HUMAN TRAFFIC FOREIGN GIRLS ARE PAYING FOR CANADA’S LAXED LAWS
St.Catharines, Chatham, Halifax: terminus points on the
Underground Railway, the train of safe houses and
abolitionist contacts that brought slaves to freedom in
Canada. It is a point of historical pride, a cornerstone in
the effort to build a free and tolerant and society. There is
no evidence of these traditional values in the fight against
modern slavery in Canada.
Every year an estimated 900,000 girls and women are
trafficked from Eastern Europe into sexual slavery, says
journalist Victor Malarek’s The Natashas: The New Global
Sex Trade. They end up in the Middle East, Asia and North
America.
It isn’t clear how many women and girls are victims of
sexual slavery in Canada, but one paper commissioned by
Status of Women estimates that 8,000 to 16,000—half
being under 18—are harboured into the country every
year. In contrast, 18,000 to 20,000 people are trafficked to
the U.S., with the UN estimating that about two million
are trafficked annually world–wide.
According to Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Canada (PSEPC), organised crime groups have used
“Aboriginal children, as well as Eastern European women
and children, in trafficking between provinces for the
purposes of prostitution, among other activities”—forced
marriages and bonded or indentured labour for
agricultural work, domestic service and sweatshops.
There is a difference between human trafficking and
human smuggling. Human smugglers are in the
transportation business and, for a fee, move people from
point A to B using illegal channels. Human traffickers are
in the flesh business, recruiting and entrapping victims
to sell to the highest bidder. They don’t even use the
same routes.
In Canada human trafficking usually begins with legal
permits. Women enter the country on student or visitor
visas with others getting permission to work as “buskers”
