UNITED NATION'S PEACEKEEPERS KEEPING MORE THAN PEACE

Sri Lankan authorities were involved in the investigation
Sri Lanka troops 'abused Haitians'

The UN is sending home more than 100 of the 950 Sri Lankan peacekeepers in Haiti, accusing them of sexual abuse, including with underage girls.

The UN said the troops had paid for sex and that some of the girls were minors.
UN peacekeepers have been involved in a series of sex-abuse scandals, including this year in Ivory Coast, where 800 were suspended.

The organisation said it had a "zero tolerance" policy but it was up to the supplying nations to discipline troops.

A 2005 UN report suggested a central disciplining policy but member nations could not agree.

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7075866.stm

INTERNATIONAL HUMAN TRAFFICKING VICTIMS GET HOME IN WASHINGTON STATE

ERIKA SCHULTZ / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Trong and Rani Hong are creating the first home in the state for international human-trafficking victims

Survivors of sorrow shelter the exploited
By Lornet Turnbull
The Seattle Times staff reporter

As a 7-year-old girl in southern India in 1978, she was taken from her parents and sold into slavery.

At the same time, a 9-year-old boy in Southeast Asia was surviving alone in a cave, after the fishing boat on which he was fleeing Vietnam became shipwrecked.

Rani and Trong Hong would eventually be rescued from their separate childhood nightmares and brought to safety in Washington state. They would meet as adults on a blind date, fall in love and marry.

Years passed before they shared the stories of their own sad pasts with one another — he because he chose not to remember, she because she couldn't, the trauma so great it had forced to her forget.

Now, motivated by the pain of their early years to help others, they are renovating a home exclusively for victims of human trafficking — people recruited, transported and harbored for sexual exploitation or slave labor.

(snip)
The U.S. government estimates that 14,500 to 17,500 victims are trafficked into the U.S. annually and about 1.2 million worldwide, although only a fraction are ever discovered.

In 2002, Washington became the first state to pass trafficking legislation and establish a task force whose member agencies, headquartered in Seattle, work with about 40 victims a year.

As a port city, Seattle is a hotbed for trafficking. Victims are often women and children — although men are trafficked, too — brought here from countries in Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe.



The Seattle Times
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis.cgi/web/vortex/display?slug=trafficking29m&date=20071029&query=LORNET+TURNBULL

Human trafficking is a sad crime. Trong and Rani Hong are devoting their lives to help other victims to escape and to survive.