World Day Against Trafficking in Persons

According to various studies, human trafficking is the third largest crime industry in the world behind drug dealing and arms trafficking—which are also often connected to human trafficking—and is the fastest growing activity of transnational criminal organisations. Bangladesh, like all other countries of the world, has been suffering greatly from this evil. Recently, Interpol released details of "Operation Liberterra", a mission coordinated by authorities in dozens of states which led to the rescue of 430 human trafficking victims and the arrest of 286 suspects. The victims included migrants and underage girls who were being smuggled to Greece from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Syria.

Judging from recent news reports and research findings, it seems that human trafficking from Bangladesh is on the rise. Whether that is actually the case or is due to the authorities doing a better job of capturing the criminals responsible for this evil is hard to determine, but what is obvious is that thousands of people are falling victim to traffickers every year. And much of it is due to people desperately trying to migrate abroad for better jobs, unware of the dangers of getting trafficked and being forced into various forms of slavery in the process.

Over the past couple of years, the authorities have certainly done a better job in terms of fighting human traffickers and rescuing trafficking victims, which has led to Bangladesh earning itself an upgrade to Tier 2 in the ranking of countries fighting trafficking, according to a US report. In the process, a few trafficking masterminds have also been identified and captured, and it was discovered that one way or another, most of them were either politically connected or themselves politically powerful individuals. This also illustrates how people who are influential and powerful in society are running such criminal networks, using their connections to benefit themselves from what is essentially a form of modern-day slavery. This obviously makes it more difficult to fight human trafficking. Nevertheless, the authorities must take every step necessary to stop this crime.

Promoting safe migration is a proven strategy to reduce vulnerability to trafficking. The government should also invest in skills development of prospective migrants to ensure greater security for them. Investment in making higher-quality pre-departure information available is equally important, as is the provision of protection by Bangladeshi representations to migrants abroad. However, at the end of the day, given the nature of this crime and trafficking networks being transnational in their set-ups, the authorities must coordinate with other countries in transnational actions to stop human trafficking—by reducing the operational space for organised trafficking and smuggling networks.