PH efforts vs. human trafficking rewarded in US report

MANILA – The Philippines has retained its Tier 1 status in the United States’ 2021 index on trafficking in persons (TIP).

According to the US State Department, a Tier 1 ranking indicates that a government has made efforts to address TIP and has demonstrated “appreciable progress each year in combating” the problem.

“The Government of the Philippines fully meets the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking. The government continued to demonstrate serious and sustained efforts during the reporting period, considering the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on its anti-trafficking capacity; therefore, the Philippines remained on Tier 1,” read the US 2021 TIP Report obtained on Friday.

The efforts include prosecuting more traffickers than the previous reporting period, including “significantly more defendants charged with using child soldiers and sentencing the majority of convicted traffickers to significant terms of imprisonment”.

The report also cited the increase in prosecutors assigned to anti-trafficking task forces and the opening of a specialized shelter and one-stop service center in Manila that has provided assistance to more than 1,000 victims.

From April 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021, the Philippines initiated prosecution of 377 alleged traffickers, up from 266 in 2019. These included 36 labor trafficking defendants, 272 sex trafficking defendants, and 69 defendants charged with using a child for soldiering.

The government also convicted 73 traffickers under the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act and related laws.

The report also cited that pandemic mitigation efforts forced human traffickers to go online.

“Online recruitment and grooming increased as children spent more time online for virtual learning due to school closures, often with little parental supervision. Reports from several countries demonstrated drastic increases in online commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking, including online sexual exploitation of children (OSEC), and demand for and distribution of child sexual exploitation material (CSEM), including content that involved human trafficking victims,” the report read.

In the Philippines, the report said there was an increase of nearly 300 percent in referrals for potential online sex trafficking and OSEC cases from March to May 2020 when Covid-19 lockdowns were imposed.

Among the report’s recommendations were:
• Increase efforts to investigate, prosecute, and convict complicit officials and labor traffickers.
• Strengthen the capacity of local government units to provide reintegration services for trafficking survivors
• Increase support to government and non-government programs that provide specialized care for trafficking victims, including child victims of online sexual exploitation.
• Increase resources for anti-trafficking task forces while providing robust victim and witness assistance services.
•Create a central database for information on illegal recruiters and human trafficking cases to facilitate interagency coordination in detecting, investigating, and prosecuting traffickers

The State Department releases the TIP report annually.

In 2016, the Philippines’ status was raised from Tier 2 to 1, which has been maintained for six consecutive years now.