South Sudan, IOM join forces to fight human trafficking

Juba, South Sudan | XINHUA | South Sudan and the UN migration agency, International Organization for Migration (IOM) on Wednesday joined forces to fight human trafficking in the east African country.

IOM said it helped the South Sudanese government set up a body to help the conflict-torn country track and respond to human trafficking.

Majak Akec Malok, Inspector General of Police, said the partnership with IOM will boost the country’s efforts to combat trafficking.

Established late last year, the Technical Task Force on Anti-Trafficking in Persons and Smuggling of Migrants will enable the government to respond, raise awareness and train front line actors on victim identification and participate in regional policy dialogues and evidence collection on data.

The body released its first report in Juba on Wednesday, which finds that there is widespread human trafficking ongoing in South Sudan.

The report indicates that the prevalent forms of trafficking in South Sudan are forced recruitment into armed forces and armed groups, forced marriage, domestic servitude and sexual exploitation particularly among women and children, as well as labor exploitation.

It added that human traffickers took advantage of ill-equipped government institutions to target and exploit vulnerable groups.

******

XINHUA