Human Trafficing

Human trafficking like prostitution has been around for many years. It is a fact that more

money than one can imagine has been made selling humans to the highest bidder. It is also a

fact that money made from human trafficking finds its way into the hands of drug lords. Drug

lords than turn around and give the money to support terrorist activities. This could not have

been made more evident to the United States than on September 11, 2001. What can the

United States' with the help of the United Nations do about countries actively involved in human

trafficking?In1865, President Abraham Lincoln and the United States Congress ratified the 13

th

Amendment of the Constitution which states neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall exist

within the United States.

1

Over the past decade, trafficking in human beings has reached

epidemic proportions. No country is immune, including the United States. Traffickers operate in

our own country, stalking our own citizens, especially our children. "The U. S. State

Department's 2005 Report on Human Trafficking estimates that between 600,000 to 800,000

people are trafficked across international borders every year and almost 20,000 are trafficked

across U.S. borders alone."

2

What is more disturbing than that number is that half of all

trafficking victims are children under the age of eighteen. United States law enforcement has

documented cases of Latvian girls trafficked into sexual slavery in Chicago, or Ukrainian girls

trafficked in Los Angeles, and Maryland, or Thai, Korean, Malaysian and Vietnamese girls

trafficked in Georgia, or Mexican girls trafficked in California, New Jersey and Florida. Like

slave