Latest news with #traffickers
Fast Company
6 days ago
- Fast Company
4 steps CEOs can take to stop exploitation in their business
Human trafficking and exploitation are closer than many realize. In a recent UC Irvine study —'Americans' Perceptions of Human Trafficking in the United States'—86.2% of respondents said they strongly agree that human trafficking is a global problem, but just 36.3% strongly agree that it's a problem in their own state. Of course, trafficking is a problem in every state. It happens in cities, suburbs, and rural areas. It happens in your office, in your supply chain, and on websites you use every day. Nowhere is immune. This is a blind spot for the public and business leaders, and one that can put your employees at risk and expose your organization to serious liability. When you imagine trafficking to be a problem elsewhere or that Hollywood tropes reflect reality, you can overlook the systemic nature of exploitation. Only by understanding the truth behind common misconceptions can business leaders take steps to root it out. THE BIGGEST MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT HUMAN TRAFFICKING Many people think trafficking always involves kidnapping—51% of people surveyed said 'targeted kidnapping/abduction' was one of the top five ways victims are recruited or lured into human trafficking situations. More often, traffickers use fraud or coercion, building trust with their victims and exploiting vulnerabilities like poverty and social isolation. Another misconception is that trafficking always involves movement across borders. It can, but many victims of exploitation never leave their community or even their home. We're seeing more of these cases as systematic, organized, tech-facilitated exploitation gives traffickers new ways to feed on existing vulnerabilities. Social media, dating apps, and other online platforms offer traffickers new sources to groom victims with promises of work or romance, only to coerce them into forced labor or commercial sex. Fraudulent job ads lure the economically vulnerable into forced labor. Relationships born online can transform through coercion into exploitation monetized on platforms like OnlyFans. Online sextortion is a growing problem, and child sexual abuse material (CSAM) continues to proliferate. Online scams, often dismissed as bot comments, are often staffed by thousands of victims exploited by criminal syndicates. Even content moderation, often carried out in Africa and Asia, can be exploitative, exposing victims to traumatizing imagery, often for little more than a fast food lunch in compensation. Misconceptions about where and how trafficking happens allow exploitation to flourish as the public and business leaders focus their attention elsewhere. HOW MISCONCEPTIONS CAN COST YOUR BUSINESS When you're looking in the wrong places for exploitation—or not looking at all—your company faces reputational and financial risks. The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, as well as various state laws, can create civil and criminal exposure. Just this year, a group of Indonesian fishermen sued Bumble Bee Foods under the TVPRA, alleging the company 'knowingly benefited' from forced labor in its supply chain. In another recent incident, at least four parts suppliers for Hyundai and Kia in Alabama were employing children as young as 12 to operate machinery, leading to investigations, fines, and lawsuits. The company claimed ignorance, but that didn't slow the consequences or headlines. Italian prosecutors placed Dior's manufacturing arm under administration after a subcontractor—which had passed multiple audits—was found to be a front for another company that exploited undocumented workers. These are just a few examples from the past few years, and only what has been uncovered. Companies that accept the myths about exploitation, content to let their business run in ignorance of how their supply chain operates, are not only tacitly supporting exploitation but inviting a wave of legal, government, and public blowback. 4 STEPS EVERY BUSINESS LEADER SHOULD TAKE RIGHT NOW TO PREVENT EXPLOITATION 1. Scrutinize Your Supply Chain As Dior found out, cursory audits won't cut it. Map your entire supply chain to identify high-risk areas. Don't stop with direct suppliers—look into subcontractors and subsuppliers, too. Implement unannounced inspections. Interview individual workers confidentially. Only by holding your supply chain to the highest standards and most transparent practices can you be confident that it's free of exploitation. 2. Embrace New Technology Like AI Prioritize piloting new technology as a way to increase your competitiveness and advance your business, but also to better abide by your ethics. AI tools, for example, can clarify the origin of product parts and raw materials in your supply chain and better identify signs of forced labor. Even companies with clean supplier audits have used these types of AI tools to spot vendors exploiting workers. 3. Create Reporting Systems Anonymous reporting mechanisms, available 24/7 and in multiple languages, encourage employees to report suspected exploitation without fear of retribution. Kymera International, for example, requires all employees to report trafficking in any part of the company's business or supply chains, and offers several ways to do so, including an anonymous tip line. Johnson & Johnson has its ' Our Credo Integrity Line,' which is operated by a third party and allows for confidential reporting. 4. Partner With And Support Survivor-Centered Organizations The most effective way to address misconceptions around trafficking is through survivor-led education and storytelling that highlights the individual experiences of survivors that go beyond common public perceptions. Firsthand accounts show the complexities of trafficking and dispel harmful stereotypes that often overshadow the realities of exploitation. By partnering with these organizations, you can help spread these stories and help your team recognize the red flags of exploitation through awareness training that highlights survivors' diverse backgrounds and experiences. BETTER AWARENESS MEANS BETTER LEADERSHIP Unfortunately, trafficking is not a distant problem. It starts in our communities, our workplaces, and across tech platforms. It persists because traffickers exploit their victims' vulnerabilities, survivors lack support, and too many still believe the myths that mask reality. Business leaders have the unique power to disrupt the networks of exploitation by taking measures across their operations and supply chains. By correcting myths and grounding policies and efforts in survivors' stories, we can better support survivors and prevent exploitation wherever it occurs.
Yahoo
23-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Greece to deploy frigates off Libya to curb increased migrant flows, PM says
ATHENS (Reuters) -Greece will deploy two frigates and one more vessel off Libya's territorial waters to deter migrants from arriving at its southern islands of Crete and Gavdos, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Monday. Mitsotakis did not elaborate on the role of the vessels or explain what they would do, but said the move would be in coordination with Libyan authorities and the rest of the European forces operating in the area. Sea arrivals from northeastern Libya of migrants trying to cross to Europe mainly from the Middle East and North Africa, including war-torn Sudan, have surged in recent months. More than 800 migrants have tried to reach Greece's southern islands since Thursday. Mitsotakis told Greek President Constantine Tassoulas that the issue was discussed during a national security and defence council on Sunday and that the situation was alarming. "I have asked the defence minister... to ensure that Greek Navy vessels are deployed off Libya's territorial waters to pre-emptively ... send a message that traffickers will not command who enters our country," he said. The three ships, including a support vessel would leave Greece in next coming days, two government officials with knowledge of the issue told Reuters. Greece has been a favoured gateway to the European Union for migrants and refugees from the Middle East, Africa and Asia since 2015 when nearly 1 million people landed on its islands, causing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. Since then migrant flows from Turkey have dropped significantly. In more recent years, Greece has seen a rise in arrivals from Libya - including Sudanese nationals fleeing Egypt as well as Egyptian and Bangladeshi nationals - and Athens and Cairo have discussed the spike in migration flows. Greece and Libya have been trying to mend relations strained by an accord signed in 2019 between the Libyan government and Turkey.
Reuters
23-06-2025
- Politics
- Reuters
Greece to deploy frigates off Libya to curb increased migrant flows, PM says
ATHENS, June 23 (Reuters) - Greece will deploy two frigates and one more vessel off Libya's territorial waters to deter migrants from arriving at its southern islands of Crete and Gavdos, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Monday. Mitsotakis did not elaborate on the role of the vessels or explain what they would do, but said the move would be in coordination with Libyan authorities and the rest of the European forces operating in the area. Sea arrivals from northeastern Libya of migrants trying to cross to Europe mainly from the Middle East and North Africa, including war-torn Sudan, have surged in recent months. More than 800 migrants have tried to reach Greece's southern islands since Thursday. Mitsotakis told Greek President Constantine Tassoulas that the issue was discussed during a national security and defence council on Sunday and that the situation was alarming. "I have asked the defence minister... to ensure that Greek Navy vessels are deployed off Libya's territorial waters to pre-emptively ... send a message that traffickers will not command who enters our country," he said. The three ships, including a support vessel would leave Greece in next coming days, two government officials with knowledge of the issue told Reuters. Greece has been a favoured gateway to the European Union for migrants and refugees from the Middle East, Africa and Asia since 2015 when nearly 1 million people landed on its islands, causing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. Since then migrant flows from Turkey have dropped significantly. In more recent years, Greece has seen a rise in arrivals from Libya - including Sudanese nationals fleeing Egypt as well as Egyptian and Bangladeshi nationals - and Athens and Cairo have discussed the spike in migration flows. Greece and Libya have been trying to mend relations strained by an accord signed in 2019 between the Libyan government and Turkey.
Daily Mail
20-06-2025
- Daily Mail
Inside the migrant gateway to Britain that staff say is a TINDERBOX: Manston is where most illegal boat migrants are taken for processing, but the truth about what happens there is as alarming as it's scandalous
They are the first words uttered by boat migrants to British authorities after they set foot on our soil: 'Where is the hotel?' It is what they invariably say when they get off buses at the giant migrant reception camp on a former RAF base in Manston, Kent – the centre that processes all who arrive on traffickers' boats. We know this because, for the first time, whistleblowers at Manston have talked to the Mail in an investigation that lays bare in terrifying detail how overwhelmed staff struggle to adequately process the sheer numbers of migrants arriving on peak crossing days at Manston's doors. The whistleblowers told us that inadequate checks mean they are powerless to prevent migrants who have criminal pasts from being released on to Britain's streets, and staying in hotels across the country. 'They ask us that hotel question immediately,' a young male worker at the camp said this week. 'They expect to get a hotel bed straight away and that is one key reason they come to the UK. We are told not to answer – to distract them by offering a bag of crisps or a bottle of water.' So pressing is the concern about where they will stay, added the workers, that 'only the fear of not being given a hotel stops them misbehaving or running out of control at the camp. They could overwhelm us by sheer numbers in what feels like a tinderbox about to explode'. The Manston workers said they are told by the Home Office to refer to the thousands of migrants passing through the camp as 'residents' as if they are paying guests. Alarmingly, they are instructed not to talk about their private life to migrants, who are mainly young men, in case the information puts them at risk after the strangers leave the camp and are free to roam Britain. 'We must not say if we have children, for instance, or where we live because our families could be targeted by one of these foreign men at a later date,' the Mail was told. The whistleblowers talked to the Mail on the phone, via social media, face to face, and through intermediaries. All spoke on the condition of anonymity, for fear of reprisals from the Home Office which runs the camp amid great secrecy. Some have left Manston recently; others still do occasional shifts there on security, medical, cleaning, catering or administration duties. What emerged from our conversations is a deeply concerning picture of a migrant reception centre they described as 'chaos' and 'a joke'. And crucially, a centre where migrants 'routinely lie' about their backgrounds, their ages, and their nationalities – so no one can discover whether they have a criminal past. 'Most coming in are men. No one knows who they are, or their history,' a worker said. 'The men could be murderers or paedophiles. They throw away their identity documents either in France before getting on a boat or at sea when they are travelling over.' Another worker added: 'We know what the migrants tell us is often a falsehood but there is nothing we can do. We have to write it on their records as though it is the truth. 'Time and again, the migrants give us the same fantasy story as if they have learned a script. The Afghans say they are running from the Taliban. Some Africans from strict religious countries say they are gay and they will be killed at home for their homosexuality. A lot even give the same birth date of January 1.' A third worker explained: 'Britain is being hoodwinked. We have to accept at face value that their name and country is correct. There is no way of telling because, since Brexit, the EU police don't allow Britain to cross check the fingerprints or information collected when the migrant first entered Europe before arriving at Calais for the boats. 'Some will have been deported from EU countries for crimes. Some will have spent time in prison abroad. 'But we don't know – we can only start with a blank sheet. Yet within days these strangers are sprinkled around the country. If they are considered a potential danger to us staff, why are they not considered a risk to the British public?' At least 150,000 migrants have arrived on traffickers' boats to Britain in the last seven years. Nearly 2,000 have sailed over in the last 8 days, bringing the tally since Labour took office last July close to 40,000. Today, hundreds more throng on the French coast waiting to cross the 21 miles to Dover. All the boat arrivals are put on buses from Dover port to Manston reception camp for fingerprinting and background checks. They spend 24 hours in a 'custody' marquee, before being moved to on-site chalets for up to three days as medicals are performed and more forms filled in. At least 90 per cent of them claim asylum, telling Manston staff they face persecution, oppression, or war in their home country. They are not allowed mobiles at the camp, but are permitted to use on-site phones to call immigration lawyers for advice. Within 'normally just 72 hours', they are bussed out, in vehicles with darkened windows and often at night, to requisitioned hotels or leased Home Office houses up and down Britain. 'The Manston staff are getting depressed, even suicidal,' claimed one of our informants. 'As for the migrants themselves, the men often have sexually transmitted diseases, and scabies affects a lot of them. 'I have seen foreign mothers so tired and dehydrated as they waited in the custody marquee on a hard seat, that they nearly let their babies slip from their laps to the ground. 'The sights you see are unimaginable. Some 'residents' are whole families of three generations from the grandfather to his grandchildren. They are clearly here seeking a better life but still claim to be asylum seekers.' Our probe into the camp coincided with a damning report this week that exposed the extent of child rape grooming gangs in Britain's towns and cities. The author, Baroness Casey, revealed for the first time that asylum seekers and foreign nationals are involved in a 'significant proportion' of the around 12 live police investigations into this hideous crime. The disclosure has led Home Secretary Yvette Cooper to accept Baroness Casey's recommendation for the mandatory collection of the ethnicity and nationality of all child sex abuse suspects. Foreign-born paedophiles will, in future, be banned from claiming asylum. Ministry of Justice data also shows that one in five child-sex offence convictions involves foreign nationals. The worrying statistic was handed to the Independent MP Rupert Lowe who is running his own national 'Rape Gang Inquiry' after the Government initially refused to do so. He says not a 'single foreign national should be in our country raping children'. Shadow Home Secretary, Tory Chris Philp has also stated that a 'significant' number of the paedophiles involved in grooming gangs are asylum seekers or foreigners. 'More illegal immigrants have entered the UK across the Channel so far this year than any other in history,' he added. All this is highly relevant to what is going on at Manston and begs the question of whether the checks made there are worth the paper they are printed on. Last year the Mail published a map of England showing where asylum seekers had been convicted of crimes, including paedophilia, rape, knife attacks and murders, around the country. Many had slipped in by boat across the Channel. Our report highlighted an Afghan asylum seeker, Rasuili Zubaidullah, 22, who had drugged, raped and killed a 13-year-old girl in Vienna, Austria, in 2020. Just weeks after committing the crime, as a manhunt for him was launched by Vienna police, he sailed to Britain on a trafficker's boat using a fake name. Saying he was a refugee, he was sent to a migrants' hotel in Whitechapel, east London. Only when Austrian immigration police tracked him to the hotel, alerting the British, was he deported to face a trial which led to his murder conviction. What is plainly an asylum charade has been going on for years. It began well before Manston was opened in 2022 in response to traffickers sending more and more small boats with migrants across the Channel. Almost 20 years ago, under Tony Blair's Labour government, the Mail first blew open the scandal of asylum seekers and their links to crime. In 2006 we exposed the case of Oule Doucoure, an African who was then 23, who smuggled himself into Britain – on what was believed to be a Channel ferry lorry – before raping and half strangling a young nanny in a terrifying assault. Doucoure, who had found work as a kitchen porter working in the restaurant of Harvey Nichols' store in Knightsbridge, spied the 21-year-old woman on a London bus and followed her home. He nearly killed the woman who fainted in the attack. He was jailed and immediately claimed political asylum, joining the 3,500-strong ranks of asylum seekers among 11,000 foreign criminals in our prisons. Doucoure had destroyed his passport and refused to tell the authorities who he was or which country he came from – just as so many arriving at Manston do. Back then, one in every ten foreign criminals was deliberately obscuring their identity and country of birth to hamper deportation. The result? Like Doucoure, whose whereabouts is now unknown, they were deemed to be stateless convicts who, therefore, could not be sent back anywhere whatever their bad deeds. What is certain, is that some asylum seekers – including a number of those coming in on the boats through Manston and currently living in hotels – are involved in sex crimes against under-age British women and girls. Only this week an Afghan asylum seeker who raped a 15-year-old after following her in a Scottish town centre was jailed for nine years. Sadeq Nikzad, 29, attacked the teenager in Falkirk in 2023 soon after arriving illegally on a small boat. His lawyers told the judge he had not been educated in 'cultural differences' between Britain and Afghanistan. We have monitored the websites of self-appointed 'online child protection' teams, Britons who snare internet predators of under-age girls and hand them to the police. The videos are shocking viewing. In one sting, a man said to be an asylum seeker from Afghanistan is caught by a team in Newcastle upon Tyne after attempting to meet a 14-year-old British girl. He says on video: 'I want to meet my little girl. I will marry and convert her (to Islam). Get the police. I don't care.' Another video from a team shows the capture of 'lonely' asylum seeker Kalid Oryakhel. He had been in the country nine months and living in a Home Office migrants' hotel in Otley, near Leeds, when he tried to groom two young girls on-line. A court in 2023 heard the 26-year-old 'predator', believed to be an Afghan, had invited the children to 'make love' in the hotel garden, then sent them lewd messages and a three-minute film of him masturbating. He was found guilty and jailed for 45 months. Our contacts among the online protection teams told us this week: 'The migrant hotels do harbour sex pests and predators. It is naïve to say otherwise. 'They are getting to live among us in Britain and are endangering our children.' None of this would surprise the Manston whistleblowers who are ordered by the Home Office never to talk about their work. 'We have got to the point where we cannot remain silent,' said one of them. And who, in all honesty, can blame them?
Telegraph
18-06-2025
- General
- Telegraph
French police fail to stop Channel migrant on crutches
French police failed to prevent a man using a crutch from getting into a migrant boat setting out across the Channel. The man, who leant heavily on the crutch, was one of several dozen people who boarded a dinghy off a stretch of beach near Calais It comes after Sir Keir Starmer admitted that the small-boats crisis is getting worse, and ahead of an expected surge in crossings due to warmer weather. Just after first light on Wednesday morning, the man with the crutch was among a group of migrants, marshalled by a trafficker wearing a mask, who made their way across the long sandy beach at Gravelines and into the shallow waters. French police were nowhere to be seen. His companions had helped him wade out to the boat and cries of encouragement could be heard as he climbed aboard the tiny, overladen dinghy. Unlike many of his fellow passengers, he was not wearing a lifejacket. The number of people arriving on small boats across the Channel so far this year is more than 22 per cent higher than it was by this time in 2024. From the beginning of Jan until June 14, 16,317 migrants crossed to the UK. Last year 13,489 had made the journey by the end of June. On Monday, another 228 people crossed in four boats, according to the latest Home Office figures. A further 134 people had managed to reach the UK on Saturday, in two small boats. On Friday, more than 900 migrants crossed in 14 boats – the single largest number for several weeks. Last Thursday, 52 reached the UK coast in one boat, and the day before 400 had made it across in six small boats. The crossing remains perilous. Since the beginning of the year at least 15 people have died at sea while attempting to cross the Channel, according to the French. In 2024, more than 78 migrants died while attempting to reach the UK. On Saturday, the French coastguard said they had rescued almost 100 people who had attempted the crossing on that day and the previous 24 hours. There has been growing frustration at France's apparent foot-dragging, with it stopping fewer than 40 per cent of boats so far this year. It marks the lowest proportion on record despite a three-year Anglo-French deal costing £480 million to combat the crossings. But France's interior ministry has pledged to come up with a new strategy by the time of Franco-British summit – which begins on July 8 – involving police and gendarmes intercepting migrant boats at sea up to 300 metres from the coast for the first time. Matthew Pennycook, a Labour minister, said the reform was part of a series of changes which he said would allow the UK to cut the number of economic migrants and asylum seekers reaching its shores. French police have already begun to adopt more robust tactics, including dousing beaches with tear gas, to try to stop so many small boats leaving northern France. They are also using drones to spot boats along a 75-mile stretch of coastline, which is policed by hundreds of officers. At Gravelines on Wednesday, police officers appeared to be focusing their efforts further inland in a bid to deter migrants from even reaching the beach. The French authorities claim two-thirds of vessels are already being prevented from leaving. The promised crackdown comes as conditions in the migrant camps in northern France appeared to be deteriorating, with rising tensions among those desperate to leave. Two migrants were shot dead in two separate incidents at camps near the town of Dunkirk on Saturday and Sunday, with around five others wounded. All those involved were reported to be of Sudanese origin. French police said that one migrant was shot and killed at a camp at Loon Plage, outside Dunkirk, on Sunday. The shooting came a day after gunfire killed another man in the same area the previous day and left five others wounded. Armed officers arrested two suspected members of an organised gang on Saturday in connection with one of the shootings. A 29-year-old man who claimed to be from Iraq was held, along with a 16-year-old from Afghanistan, the public prosecutor's office said. Salomé Bahri, a volunteer with Utopia 56, a group working with migrants based near Grande-Synthe, site of a large migrant camp outside Dunkirk, told the InfoMigrants news website that there had been 'a lot of tensions in the area . . . in the last two or three weeks'. She said the situation had worsened because of the authorities' attempt to clear out the camps. One, near Loon Plage, is currently home to between 1,500 to 2,000 people, an increase from around 1,000 last winter. 'The tensions are also caused by the trafficking gangs,' said another volunteer. 'You can't say that all the migrants there are causing these tensions. But everything that is happening there, all this violence is also a consequence of the migration policies being carried out at the border.'
