Human Trafficking

Human Trafficking Reaches 'Horrific' New Heights, Declares U.N. Report - NPR

Human trafficking has taken on "horrific" dimensions, according to the 2018 Global Report on Trafficking in Persons released this month by the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Nearly 25,000 cases of human trafficking were reported to UNODC in 2016, up from approximately 20,000 in 2014 and 17,000 in 2013.

The report, which looked at data from 142 countries between 2014 and 2016, points to two particularly disturbing trends, says Angela Me, chief of the research and trend team at UNODC. The first is the increasing number of girls forced into trafficking, most frequently for sexual exploitation. The other is the growing prevalence of trafficking as a tool of war.

Sexual exploitation remains the most common form of human trafficking, at 59 percent of all victims, says Me. But there are many other types of exploitation. Forced labor is the second most prevalent form of trafficking, at 34 percent overall and 82 percent for men, with the greatest prevalence in southern, east and west Africa, and the countries of the Middle East. Between 5 and 10 percent of all kidney and liver donations worldwide [are] derived from trafficking.

- Father, we pray for these captives to be set free, with both them and their captors coming to salvation through Your Son, Jesus.

- "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed ," (Luke 4:18).