UN Agency Involvement and Impact

In 1999 the Office of the UN High Commissioner located in Geneva took on the responsibility of dealing with human trafficking at the international, regional and national levels. The OHCHR trafficking program builds anti-trafficking initiatives to address problems and produce technical solutions at the legal and political levels and has a two-prong strategy which aims to ameliorate the economic and social conditions which sustain the phenomenon of trafficking and prioritizes the protection of victim’s rights.

In 2000 the UN General Assembly adopted the Protocol to Prevent Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children as a supplement to the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC). To date, 110 countries have ratified the Protocol whereas 76 have yet to do so. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNDOC established in 1997), which has been tasked with addressing how crimes associated with transnational trafficking and the protection of trafficking victims are handled in the criminal justice system, was named the custodian of the Protocol. UNICEF, the UN Children’s Fund, is another high-profile agency involved in the issue of trafficking and its relationship with child labor, illegal adoption, abuse and sexual exploitation.

The UN’s framing of human trafficking has focused on women and children while linking the phenomenon to issues of human rights, criminality and security. Assigning custodianship to UNDOC helped to heighten the profile of the UN’s efforts by framing human trafficking as a crime against humanity perpetrated by criminal networks. On its website, UNDOC stresses prevention, prosecution of traffickers, and protection of trafficked persons. The agency estimates that there are between two and four million persons trafficked annually which contributes to the framing of trafficking as a serious problem which authorities and civil society actors need to eliminate.

UNDOC initially established the Global Programme Against Trafficking in Human Beings (GPAT) to monitor instances of trafficking and in March of 2007 launched UN.GIFT with a grant provided by the United Arab Emirates. UN.GIFT has been designed to consolidate and coordinate the global fight against human trafficking. The agency works with a broad array of stakeholders in government, business, academia, civil society and the media with the objective of fostering new partnerships and to develop better means by which to fight transnational organized crime. It provides a forum for governments and civil society organizations such as Secours Catholique, Caritas, European Women’s Lobby, and the Samilia Foundation and representatives of UN member states. The agency has helped launch the Women Leaders’ Council which sustains a dialog among female professionals working in fields related to the prevention of trafficking.

In February of 2008, UN.GIFT organized The Vienna Forum to fight Human Trafficking which was attended by representatives from 118 countries. Many workshops were held, including one entitled “The Role of the Media” (organized by the Advocacy Section of UNDOC) which addressed the framing of human trafficking in the media. As recent as two weeks ago UNDOC released a new “Tool Kit” for professionals working with the issue of trafficking. Therefore, it appears that the UN is now actively involved in bringing human trafficking, a global agenda item, to broader audiences at the local, regional and international level. By heightening awareness and coordinating efforts to suppress trafficking, the UN hopes to persuade the remaining 76 countries who have not yet ratified the Protocol to Prevent Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children to do so.