| dc.description.abstract | Over the past decade, human trafficking has moved from the margins to the mainstream of international concern. During this period we have witnessed the rapid development of a comprehensive legal framework that comprises international and regional treaties, as well as a broad range of soft-law instruments relating to trafficking. These changes confirm that a fundamental shift has taken place in how the international community thinks about human exploitation. It also confirms a change in our expectations of what Governments and others should be doing to deal with trafficking and to prevent it.
My Office has been at the forefront of efforts to promote a human rights-based approach to trafficking. As this Commentary makes clear, such an approach requires understanding of the ways in which human rights violations arise throughout the trafficking cycle and of the ways in which States’ obligations arise under international human rights law. This approach seeks to both identify and redress the discriminatory practices and the unequal distribution of power that underlie trafficking, which maintain impunity for traffickers and deny justice to their victims.
On a very practical level, a human rightsbased approach to trafficking requires an
acknowledgement that trafficking is, first and foremost, a violation of human rights. Trafficking and the practices with which it is associated, including slavery, sexual exploitation, child labour, forced labour, debt bondage and forced marriage, are themselves violations of the basic human rights to which all persons are entitled. Trafficking disproportionately affects those whose rights may already be seriously compromised, including women, children, migrants, refugees and persons with disabilities. A human rights approach to trafficking also demands that we acknowledge the responsibility of Governments to protect and promote the rights of all persons within their jurisdiction, including non-citizens. This responsibility translates into a legal obligation on Governments to work towards eliminating trafficking and related exploitation.
A human rights approach to trafficking means that all those involved in anti-trafficking efforts should integrate human rights into their analysis of the problem and into their responses. This approach requires us to consider, at each and every stage, the impact that a law, policy, practice or measure may have on persons who have been trafficked and persons who are vulnerable to being trafficked. It means rejecting responses that compromise rights and freedoms. This is the only way to retain a focus on the trafficked persons: to ensure that trafficking is not simply reduced to a problem of migration, a problem of public order or a problem of organized crime.
It was on the basis of such convictions that my predecessor, Mary Robinson, led the development of the Recommended Principles and Guidelines on Human Rights and Human Trafficking and transmitted them to the United Nations Economic and Social Council in 2002. She explained that their development was her Office’s response to the clear need for practical, human rights-based policy guidance, and encouraged States and intergovernmental organizations to make use of them in their own efforts to prevent trafficking and to protect the rights of trafficked persons. The response to this call has been impressive. Since then they have been integrated into numerous policy documents and interpretive texts attached to international and regional treaties, including both the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, and the Council of Europe’s Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings. They have been extensively cited by various international human rights bodies and adopted by the Special Rapporteur on Trafficking in Persons as a major reference point for the work of that mandate. Many non-governmental organizations have used them in their efforts to advocate a stronger and more rights-protective response to trafficking.
It is this very positive response that has paved the way for the present Commentary, a comprehensive analysis of the Principles and Guidelines in the light of both general principles of international law and the specific rules that relate directly to trafficking. The need for such a publication has been repeatedly drawn to the attention of OHCHR. Despite the impressive achievements of the past decade, the rights of individuals and the obligations of States in this area are not yet widely or well understood. As a result, the potential of international law to guide and direct positive change is only partially being fulfilled. The Commentary seeks to remedy this situation. It uses the Principles and Guidelines to structure a detailed overview of the legal aspects of trafficking, focusing particularly but not exclusively on international human rights law.
I commend the Principles and Guidelines and the present Commentary to States, the international human rights system, intergovernmental agencies, civil society groups and all others involved in preventing trafficking, securing justice for those who have been trafficked and ending impunity for those who benefit from the criminal exploitation of their fellow human beings. | en_US |
