do so. Cuba demands the end to the use of this issue to attempt to discredit the country and justify the each day more rejected and shameful policy of sanctions against its people. Cuba is one of the countries in the world that exhibits an exemplary performance in the protection of childhood, the youth and women.” On the contrary, “the U.S. is one of the main destinations for trafficking in persons in the world.”

In accordance with the classification criteria of the U.S. Department of State, countries with the best performance in combating human trafficking and rescuing victims are classified as Tier 1 countries; countries that are committed to combating human trafficking but have not yet met international standards are classified as Tier 2 countries; those countries in Tier 2 that have not made significant progress are included in the list of Tier 3 countries.