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BL Premium reports that the 2024 Trafficking in Persons Report, produced by the US State Department, indicates that complicity between SA and Lesotho officials has enabled sex trafficking of Basotho women into SA to continue with “impunity”.
According to the report, traffickers recruit victims from neighbouring countries and rural areas in SA, particularly Gauteng, and exploit them in sex trafficking locally and in urban centres, such as Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban and Bloemfontein. “Observers reported prior cases of sex trafficking of Basotho women from Lesotho in SA brothels; however, due to alleged official complicity of both Basotho and SA officials linked to the brothels, they continued to operate with impunity. Traffickers exploit Basotho women in sex trafficking and domestic servitude and men in labour trafficking, particularly in the mining and textile sectors, in SA,” the report found. SA’s high unemployment and socioeconomic stratification increased vulnerability to exploitation, particularly of youth, black women, and foreign migrants. The report identified social media as one of the platforms traffickers used to find victims. This was done via fake job advertisements on social media and classified advertisement forums, including advertisements for webcam modelling, hospitality, mining and domestic work. SA police last week rescued 90 Ethiopian migrants who were being held against their will at a property in Johannesburg. Police said the migrants, believed to be victims of human trafficking, were packed into small rooms and kept locked up. The US state department report has urged SA to increase efforts to investigate and prosecute trafficking crimes and seek adequate penalties for convicted traffickers, including complicit officials, which should involve significant prison terms.
Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Kabelo Khumalo at BusinessLive (subscriber access only)
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