[House Hearing, 113 Congress] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office] EFFECTIVE ACCOUNTABILITY: TIER RANKINGS IN THE FIGHT AGAINST HUMAN TRAFFICKING ======================================================================= HEARING BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, GLOBAL HUMAN RIGHTS, AND INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION __________ APRIL 29, 2014 __________ Serial No. 113-193 __________ Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/ ______ U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 87-712 PDF WASHINGTON : 2014 ----------------------------------------------------------------------- For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512-1800 DC area (202) 512-1800 Fax: (202) 512-2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402-0001 COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American DANA ROHRABACHER, California Samoa STEVE CHABOT, Ohio BRAD SHERMAN, California JOE WILSON, South Carolina GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey TED POE, Texas GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia MATT SALMON, Arizona THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania BRIAN HIGGINS, New York JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina KAREN BASS, California ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts MO BROOKS, Alabama DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island TOM COTTON, Arkansas ALAN GRAYSON, Florida PAUL COOK, California JUAN VARGAS, California GEORGE HOLDING, North Carolina BRADLEY S. SCHNEIDER, Illinois RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas JOSEPH P. KENNEDY III, SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania Massachusetts STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas AMI BERA, California RON DeSANTIS, Florida ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California DOUG COLLINS, Georgia GRACE MENG, New York MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina LOIS FRANKEL, Florida TED S. YOHO, Florida TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii LUKE MESSER, Indiana JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas Amy Porter, Chief of Staff Thomas Sheehy, Staff Director Jason Steinbaum, Democratic Staff Director ------ Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania KAREN BASS, California RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas AMI BERA, California MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina C O N T E N T S ---------- Page WITNESSES The Honorable Mark Lagon, global politics and security chair, master of science in Foreign Service Program, Georgetown University (former Ambassador-at-Large for Trafficking in Persons, U.S. Department of State)............................. 7 Mr. Brian Campbell, director of policy and legal programs, International Labor Rights Forum............................... 17 Mr. Blair Burns, vice president of regional operations, Southeast Asia, International Justice Mission............................ 44 Ms. Nathalie Lummert, director, Special Programs, Migration and Refugee Services, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.......... 53 Wakar Uddin, Ph.D., director general, Arakan Rohingya Union...... 71 LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING The Honorable Mark Lagon: Prepared statement..................... 10 Mr. Brian Campbell: Prepared statement........................... 20 Mr. Blair Burns: Prepared statement.............................. 48 Ms. Nathalie Lummert: Prepared statement......................... 56 Wakar Uddin, Ph.D.: Prepared statement........................... 75 APPENDIX Hearing notice................................................... 96 Hearing minutes.................................................. 97 The Honorable Christopher H. Smith, a Representative in Congress from the State of New Jersey, and chairman, Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations: Written statement for the record by Ms. Mara Hvistendahl....... 98 Written statement for the record by Nora E. Rowley, M.D., M.P.H........................................................ 101 EFFECTIVE ACCOUNTABILITY: TIER RANKINGS IN THE FIGHT AGAINST HUMAN TRAFFICKING ---------- TUESDAY, APRIL 29, 2014 House of Representatives, Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations, Committee on Foreign Affairs, Washington, DC. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 o'clock p.m., in room 2200 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H. Smith (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Mr. Smith. The subcommittee will come to order. Good afternoon and welcome. First of all, let me apologize for the lateness in convening this hearing. We did have a series of votes. And so, I do apologize for that delay. Welcome to this afternoon's hearing on the power of holding countries accountable in the annual Trafficking in Persons Report, including its tier rankings, for government successes or failures in the fight against human trafficking. Experts have observed that there are more slaves in the world today than at any previous time in history. With the Trafficking in Persons Report and tier rankings, the United States is ensuring more accountability and progress, more than ever we believe, in the fight to rid the world of modern-day slavery. Many joining us this afternoon have been in this fight for more than a decade, at least from the year 2000, when a law that I authored, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, created a comprehensive policy that not only established the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons at the Department of State, but also the annual Trafficking in Persons Report. The success of the TIP Report and rankings is beyond anything we could have hoped for at the time. From presidential suites to the halls of parliaments, to law enforcement assets and police stations in remote corners of the world, this report focuses anti-trafficking work in 187 countries on pivotal goals of prevention, prosecution of the traffickers, and protection for the victims. Much of the praise for the success of the TIP Report is due to the incredibly effective Ambassadors-at-Large who have led the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons and their highly-dedicated staff. Ambassador Mark Lagon is one of them, and he is here with us today. We are honored to have him and look forward to hearing from him with his testimony. Each year the trafficking office evaluates whether a government of a country is fully complying with the minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking or, if not, whether the government is making significant efforts to do so. The record is laid bare for the world to see and summarized in a tier rankings narrative. Tier 1 countries fully meet the minimum standards. Tier 2 countries do not meet the minimum standards, but are making significant efforts to do so. Tier 3 countries do not meet the standards and are not making significant efforts to do so. Along with the embarrassment of being listed on Tier 3 as an egregious violator, such countries are open to sanctions by the United States Government. Over the last 14 years, mor than 100 countries have enacted anti-trafficking laws, and many countries have taken other steps required to significantly raise their tier rankings. Some countries openly credit the TIP Report as a key factor in their increased and effective anti-trafficking response. We created the Tier 2 Watch List in the 2003 TVPA reauthorization. This list was intended to encourage good-faith anti-trafficking progress in a country that may have taken positive anti-trafficking steps late in the evaluation year. Unfortunately, some countries made a habit of last-minute efforts and failed to follow through year after year, effectively gaming the system. To protect the integrity of the tier system and ensure it worked properly to inspire progress in the fight against human trafficking, Congress in 2008 created an automatic downgrade for any country that had been on a Tier 2 Watch List for 2 years, but had not taken significant effort enough to move up a tier. The President can waive the automatic downgrade for an additional 2 years if he has certified ``credible evidence'' that the country has a written and sufficiently-resourced plan which, if implemented, would constitute significant efforts to meet the minimum standards. Last year was the first test of the new system, and it worked. China, Russia, and Uzbekistan ran out of waivers and moved to Tier 3, which accurately reflected their records. In this afternoon's hearing, we will evaluate whether these countries have made any significant progress over the last year. I am particularly concerned that China's trafficking crisis continues unabated. The recent U.N. Commission of Inquiry report on North Korea provides horrifying evidence of the trafficking of North Korean women to China for sex, brides, and labor. I would note, parenthetically, that I have chaired at least five hearings that we have heard trafficking victims tell their story, North Korean women, the lucky ones who are finally free from the slavery that they found when they crossed the border into China. An estimated 90 percent of North Korean women seeking asylum in China are trafficked for these reasons. Thousands of women a year leave desperate situations in North Korea, only to end up in a brothel or forced marriage, a tragic and astonishing fact. China's response has not been to provide protection for victims or to prosecute traffickers, and they are signers of the refugee convention, and they completely abrogate their responsibilities of refoulement under the refugee convention. They hunt down and repatriate North Koreans, send them back to hard labor, long imprisonments, and even execution. North Korean women are not the only victims. By 2020, more than 40 million Chinese men will be unable to find wives in China because of China's shortsighted and abusive one-child policy, which, coupled with modern abortion technology has triggered the mass abortion of tens of millions of baby girls, a human rights abuse in and of itself. Sex-selective abortions have also created a huge trafficking magnet, pulling victims into forced marriages and brothels from countries in proximity to China and beyond. China's extremely modest and overly hyped suggestion that it might relax the Draconian one-child-per-couple policy is unlikely to mitigate disaster and may be further counteracted by the spread of sex-selection abortion technology to even more of rural China. Whether the birth limitation is one child or two children in special cases, birth limitation policies constitute abuse, cruelty, and exploitation without precedent or parallel for baby girls and, by extension, the rest of society. The Government of China is failing not only to address its only trafficking problems, but is creating an incentive for human trafficking in the whole region. Although she could not join us today, renowned author Mara Hvistendahl, author of Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys Over Girls and the Consequences of a World Full of Men, will be submitting testimony for the record specifically on the effect of the sex ratio imbalance as the cause of human trafficking and the proliferation of marriage agencies in China which traffic women from poorer countries into China and sell them into marriage. The hearing this afternoon will also take a look at a second set of countries this year that must be automatically downgraded unless they have made significant efforts to fight human trafficking. These countries include Thailand, Malaysia, Afghanistan, Chad, Barbados, and Maldives. Burma may receive a Presidential waiver in order to avoid a downgrade to Tier 3, but the facts on the ground don't justify that course of action. Cutting across Burma, Thailand, and Malaysia is the tragic plight of the Rohingya minority. Rohingya are leaving Burma by the thousands to escape religious persecution. However, according to reports put out by Reuters, Thai authorities are selling Rohingya to human traffickers, where they are held in tropical gulags until relatives pay ransom. Those who cannot pay the ransom are sold into sex slavery or hard labor and may die from abuse or disease. Thai authorities have done little to stop this practice. Their efforts at prevention and prosecution are said to be losing steam. Rohingya are often trafficked to Malaysia, where they are exploited for labor, the sad fact is that many Rohingya, a persecuted Sunni Muslim minority in Burma, hope to find refuge in Malaysia, a majority Muslim country. Burma is the source of Rohingya trafficking in the region. Policies of discrimination, child limitation, forced birth control, and violence push Rohingya minority to leave Burma and leave them as vulnerable refugees. The Burmese Government is culpable in this trafficking and the regional problems that their policies create. The Burmese Government has done little to stop trafficking of these individuals. Reports indicate that authorities profit from the sale of Rohingya traffickers and women are held at military bases as sex slaves and many men are used for forced labor. Though these practices have gone on for many years, I believe they are underreported in the State Department's TIP Report. Displaced by war and the Burmese military, women and children from the Kachin tribe in Burma are also subjected to human trafficking. Roija, an 18-year-old woman living in an IDP camp in northern Burma, was lured to China with the promise of a restaurant job. Once in China, she was bussed to a rural village and locked in a room. According to her testimony, she cried for 3 days and begged those around her to let her go. She was told to just give up and was sold as a bride for $5,312. The importance of accurate tier ratings in TIP Report country profiles cannot be overstated. That is why we are having this hearing. Again and again, we have seen countries turn 180 degrees and begin the hard work of reaching the minimum standards after the TIP Report accurately exposed with a Tier 3 rating and a truthful country report of each country's failure to take significant action against human trafficking. I will never forget two of our closest allies, Israel and South Korea, both were on Tier 3. I remember meeting with their Ambassadors who had files demonstrating to all of us and anyone who would listen, especially the TIP office, what measures they were taking to mitigate this terrible crime, these crimes that were occurring under their watch. And both of those countries got off Tier 3 when they took substantive action. So, this hearing is an attempt to further inform all of us and, by extension, the TIP office, of your concerns, experts in the field, and I look forward to hearing your testimony. I would like to yield to Dr. Bera. Mr. Bera. Thank you, Chairman Smith. And I know Ranking Member Bass is on her way, after votes, here. So, I will defer and let her make an opening statement. I just want to applaud the committee on your commitment, Mr. Chairman, and dedication to mitigating human trafficking. We have had a number of hearings, both here in the subcommittee as well as the full committee hearing. As the examples you pointed out, there is nothing more inhumane or reprehensible than human trafficking and our values as Americans clearly reflect the need that we have to stand up for the values that we hold dear the value of the dignity of life. Human trafficking occurs in virtually every country around the world, despite our efforts to end this horrible injustice. According to the International Labor Organization, nearly 21 million people were human trafficking victims in 2012, and traffickers receive more than $32 billion a year. Tragically, our own country is no exception to this, with an estimated 300,000 children at risk each year in the United States for commercial sexual exploitation. This is a particularly important issue to me because it is a challenge in my home town of Sacramento. Sacramento is among the top U.S. cities that suffer from human trafficking, particularly childhood prostitution. And Sacramento, unfortunately, because of its location and many transportation routes, often becomes an entry point for other areas of the country. As we have discussed in this committee previously, one way the State of California is working on combating human trafficking is making sure there are lots of eyes on the ground. That is by training the public to look for those warning signs, so that they can be vigilant and notify authorities. This training certainly is incredibly important because, again, there is no more reprehensible crime, but we have got to raise that community awareness. So, again, we have those folks in the neighborhoods looking for signs of suspicious activity. In addition, employing a victims-centered approached where victims have access to social services and are empowered to take actions and steps toward the right direction in mitigating human trafficking. Again, it is very important for us to not revictimize the victims, but to help them rebuild their lives. Since the State Department's reports were first launched, 120 countries have established anti-human trafficking laws. In this regard, it is incredibly important that the State Department continue to place countries in appropriate tiers, so we can find better ways to cooperate and stop trafficking, both internationally and at home. It is that leverage of proper tier placement that is very important, and I look forward to hearing about that from the witnesses. Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Dr. Bera. Thank you for your comments, and I look forward to working with you even further on this important issue. I would like to now yield to Randy Weber, the vice chairman of the subcommittee and, also, the author of the trafficking law in Texas, when he was a member of the legislature there. Mr. Weber. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to echo my colleague down there, the good doctor's comments about it is a terrific scourge and it is something that needs to be stamped out. In Texas we understood that. You know, they call a lot of the buyers of sex, actually, purchasers of sex, or POSes. And I told the last panel, I said, ``We call them `POS' in Texas, too, but it is not the exact same connotation.'' And offline, I might tell you what that stands for. But, yes, we had a very important bill, House Bill 4009, in the Texas Legislature where we strengthened the definition of human trafficking, where we increased the penalties of human trafficking, where we made sure that law enforcement knew that these young girls that are pressed into slavery, basically, aren't always willing prostitutes, for example. Then, you dig deeper, look deeper. We actually made a Web site with HHSC, the Health and Human Services Commission, where they put it up online and they brought together all the NGOs and the different organizations and law enforcement, where they could go to get training. We had three, I think it was either three or four, seminars around the State each year where they would go and hear speakers, hear about the background. We like to say that everything is bigger and better in Texas, and it certainly is. Unfortunately, though, in this particular realm, we hold the record. Twenty-five percent of the human trafficking in this country is in Texas, and that is not one of the records that we want. And so, we set about to do something different, to change that. So, I applaud you all for being here, and I applaud, Mr. Chair, you for putting this hearing on, and look forward to what the witnesses have to say. I yield back. Mr. Smith. I would just say that those who are at risk or victims are safer because of the work you did, landmark work, in Texas. I would like to now introduce our distinguished panel, beginning first with Ambassador Mark Lagon, who was the Ambassador-at-Large from 2007 to 2009 in the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons. Ambassador Lagon went on to become executive director and CEO of the anti-trafficking nonprofit, the Polaris Project. Currently, Ambassador Lagon is the global politics and security chair at Georgetown University's master of science in Foreign Service program and adjunct senior fellow for human rights at the Council on Foreign Relations. Then, we have Mr. Brian Campbell, who is responsible for International Labor Rights' foreign policy, legal and legislative advocacy, and runs its campaign to end child labor. For several years, Mr. Campbell has led advocacy efforts in state-sponsored forced labor in Uzbekistan's cotton industry, working closely with child labor NGO partners in Uzbekistan to elevate the role of civil society in the country, promote enforcement of existing laws, policies, and standards that protect workers' core labor rights, and develop and improve legal and soft law instruments. We will, then, hear from Mr. Blair Burns, who is vice president of the Regional Operations for Southeast Asia at the International Justice Mission, where he oversees IJM's work in Cambodia, Thailand, and the Philippines to bring freedom and justice to victims of human trafficking and sexual assault. He also leads IJM's local and national strategies to reform the justice systems in these countries to ensure protection to the poor from violence. Prior to his role, Mr. Burns worked with IJM in India, where he led a team to rescue more than 700 people from slavery. I note, parenthetically, that IJM worked very closely with me and my staff, and with Mark Lagon over on the Senate side, when we were writing this legislation. And Gary and the rest of the team really had a great impact on the legislation, and I want to thank them for that. Then, we will hear from Ms. Nathalie Lummert, who is director of special programs with the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Migration and Refugee Services, where she manages initiatives relative to unaccompanied children and trafficking victims and immigrant detention. She has over 15 years of experience with forced migration issues and is an expert in case management, program development, and advocacy for various migrant populations. Prior to her work at the USCCB, Nathalie worked with the UNHCR and with at-risk populations, such as the homeless and runaway youth. Thank you, too, for your leadership. And finally, we will hear from Dr. Wakar Uddin, who is the director general of the Rohingya Union, where he is a key leader and advocate for Rohingya citizenship in Burma and for international political and humanitarian support of the people. He is also a founder and chairman of the Burmese Rohingya Association of North America, which works closely with various organizations to ensure the welfare of refugees and immigrants in the United States and in Canada. Ambassador Lagon, if you could provide your testimony? STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE MARK LAGON, GLOBAL POLITICS AND SECURITY CHAIR, MASTER OF SCIENCE IN FOREIGN SERVICE PROGRAM, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY (FORMER AMBASSADOR-AT-LARGE FOR TRAFFICKING IN PERSONS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE) Ambassador Lagon. Chairman Smith, members of the committee, I thank you very much for inviting me. It is a special pleasure to look at the upcoming Trafficking in Persons Report with the legislator most responsible for putting that tool in the policy toolbox for the United States. This is an issue of robustly bipartisan concern, and I want to say I am pleased to see President Obama's personal engagement in the annual meetings of the Presidential Interagency Task Force on Trafficking. He used the occasion on April 8th to focus on victim protection, and I would like to say a word about that a bit later. Secretary Kerry and his team at the State Department deserve praise for going through with automatic downgrades of Russia, China, and Uzbekistan to Tier 3 in the TIP Report last year. I would like to speak to a few countries of particular concern meriting close scrutiny this year. Malaysia is among those countries that face an automatic downgrade to Tier 3. It desperately needs to amend its anti- trafficking law to allow victims to live, travel, and reside outside of government facilities. It needs to increase efforts to prosecute fraudulent labor recruiters, and it needs to increase training to avoid government complicity in trafficking. Thailand, in Southeast Asia, is also on the cusp of an automatic downgrade. I would just like to say, as an aside, I think Thailand is an example, I found personally, of perhaps an unfortunate addition to the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, in the 2013 reauthorization that the House acceded to, drafted by the Senate. It gives credit in the minimum standards to countries that have conferences and partnerships with NGOs and other entities. Well, you know, I have worked with the Global Business Coalition Against Human Trafficking. I believe in partnerships. But when I went to speak at a conference in Thailand on Rule of Law last fall, that is not evidence that Thailand is doing more. Government action is what matters. Reuters reported this month that the Thai Government had shared statistics with the United States on human trafficking, but their veracity is suspect, particularly for the reason that the Rohingya people trafficked from Burma don't seem to be counted. They seem to be treated as human smuggling victims. In this region of Southeast Asia, one sees a particularly acute problem in the seafood sector. I testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Natural Resources Committee on human trafficking in illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing. But trafficking doesn't just occur on the high seas. When that seafood comes to shore, it has got to be processed, and many migrants are subject to trafficking, just like Burmese victims I met 7 years ago, as Ambassador, on the outskirts of Bangkok. And that abuse persists today. That is a shame. Also in the East Asian region, otherwise admirable, affluent, democratic allies New Zealand and Japan, well, have a good record of spending resources elsewhere in the region, but they deserve some scrutiny for their conduct at home. New Zealand has for a number of years been assigned to Tier 1, but look at the narrative of last year's report. The government hasn't prosecuted or convicted any offenders in the last 7 years nor has it identified any trafficking victims in the last 9 years. Japan deserves on the merits no more than a Tier 2 ranking. It is very much in the power of Japan to ratify the U.N. Palermo Protocol and pass a comprehensive anti-trafficking law, and it hasn't done it. When I am asked what region of the world exhibits the worst human trafficking, my answer is always the Arabian Gulf. There, documented guest workers, foreigners from South and Southeast Asia, and increasingly from Africa, as well as women, are not treated as human beings in full, not accorded access to justice. In particular, I am concerned with Qatar, which has earned a Tier 2 ranking the last 2 years. It is of special interest, given its preparations for the 2022 World Cup. Major sporting events cause a dual hazard of human trafficking in the construction of arenas and in the sex trafficking that spikes during the events. Mr. Chairman, I admire the fact that during the Super Bowl last year you spoke to that sex trafficking hazard in your own State of New Jersey. Well, in Qatar there was a report 2 weeks ago claiming that 1,200 men had lost their lives since construction work started, far ahead of any loss of life or harm in Brazil and South Africa preparing for World Cup games, or even Beijing in preparing for the Olympics. Qatar is not alone in its responsibility. The source countries of migrants who are abused also are. And the Government of Nepal is a good example. By not regulating its labor recruiters who woo its nationals into debt, and for not more forcibly defending its nationals in diplomacy, it is a shame that Nepal is not doing more. It is too taken with the remittances that seem to make up a quarter of its economy. India, in South Asia, has the highest incidence of human trafficking globally. But one case outside of India deserves special attention. The arrest of the Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade in the United States for trafficking of a domestic servant calls attention to the special priority that the Trafficking Victims Protection Act places on government officials' complicity in TIP. The U.S. regulation to penalize flagrant or repeated abuses of countries whose diplomats are bringing third country nationals into the United States has never been invoked. It is about time it is. Afghanistan faces an automatic downgrade to Tier 3, with families selling children for prostitution, insurgent groups forcing children to serve as suicide bombers, and labor brokers driving Afghan men, women, and children into forced labor abroad. We ought to, long after the U.S.-led invasion, be candid about the reality on the ground. A couple of more cases I would like to cite are ostensible success stories. Brazil, year after year on Tier 2, has had labor inspectors rescuing forced labor victims by the thousands, but it wasn't until last year's report that a case of labor slavery was documented as having earned an honest-to- goodness prison sentence as opposed to a halfway house, a community service term, or some suspended sentence. Brazil is more broadly emblematic of a global pattern of impunity for labor trafficking. Continuing the statistical disaggregation introduced in my own tenure as Ambassador, the 2013 report revealed that only 15 percent of prosecutions for TIP globally were for labor, rather than sexual exploitation. And that was double the 7 percent, a meager figure, the year before. In Europe, there remains a problem for demand for sex trafficking. How meaningful can the anti-demand efforts of nations which the TVPA minimum standards require the TIP Report to account for if sex buying is legal and, frankly, encouraged as a tourist industry by the Dutch, German, and other governments? In these examples, generally, one sees two imperatives for the U.S. anti-trafficking policy globally. First, fighting demand. It is intolerable to keep suggesting boys will be boys with the purchase of commercial sex. Sex trafficking grows in this swamp. It is for this reason that I support legislation sponsored by Congressman Hultgren to add a provision to the TVPA minimum standards which assesses whether national governments that have it in their power to criminalize sex buying, by the ``POSes'' that Congressman Weber spoke of, do so. Second, of the three famous P's of prosecution, protection, and prevention, protection of victims must come first. If the United States Government is spending so very little in this area relative to, say, corporate welfare and agribusiness welfare, how can we expect developing nations to advance victim identification, shelter capacity, physical/medical care, therapy for deep-layered traumas of victims, job training, and, finally, job placement, as the ultimate dignity-reclaiming step for a victim? In conclusion, Congress would do well to focus on demand and survivor empowerment. By focusing on them in oversight and legislation, it will contribute to the actual contraction and eventual abolition of what amounts to slavery in our time. Thank you. Mr. Smith. Ambassador Lagon, thank you very much for your testimony. Without objection, your full statement will be made a part of the record, along with that of all of our distinguished witnesses. Ambassador Lagon. I appreciate that, Mr. Chairman. [The prepared statement of Mr. Lagon follows:] [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] ---------- Mr. Smith. All right, now, Mr. Campbell, if you would proceed? STATEMENT OF MR. BRIAN CAMPBELL, DIRECTOR OF POLICY AND LEGAL PROGRAMS, INTERNATIONAL LABOR RIGHTS FORUM Mr. Campbell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to start by saying that my testimony today is possible only through the sacrifices made by hundreds of Uzbekistani citizens who risk their lives year after year to fight against the mass crimes the Government of Uzbekistan is committing against its own people. Equipped with pen, paper, camera, and specialized training in monitoring and interview methodologies, the human rights defenders across the Uzbekistan band together in networks to anonymously and effectively gather as much evidence as possible about the Government of Uzbekistan's forced labor system. At great risk to them and their families, they find ways to get evidence out of the country to their colleagues at organizations like the Uzbek-German Forum in Germany and the Association for Human Rights in Central Asia, based in France, and others, so the information can be shared publicly. And I am here to say that their sacrifice has begun to bear fruit, and I have some good news to share, Mr. Chairman. Thanks in large part to your commitment, the commitment of the Congress as a whole in fighting against the crime of forced labor in Uzbekistan, the United States Department of State made the right decision last year and allowed the automatic downgrade of the Government of Uzbekistan to Tier 3 in its Trafficking in Persons Report. The decision was vital in convincing the Government of Uzbekistan to drop its longstanding opposition to the monitoring of the cotton harvest by the International Labor Organization. It was shortly after the decision was published last June that the Uzbekistan Government finely relented and signed the agreement to let the monitors in. As a result of this pressure, I am happy to report that the Government of Uzbekistan granted a reprieve to thousands of its own children under the age of 14 from having to participate as forced laborers in the cotton harvest last fall. Thousands of children were saved from the debilitating work of harvesting cotton by hand in a hazardous, often toxic working environment. Thousands of young children were saved from the fate of Amirbek Rakhmatov, a 6-year-old, first-year schoolboy from Vobkent District of Bukhara who died while out picking cotton with his mother last year. Unfortunately, the bad news still dwarfs the good news. Despite the presence of ILO monitors, the Uzbek Government continued its forced labor system for cotton production. It continued to operate a state-order system or command economy for cotton production that is underpinned by an extensive system of state-sponsored forced labor. Use of coercion begins with farmers and, then, increasingly over the course of the year, extends to all of its citizens and the system is administered by government officials nationwide. The government establishes a quota and, then, compels farmers to meet that quota and compels farmers to sell their cotton to the government. The government earns over $1 billion annually from this forced labor system. Farmers who fail to meet the government-established quota for cotton production continue to face severe consequences, loss of land, prosecution on criminal charges, and physical punishment included. During the harvest, farmers regularly report being scolded, humiliated, and beaten at their regular meetings held in their local communities in which they are supposed to report on their progress in fulfilling their cotton quota. To harvest the cotton, the Uzbek Government continued to systematically mobilize children aged 16 and 17 throughout the country and, also, 15-year-olds in many regions. They also, in different regions, depending on the local governor, mobilized the younger children as well, the children under 14 years old. Forced labor was organized through the state education system and the threat was expulsion from school. The forced mobilization of the harvest began in September and continued through November. In addition to children, the government systematically forced adult farmers, public sector workers, private sector workers, unemployed citizens, and those in receipt of public welfare benefits to labor. Authorities forced pensioners, mothers receiving social benefits, and other citizens to pick cotton under the threat of losing those benefits on which they depend. Under pressure from authorities in higher positions, administrators of public institutions and private business owners forced their workers to pick cotton under the threat of dismissal from their jobs. University administrators forced their students under threat of expulsion. Teachers and public sector professionals participated in the cotton harvest only because, if they didn't, they would lose their public sector jobs. Despite the undeniable evidence of forced labor, the Government of Uzbekistan continues to publicly deny that it operates a forced labor system for cotton production. They were very clear to the ILO stating directly that they do not operate a forced labor system. In fact, to perpetuate this myth, the Government of Uzbekistan tried to impose on the ILO certain conditions for their monitoring that made truly independent monitoring impossible. For example, the monitors were government officials from Uzbekistan who were accompanying the ILO. Despite these efforts to prevent independent monitoring, though, the ILO was still able to corroborate the civil society reports of the serious and continued use of forced labor by the Government of Uzbekistan. And the ILO findings were, then, corroborated again by the World Bank Inspection Panel who had sent the monitoring team to look into the forced labor possibly touching their projects. Their findings were very clear that their projects, when investing in agriculture in Uzbekistan, could benefit the forced labor system of cotton production. While we are confident that the ILO will continue to do its duty to use whatever diplomatic path it can find to end this forced labor problem, and we hope that they will continue to impress upon each and every government official that forced labor is a crime in violation of international law, we see no evidence that the Government of Uzbekistan is committed to ending its highly-profitable forced labor system and holding those who have perpetuated these mass crimes accountable under the law. We must all remember forced labor is a crime. Those investing in the cotton system, like Daewoo International Corporation from Korea, Indorama Corporation from Singapore, or even those who want to sell tractors and irrigation equipment to the government, made possible possibly by contracts funded by banks, the World Bank, possibly the Asian Development Bank, if they are offered, their potential for liability is very clear. Section 18 U.S. Code 1589 prohibits any person from knowingly benefitting from forced labor. Those who do face up to life in prison. And then, the Tariff Act of 1930 prohibits cotton products from being sold in the United States that are made with forced labor. And this is what happened to Indorama Corporation last October when they could not import their Uzbek cotton product into the United States. For companies who are investing outside the cotton sector, the risks are just as great that they will get pulled into the forced labor system as well. This is what happened to General Motors, whose employees were compelled to pick cotton during the harvest for the third consecutive year. And the people who compelled them? The Federation of Trade Unions of Uzbekistan, which is not an independent trade union. It is an agency of the government, but, also, one of the ILO social partners, and they were working with managers from the General Motors plant in Andijan. To end my testimony, I just want to say very clearly that, based on the evidence by human rights monitors, reports from the ILO and World Bank that the Government of Uzbekistan continued to impose a forced labor system for cotton production, while at the same time denying its existence, and the recognition of the sacrifices made by human rights defenders who risk their lives in fighting against the government's crimes, we adamantly urge the United States Department of State to maintain Uzbekistan on Tier 3 and to utilize all the tools at its disposal to bring an end to forced labor in Uzbekistan. Very specifically, we also call on the U.S. Government to exercise the sanctions made available under the TIP law. Utilize your voice and vote at the World Bank, at the Asian Development Bank, and prevent any investment that is going to benefit the forced labor system. We don't tolerate it for our own companies. We should not tolerate it for the multilateral institutions, either. Investing in forced labor is investing in a crime, and it cannot happen. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. [The prepared statement of Mr. Campbell follows:] [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] ---------- Mr. Smith. Mr. Campbell, thank you very much for your clarity and for your insights. Last year Ambassador Lagon spoke about America's pathetic embrace of slavery which was in significant part about cotton. So, here we have it occurring in Uzbekistan, and I think your words couldn't have been more clear. I would like to now yield to Mr. Burns for his testimony. STATEMENT OF MR. BLAIR BURNS, VICE PRESIDENT OF REGIONAL OPERATIONS, SOUTHEAST ASIA, INTERNATIONAL JUSTICE MISSION Mr. Burns. Thank you. As you said, my name is Blair Burns, and I work for International Justice Mission. IJM is a global team of attorneys, investigators, social workers, community activists, and other professionals working in over 20 communities throughout the developing world. I have been with IJM for 10 years and I oversee our work in Southeast Asia, where our offices focus primarily on combating the commercial sexual exploitation of children. Prior to my current position, as the chairman mentioned, I lived in Chennai, India, where I directed our programs to combat forced labor slavery in India. Thank you for asking me to testify today. My children don't actually believe that I am testifying before Congress. They are very cynical little people. And, Chairman Smith, thank you so much for your long time of leadership on anti-trafficking. It matters. It matters quite a lot. The 2013 Global Slavery Index indicates that there are more slaves today in our world than at any other point in human history. I have met a lot of them. They are people just like you and me. They are fathers and mothers, friends and coworkers, sons and daughters, grandparents and children, all of whom have the same hopes and dreams that we have to live lives of happiness, freedom from violence, and safety. Some might have us believe that they are slaves because they are victims of abject poverty, but that belies the fact that every country in the world has poor people, including this one, but only a minority of countries has a problem of slavery and human trafficking thriving within its borders. Slavery and sex trafficking are violent crimes. Such criminal enterprises fester and thrive only because local justice systems fail to enforce the laws that are against them. Why does slavery not fester and thrive in our country? Because the Government of the United States brings great resources to bear against those who would perpetrate such violence. But let me clarify. I am not here today to tell you horrific, dramatic tales about how bad things are. I am not here to draw you into an even more bleak picture. Rather, I am here to point you to some things that I am seeing in this fight that are very good, to point you to some places where women and men of goodwill are turning the tide against global slavery, to tell you more about an example of the great power of the United States being used rightly, to provide effective leadership to end one of the great tragedies of our time. To put it quite clearly, in 10 years of doing this work across Asia, I have seen no action of a Western government that is more effective at anything than the annual release of the Trafficking in Persons Report by the Department of State. I have had senior government officials in every Asian country I have visited from India to the Philippines tell me in private that their highest trafficking-related priority is to improve their nation's tier ranking on the next TIP Report. In my experience, the actions of these countries have borne out what they have told me behind closed doors. I want to tell you two stories. We have worked in the Philippines since 2001. Since that time, our offices have seen over 1,000 girls and women rescued from commercial sexual exploitation and hundreds of perpetrators jailed for their crimes. In 2007, with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, we launched an anti-trafficking program in Cebu, the second-largest city in the Philippines. Before beginning operations, we conducted a baseline study to measure the prevalence of children offered for commercial sex, to measure the extent of the crime. We, then, began operations by partnering with local justice system officials to enforce the Philippines' laws against the trafficking of children. The first thing we learned was that, as of that point, the laws were not being enforced at all. In our research we could find no evidence of any criminal prosecution of any trafficker in Cebu. We found that, in general, law enforcement lacked both the will and the capacity to act, but we also found that there were officials of goodwill who wanted to serve their country. Early in the project we partnered with the Philippines National Police Regional Command to create, train, and mentor a dedicated regional anti-trafficking unit. After just a few years, by 2010, over 70 suspected traffickers and pimps were in jail, as their trials progressed through the Philippines' glacial criminal justice system. And that is when some remarkable things began to happen. First, we conducted another study on prevalence and published the results. We found that the number of children offered for commercial sex had dropped by 79 percent in Cebu, 79 percent. In other words, with the sudden, unexpected, and sustained enforcement of the law, it finally became truly illegal to traffic children for sexual exploitation in Cebu. And so, what did most of the traffickers then do? They found other ways to make money. They stopped exploiting children. Second, in 2010, the TIP office put the Philippines in the Tier 2 Watch List for the second year in a row. And just 2 years before that, the Congress required that countries could only stay on the Watch List for 2 years in a row. For those of you who might have voted for that, brilliant move. The Philippines was in grave danger of losing a lot of coveted foreign aid. And third, a new administration came into power in Manila. And so, in late 2010, the new Secretary of Justice, Leila de Lima, came to Washington for a meeting at the World Bank. She was in town for part of 1 day and called me to meet with her at the Embassy. We sat down. She looked me in the eyes and said, ``Tell me about your program in Cebu, and tell me how we can replicate that success throughout the rest of my country.'' I had a few ideas for her. Shortly thereafter, the Supreme Court directed all courts in the Philippines to fast-track the trafficking cases. We began to see cases that once took 10 years to move through trial reach judgment in one to three. We worked with the Secretary as she cleaned up and reestablished the Anti- Trafficking Unit of the National Bureau of Investigations in Manila. Whereas agents of this unit once made barely-veiled death threats to our staff, they quickly became some of the closest law enforcement partners we had. The Philippines National Police, under a different ministry than Justice, decided to replicate the dedicated Anti- Trafficking Unit in Cebu. It stood up units in Manila and Pampanga, incorporated our training curriculum into their regular training program, and partnered with our offices to provide ongoing mentorship to the units. Today they are in the process of incorporating these units into a single national command. So, what is the result? Today the trafficking of children is truly against the law in the Philippines, and everybody knows it. Why? Because that law is now enforced. And not only is the law being enforced, it is being sustainably enforced by elements of the Philippines justice system that are largely operating independently of IJM or any other NGO. When we conduct additional prevalence studies this year and in 2016, we fully expect to see further dramatic reduction in the violent crime of trafficking. And the story is quite similar in Cambodia, where things were once even worse. There, in 2003, we found entire open markets where minority Vietnamese girls ages 6, 7, 8, and 9 were sold for a few dollars to any foreign pedophile who could find his way to Phnom Penh. The police and senior Cambodian Government officials knew exactly what was happening, yet took no action. Western governments were also unwilling to speak out. But, by 2005, the TIP Report put Cambodia on Tier 3, and we then have the government's attention. In response to earlier recommendations from the TIP office, Cambodia had already stood up a national-level anti-human- trafficking department, but the officers of this department were both untrained and lacked any will to conduct any trafficking operations. With help from USAID, we launched a world-class police training program for the department, and then, we began ongoing case-by-case mentorship with the trained officers. We have continued that mentorship for nearly a decade. Slowly, but surely, the anti-human-trafficking department rose up into an effective law enforcement agency. Today the public does what was unthinkable then. When a girl goes missing, they call the police. We know this because, when that happens, the police call us. The department proactively enforces the law across the country and prosecutors and courts have followed suit. We have seen 187 convictions of traffickers in Cambodia in our cases alone. So, what is the result of real law enforcement in Cambodia? In late 2012, we conducted a prevalence study. The results were remarkable. Less than 1 percent of all sex workers were minors under the age of 15. Data collectors in three cities found no one offered for commercial sex under the age of 12. Thank you for inviting me today, and please let me know if you have any questions. [The prepared statement of Mr. Burns follows:] [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] ---------- Mr. Smith. Thank you very, very much, Mr. Burns, for your testimony. You have made so many good points. Unfortunately, we have two votes. So, we will have to interrupt. Ms. Bass. Now? Mr. Smith. Yes, we are in the final 8 minutes of the first one. So, I apologize again to our two remaining witnesses. And if anyone has to go, obviously, you go, but we regret we won't get to ask you questions. But you did make a very good point, Mr. Burns, about when they were on Tier 3 in Cambodia; it got their attention. I have found, and I know Ambassador Lagon more than anyone else has found over the years, that when they are on Tier 3, I don't care who they are. They may protest--the Greeks protested mightily when they were placed on Tier 3--but it gets their attention. And naming and shaming is an important part of this process, but it ought to be followed by tangible sanctions, which often is not the case. But thank you for your excellent testimony. I would like to yield to Ms. Bass, if she has anything. Okay. I don't want to cut your testimony short, Ms. Lummert. So, if you don't mind, we will stand in brief recess, then come right back. These are the last two votes of the day. So, again, I apologize. [Recess.] Mr. Smith. The hearing will continue. I would like to ask--you were done, right, Mr. Burns? Yes. STATEMENT OF MS. NATHALIE LUMMERT, DIRECTOR, SPECIAL PROGRAMS, MIGRATION AND REFUGEE SERVICES, U.S. CONFERENCE OF CATHOLIC BISHOPS Ms. Lummert. Mr. Chairman, thank you for the invitation to speak today. I have a longer written testimony, but in my oral remarks I will focus on the Church's anti-trafficking efforts domestically and internationally and the partnerships which we think need to continue to expand in the efforts to combat human trafficking. As you may know, His Holiness Pope Francis has elevated the issue of human trafficking as a priority for the global Church. At a conference I attended at the Vatican this month, the Holy Father called human trafficking ``a crime against humanity and an open wound on the body of contemporary society.'' This conference, organized by the Catholic Bishops Conference of England and Wales, gathered senior law enforcement and Church leaders from around the world to coordinate around combating human trafficking. The conference initiated a new international network of Bishops Conferences and law enforcement agencies working together to combat human trafficking. Pope Francis emphasized the importance of the complementary approaches of law enforcement and humanitarian efforts working together on this issue. It would be impossible for me to describe all the work of the Catholic Church globally in the area of human trafficking in 5 minutes; however, examples include COATNET, a coalition led by Caritas International, working across borders; Talitha Kum, an international network of women religious in 75 countries; Catholic Relief Services; Bishops Conferences; and the pastoral presence of the Apostleship of the Sea, the Church's maritime ministry present in over 200 ports globally. The efforts of the Catholic Church in the U.S. are included in my written testimony. In March, the Vatican also announced a new partnership called the Global Freedom Network with the Anglican Church and the Grand Imam of al-Azhar, Egypt. The overarching goal of the initiative is to eradicate modern-day forms of slavery by encouraging governments, businesses, educational and faith institutions to rid their supply chains of slave labor. The Global Freedom Network will focus upon: One, raising awareness and education of the scourge at all levels of political life; two, assisting countries with developing a strategic plan to eradicate slavery and cleanse supply chains; three, facilitating support for the victims; four, advocating for enactment and reform of laws in countries which would help end trafficking and provide support for its victims. This is an exciting initiative that will be operated out of the Vatican, but, no doubt, will rely upon the assistance of the Catholic Church and other faith leaders worldwide, including the United States, to meet its goals. The Catholic Church in the U.S. is well-positioned to assist with the goals of the Global Freedom Network. Migration Refugee Services of the USCCB is engaged in anti-trafficking work, including protection of victims and education and awareness aimed at prevention. As you know, Mr. Chairman, the Bishops Conference also advocates on human trafficking issues. We have worked with you and other elected officials to enact the Trafficking Victims Protection Act and its subsequent reauthorizations. We are proud of these efforts and the protections in U.S. law for trafficking victims, but our work and yours is not done. In our written testimony we cite trafficking bills before the House of Representatives that should be considered and passed by this body, including legislation addressing supply chains and prohibiting excessive foreign labor recruitment fees for legal workers. The U.S. also needs to fully implement current law, including Section 104 of the TVPRA which calls for best- interest determinations to identify child victims in other countries. In our written testimony we also highlight the importance of partnerships and ask for continued expansion of these. The TIP Report, admirably, attempts to include all partners in all aspects of fighting human trafficking. The Bishops Conference is thankful for this and asks for the continued expansion of faith-based groups as multi-level stakeholders in the global fight. The Bishops Conference does not normally comment on tier rankings, but we do point to the populations that we are aware of that need particular attention and that should be considered as being impacted. Included among these are refugees that we are resettling to the U.S. and that we are aware of internationally through U.S. Bishops' delegations to impacted regions, seafarers, and, also, among the most vulnerable, unaccompanied children, including unaccompanied children from Eritrea that are in Ethiopia and other places subject to trafficking through the Sinai; unaccompanied children in Central America that we have seen being vulnerable to human trafficking. Catholic Church partners are natural first responders and also bring expertise and knowledge. The Church is a voice for the voiceless, including in the most remote areas of the world where trafficking is occurring, including such examples as the fishing industry among seafarers, Eritrean refugees in Africa, and the border areas, such as in our own region, including Mexico and Central America. These voices can and should inform our national/international approaches to combating human trafficking. I will close my remarks about the importance of partnerships by drawing upon the example of the meeting at the Vatican on trafficking. During that meeting, stakeholder inclusiveness was highlighted in its most pure form. In addition to reaching out to law enforcement leaders, the Holy Father also focused his attention on and met with survivors of human trafficking. And these survivors also spoke to law enforcement and Church leaders, urging them to make stronger efforts. Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, I would like to thank you for your leadership on this important issue. The U.S. Catholic Bishops continue to look forward to working with you and your colleagues on eradicating the scourge from the earth. As Pope Francis tells us in his Joy of the Gospel, the issue of human trafficking truly involves everyone. Thank you, and I look forward to answering any of your questions. [The prepared statement of Ms. Lummert follows:] [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] ---------- Mr. Smith. Thank you very, very much for your testimony and for the great, great work that the Catholic Church is doing around the world, and this new reinvigoration by Pope Francis. We know the Church was there working, and you were right to point out that when we were writing the original statute, which took three long years to get enacted, the USCCB, your General Counsel, you, your group, the USCCB was very involved with the actual writing of the text. So, I want to thank you for that as well. I would like to now introduce Dr. Uddin. STATEMENT OF WAKAR UDDIN, PH.D., DIRECTOR GENERAL, ARAKAN ROHINGYA UNION Mr. Uddin. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and committee members, for giving me the opportunity to speak, to testify before the committee. I would like to focus on a particular ethnic minority in Burma known as Rohingya. This issue that human trafficking and the smuggling issue of Rohingya in western Arakan State, Burma, is not new. It has been simmering for decades. However, due to some media reporting and the reports from the Arakan Project by Chris Lewa from Thailand, and, most recently, the writers/ reporters has opened up this issue to the international community, and it has received widespread attention, the Rohingya smuggling and trafficking issue. Mr. Chairman, the primary cause of these Rohingya trafficking and smuggling, the root cause, is the situation on the ground in Arakan State in western Burma. The human rights violations, persecution, ethnic cleansing, actions of Burmese forces are tantamount to some kind of pre-genocide, precursor for pre-genocide crime against humanity. All these conditions faced by Rohingya people in western Arakan State in western Burma, in Arakan State, are the primary cause, the root cause of these subsequent events taking place for the persecution. This trafficking of Rohingya victims, actually, this trafficking has two phases. One is a smuggling phase and another one is the trafficking phase itself. The situation on the ground is so terrifying. It has been terrifying for quite some years. The victims, the Rohingya victims have nowhere to go. They are the victims of violence, persecution. Their villages have been burned, and they have been arrested for inciting violence, accusation of inciting violence, and they have been accused of burning their own homes. The police, Burmese police, have arrested hundreds of Rohingya men and women with the accusation that they burned their homes, to show the international community that, look, we are under ethnic cleansing and to have a better house to be built, to get more aids, that kind of accusation. This morning I received phone calls from victims from Arakan State. The authorities in Burma, local authorities, I should say, and the members of RNDP, Rakhine National Democratic Party, local officials have primed the Rohingya families ready for trafficking, ready for smuggling and trafficking. If you hear their arduous journey living in Arakan State, they cannot take the horror anymore. If you hear the arduous journey to Malaysia, Thailand, it is heartbreaking, the victims. We had a victim here 3 days ago at the University, at American University, at an event that she has given an account of her own horror she faced. She was supposed to come here today, but she couldn't. The sequence of events, let me describe the sequence of events, how it takes place. The homeless Rohingya families, the victims, including men, women, and children, they don't have anywhere to go. In certain areas, in northern Arakan State there are no IDP camps. So, whether there are camps are not, these people are vulnerable to fall prey into smuggling rings. So, they want to leave Arakan State, finding refuge anywhere in the world. So, that is the priming of the victims by the smugglers. The smugglers, the ring, the cartel, they board the families to the smaller boats, smaller, rickety boats, and, then, they ship them to larger vessels docked a few miles off the coast in Bay of Bengal. There are women, there are children, there are elderly, and there are also young men who are evading, absconding police because the police has issued an arrest warrant to arrest them. And once they get arrested, 10- to 30-year prison for arson, accusation of arson and violence. So, those, also, young men had to leave along with their families. What happened is, when they leave, the man particularly leaves; the family members left behind are mainly women and girls and their wives, their mothers, and they also become fallen to prey of the forces. They will be taken hostage. The women will be taken hostage by the forces and Buddhist Rakhine extremists and they will be confined in their camps and villages and become sex slaves. Just currently, there are serious issues. Several hundred Rohingya women and young girls, even minors, have fallen into traps of the sex slaves locally in Arakan State, in army camps, in settlement villages, and other places. Now these people who are leaving Burma with families, they go; they are leaving for anywhere they can find shelter, they can find refuge. So, these boats start taking them, sailing them south. Hopefully, their destination is Malaysia because they feel that they will find safe haven in Malaysia, but often they do not reach Malaysia. There are reports of boats sinking, people drowning because of the rough weather. Their navigation is not good. They get lost in the ocean. And the worst thing, Mr. Chairman, is that they are running out of food and water, while they are sailing, running out of fuel. They are drifting. They have drifted to India. They have drifted to Sri Lanka. And then, they often arrive in Thailand, as often Thai coast guards will pick them up and take them to detention centers. Often, these folks will land at the Thai coast, and those victims who are taken to prison and camps, then, at that point the trafficking phase will start. Until this point that they arrive Thai, it is smuggling. They are smuggling by these rings. When they arrive in Thailand, Thailand does not have a refugee law that provides status to these refugees, asylum to these refugees. So, they are kept in the camps indefinitely. Then, they have a thing called option two. The Thai police, Thai immigration officers then try to get rid of them, send them away from the Thai detention center through collaboration with cartels. Then, these men, women, children are sent to southern Thailand in sex slave camps, hard-labor camps, and other places. Often, Thai authorities separate women and girls from the family members, telling them that they need better protection, and they are taken somewhere else and there is no record of returning them. They never come back. We don't know where they are. Later, we found out that they have ended up in the trade of sex slaves. That is what happened in human trafficking when the Rohingya victims are sent to camps in Thailand. And the other scenario, Mr. Chairman, is those people who are not picked up by Thai authorities, but they landed themselves at the coast, and they are taken by the cartels into the camps and taken hostage, demanding ransom. You have to pay such-and-such amount of money to get released. So, they have phones. They are sophisticated. They have a phone system that makes them call their relatives in Malaysia, people who went before and working there, and demanding thousands of dollars for ransom. And then, upon the delivery of the cash, these victims are released. Often, all the people, the victims, could not find their relatives and neighbors and friends in Malaysia to save them, and they are languishing at these camps. And then, the women and girls, minors as little as 8 years, according to their testimony that they gave to me, are traded as sex slaves. So, these are the situation the Rohingya people are facing, starting from Arakan State, as persecution, a victim of persecution, to smuggling, to trafficking. Now how can we allow this to happen in this day and age, in this century? These people, the Rohingya victims, because of their fate, this trafficking, they are falling victim, the situation on the groundin Arakan State. I do not see any end to this, unfortunately, to this entire sequence of events, unless the situation on the ground in Arakan State is resolved. It is great that there are tiers, categories for different countries, for Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3. And President Obama has had a waiver for Burma, reportedly, about this trafficking issue. And is it incentive, we are wondering? If it is an incentive, is that working? Is the Burmese Government looking into this issue on the ground, where the horror is originating, ending in Thai and Malaysian border with trade of sex slaves and hard-labor people? If the waiver is working, that is a great thing. But I am afraid that the Burmese Government will enjoy this waiver and will not look into the situation on the ground. If you cannot go to the root cause of this, I don't see any other way to solve this issue. So, our appeal on behalf of the Rohingya people, I appeal to the international community, to the committee, to our Government, that we need to insert greater pressure on the Burmese Government to solve the issue on the ground with their reinstating their citizenship, giving them all their human rights, recognizing the ethnicity as Rohingya. They are refusing to recognize Rohingya as an ethnic minority, which has been documented historically, that existed in Burma before the '60s. Once their citizenship is given back to them, their rights are given back to them, they are recognized as a national race, an ethnic minority, and then, I think we are close, one step closer to solving these human smuggling and trafficking issues in Arakan State, Burma. Thank you very much. [The prepared statement of Mr. Uddin follows:] [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] ---------- Mr. Smith. Thank you very much, Dr. Uddin. I would agree with you about the importance of really taking a hard look at Burma. You know, the release, and now somewhat reintegrated great Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung Sang Suu Kyi should not be allowed to gloss over other egregious human rights abuses, especially as they relate to trafficking. So, I do think your point--and perhaps Ambassador Lagon might want to speak to this--but the waiver authority, when we wrote that, wasn't meant to be the rule; it was meant to be the exception. It was meant to be done in good faith in a diplomatic embrace of the country that could easily be designated Tier 3, to say, ``Look, we want to work with you. We want to get to the point where you are meeting those minimum standards,'' which are what we need to apply to every country of the world, including the United States. The waiver authority has been exploited by both parties, unfortunately. And frankly, that is not the Ambassadors-at- Large's fault; it is the regional bureaus' faults and people higher up, and particularly the Ambassadors who sometimes develop a little bit of a ``clientitis.'' So, my hope is that there will be an effort made to really say, waiver authority, only use it as an exceptional tool, not as something that is just automatically meted out because it is a lot easier to do so. I will ask a couple of questions, yield to Ms. Bass, and then, to my good friend, Mr. Marino. Then, I have some additional questions I would like to get to as well. But let me just ask you, if I could, Mr. Ambassador, you know, one of the reasons why I voted against the Leahy amendment when it made its way over here, I had the competing bill that we wanted to bring up because it had a number of substantive changes that were not included in the Leahy amendment, but one of them was the cut in the TIP office's budget. Now they claim they can craft together monies from various spigots rather than have a straight-up, transparent authorization. But the other was the language that tilted in favor of the regional bureaus' additional gravitas in making decisions as to who goes on Tier 3, Tier 2, Tier 1, and Watch List. We haven't seen that play out yet. But that was a huge fight when we did the original TVPA back in 2000, that the regional bureaus didn't want this bill. They were against this bill. I met with so many of the people, you know, the Assistant Secretaries, the various desk officers. Then, we had round-the-clock meetings-- over 3 years you have a lot of meetings--with State Department people, very good people, but they didn't want it. And now, people who want to sideline or, you know, put trafficking on page 5 of the talking points, may have disproportionate influence on the Secretary, unless you have a very, very powerful Ambassador-at-Large. But, even then, he might get drowned out. Because, as we all know--and I will finish with this in terms of the question--when we did the first leader of the TIP office, we could not get Ambassador-at-Large language into the bill there was so much objection to it. So, we went with just the director, came back in 2003 and put Ambassador-at-Large because we wanted that gravitas to be equal to the weight of the work that he or she had to do. So, if you could speak to that, Mr. Ambassador? Ambassador Lagon. Well, you ask a great set of questions. I was disturbed, too, by an element of the 2013 reauthorization that was ostensibly meant to provide that there would be consultation between the regional bureaus and the TIP office. But the fact is that who has the pen, having been given to the trafficking in persons office on the preparation of the report, has been very important. And I will say a very hard-headed official Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, actually was crucial to the decision about how that would first get implemented. I think it would not be a good idea to hand that pen over to the regional bureaus. There is a constructive tension in the Department in which the overall picture of U.S. interests on multiple issues and the contexts of a state, you know, maybe it is a state at war, maybe there are real capacity issues, are brought forward by regional bureaus. But the fact that the experts on this in the trafficking in persons office are the ones who are principally charged with drafting, is essential. I do want to say one thing about personnel. The number of personnel is not everything. I would like to see the voice of the Ambassador-at-Large in the office raised, but it is not always the case that more is more. Some of the nimbleness of the office, some of the special qualities that you embedded in the legislation to act as a voice for civil society benefit from nimbleness. Mr. Smith. If I could just ask you one other question, because it was you, when you were Ambassador, who finally elevated the issue of China and the nexus with the one-child- per-couple policy to its rightful place, and I will always be deeply grateful, all who care about human rights, I believe. No other nation on earth has so systematically exterminated the girl child in utero by way of sex-selection abortion than China. As I said, we are going to have hearing testimony from Mara Hvistendahl, the author of Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys Over Girls and the Consequences of a World Full of Men, her testimony, which we will make a part of the record. But there is no doubt whatsoever that the magnet driving the Chinese situation are the missing daughters. They are gone, exterminated systematically every year since 1979 as part of the one-child-per-couple policy. Tens of millions, minimally-- some put it as many as 100 million; nobody knows for sure--but the ratio is without precedent in all of human history, and won't turn around anytime soon. So, the bride-selling and the trafficking, the magnetic effect of that dearth of women will occur and only get worse going on. I don't know how, frankly, the State Department could possibly designate China anything but a Tier 3 country, given the fact that they are surging toward more demand, based on the missing girls. And secondly, some of the very minor things that I have seen, you know, one of you mentioned earlier just attending a conference does not make a trafficking plan or any reason to rejoice. It is a step and that is all it is. If you could speak to that? Ambassador Lagon. Yes, you know, there are many reasons for serious scrutiny of China, on this issue of the demographic matter and others, with lots of faults on human trafficking. But the combination of the population policy, even if it is liberalized some--and we should watch with great skepticism whether the announced leadership reforms in population policy pan out--and attitudes which continue to stand throughout Chinese society about the value of a male child over a female child. That isn't changing, and that is, indeed, the magnet, combined with China's inhumane policy of not treating those who flee North Korea as refugees. They are under great pressure. Someone, a woman who comes over fleeing a desperate economic and political situation in North Korea, or a man as well, will be facing the fate of being deported back to North Korea for possible punishment or even execution. That is a huge situation of leverage. And when that is added to the magnet of a desperate desire for women as wives and as sex partners, you have a cocktail for a tremendous human harm. Mr. Smith. I have other questions, but I will hold off and ask Ms. Bass if she would proceed. Ms. Bass. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. As always, I appreciate your leadership on this issue for many, many, many years. So, I just wanted to ask several questions of various panelists, starting with Ambassador Lagon. I know that the White House recently launched a public/ private partnership to combat trafficking with the use of technology. Since I missed your comments earlier, I didn't know if you could talk about that and highlight some of the methods and strategies that are being used. Ambassador Lagon. Well, I am a big believer in partnerships as the lifeblood of the anti-human-trafficking movement. To her credit, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasized that as a fourth ``P.'' Before her, the former head of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, also said that there should be a fourth ``P'' of partnerships. And I think, truth be told, the Bush administration approach was one that believed in those partnerships as well. I think we should all look at ways that technology can be used, including crowdsourcing, to help the funding of NGOs and for looking at big data. But I think we should take care to remember that it is, in fact, an idea that every human being is of equal value and the people who are working in NGOs and businesses and government are the ones who really make the difference. High technology and big data for studying patterns, these are tools, and we should just remember these are tools in the service of trying to fight this terrible scourge. Ms. Bass. Are they being used? And how about the State Department? Has the State Department embraced the technology? Maybe you could give us some examples of where they were? Ambassador Lagon. Well, I think that, actually, the U.S. Agency for International Development has probably been on the forefront of trying to use technology, pursuing/offering up a challenge to potential grant applicants for the use of technology. Ms. Bass. Oh, is it in the process? Like they have a Request for Proposals out or something? Ambassador Lagon. They are, indeed, asking for people to come forward and working with a series of universities around the United States to try to figure out ways to use social media and ways to use high technology. One of the projects of the U.S. Agency for International Development is, in fact, an ability for you to be able to take your handheld out and scan a product and have a sense of its supply chain. Ms. Bass. Oh. Ambassador Lagon. That is a nascent effort---- Ms. Bass. Right. Ambassador Lagon [continuing]. But a promising one. Ms. Bass. Another question, and this is related to the Netherlands. I wanted to ask you, I think last year you were critical of the Netherlands as a Tier 1 country. We know that in the Netherlands prostitution is legal. Anybody who has been there has seen it. But I wanted to know how the State Department has asserted that prostitution and human trafficking are linked, but how does it factor in the decisions around the TIP Report? Ambassador Lagon. Well, I think there has been a subtle change in the approach of the office. I think in the Bush administration and under the Obama administration there has been an emphasis on demand, but I do think that there is perhaps less emphasis on the importance of fighting sex buying. Let me be clear when I talk about, you know, the legal regime. What I am concerned about is putting the men who would be buyers of sex on the hook. And I think it is important not to punish women who are in the sex industry---- Ms. Bass. Right. Ambassador Lagon [continuing]. Whether or not they are human trafficking victims. I think the model is not working in the Netherlands, and there have been really fascinating press stories on the model failing in Germany, where trafficking has spiked because of the legal regime. And country after country, the UK, France, and across the ocean, Canada, are pursuing legal changes to try to punish the sex buyers and move toward a more Nordic model. Ms. Bass. Right. I appreciate that. I didn't hear your testimony, Mr. Campbell, but I read your testimony about Uzbekistan. And I was wondering if you could talk about that in terms of the forced participation in the cotton harvest and if anything has changed. And also, you know, in terms of the textile industry, I don't know if any of our companies are sourcing from there. Mr. Campbell. Okay. Thank you, Congresswoman. To get right to the point, the situation continues largely unabated, that there continues to be forced labor compelled by the government and it involves children; in certain places it is younger than 14, but largely 15-, 16-, 17-year-old children from across the country, and it involves adults who come from all sectors, both the public and private sector for employment. And so, the situation continues. It is an urgent situation. Where it has changed a little bit--and I covered this a little bit in the testimony--was, because of the pressure, the pressure from this committee, the pressure from the U.S. Government, the Uzbek Government granted a reprieve for children under 14 years old across the nation from being systematically mobilized from across the nation. Now children under 14 continue to be mobilized in different parts by local government officials and stuff. So, they were mobilized still as a part of that system. Now whether they were systematically mobilized across the country, no, there were parts of the country that actually replaced their labor with adult forced labor. Unfortunately, what we have not seen is a change in their attitude toward the issue of forced labor in any way. I will just pull a quote really fast from the International Labor Organization which stated very clearly that ``The Government of Uzbekistan continues to deny that it has a forced labor problem.'' It has invited the ILO to help advise it on understanding what its forced labor problem might be, although that has been pretty clear to everybody for years. It is also they have invited the ILO, I think just announced yesterday the ILO will send in a decent work team to do some education amongst the government. But we are still talking about education about a problem that the rest of the world has known about for years. Ms. Bass. They say it doesn't exist. Mr. Campbell. Yes. And in terms of supply chains---- Ms. Bass. Right. Mr. Campbell [continuing]. I will say that the garment industry in the United States and the American Apparel and Footwear Association has been a tremendous supporter to clean their supply chains of this forced labor cotton. I mean, there is no question it is getting into our supply chains. Can we find it? It is really hard. The closest we have been able to really come was we know who is processing the cotton in Uzbekistan. There is a company, Daewoo International, a large Korean company, that has operations globally. They are processing that cotton and selling that cotton, and they are in full knowledge of the fact that they are benefitting from this forced labor system. They even said so on their own Web site. What they said was, what we can't do as a textile company is address this issue because it is a government forced labor problem in Uzbekistan. Ms. Bass. They don't have to source from there. Mr. Campbell. Well, I can't speak for Daewoo. I imagine that they would fear losing this guaranteed supply of very cheap cotton. I imagine that they would fear losing really what are their only major processing, yarn processing facilities for their other manufacturing. But that is the processed yarn. What we also are trying to learn more about, and we can find, for example, the cotton, the raw cotton is going to Bangladesh. The raw cotton is going to China. What we are trying to find out is who in Bangladesh, who in China is buying the raw cotton, because it is our opinion that this cotton is made with forced labor. Our laws prohibit the importation of goods made in whole or in part with the use of forced labor. Ms. Bass. Okay. Mr. Campbell. So, what we are trying to do is learn. I will congratulate, and I would like to say that the Department of Homeland Security and the Customs and Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement have taken this situation very seriously. What we understand, though they will tell you they can't comment on an ongoing investigation, we received a response to a Freedom of Information Act request that we had sent whereby we were able to confirm that, at our request on a petition we filed last year, the Department of Homeland Security has opened an investigation into Indorama Corporation and into Daewoo Corporation. And partly as a result of that investigation, a shipment of cotton yarn from Uzbekistan was denied entry into the United States last October. We don't have the final outcome. What we hope is that the investigation into those two corporations will continue because those are criminal violations. And to the extent that either corporation is subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, they should be prosecuted for these criminal violations. Ms. Bass. Okay. Thank you. My final question I wanted to ask Ms. Lummert. One of the issues in trafficking that is of major interest to me is trafficking domestically here in the United States, not of primarily females from overseas, but girls right here. We know that a large percentage of these girls have a relationship to the child welfare system and they have fallen through the cracks for a long time. We just kind of assumed that any girl that ran away ran away and didn't realize that she was necessarily being forced and trafficked. And so, you spoke about the Catholic Church's work domestically. I was looking through your written presentation, and that part of it just was mainly talking about girls coming from overseas to here. So, my question to you is, is the Catholic Church involved in any kind of systematic way, focusing on the trafficking of girls here domestically? I know there are some males, but it is primarily girls. And if there is an organized effort on the Catholic Church's part? Ms. Lummert. Right. The Catholic Charities network in the U.S. is very extensive and they operate foster care programs throughout the country. Within those foster care programs, of course, they are seeing victims of trafficking domestically. Some of them may have been foreign-born, but they are trafficked within the U.S. as well. One of the things that we are doing is looking at our model of refugee foster care network that actually has served victims of trafficking, some of whom are brought in internationally, but some whom also have been trafficked within the U.S., to look at what has worked with that model of care and the services. We have served about 100 survivors of trafficking, children, girls and boys, both labor and sex trafficking, to see what are the practices that they are using and evaluate those practices. We hope to have that available soon. But what we are seeing from that work is the importance of having a trusting relationship with the service providers, a mentoring relationship with the professionals working with the children. We think that that will also be very valuable to the domestic child welfare system as well who are serving American- born children. Ms. Bass. Yes, and maybe I can follow up with you because I would just caution a little bit that I do understand how in some ways it might be applicable, but I think there are a lot of ways it is not, and especially with a lot of the groups that are working with kids who were born here. And so, maybe there can be some relationship where we could be helpful to share. One of the things about this field is that there is a real lack of evidence-based practices dealing with this population, period. But I do worry because over the years the focus has been on the international, and I don't think we have paid--you know, we are certainly beginning now, and a lot with your leadership and the TIP Report, I think the situation in domestic trafficking is different. In the Los Angeles area, for example, some of that trafficking is done by street gangs. And so, it is really important to understand that different programs and practices might be needed. Ms. Lummert. One of the networks that I think that we could follow up with and get more information from is the Covenant House organization. They are involved with homeless and runaway youth. Ms. Bass. Right. Ms. Lummert. In fact, I used to work with them. They are involved with a Catholic coalition against trafficking as well. They are seeing this population. As you know, the children who are emancipating from foster care in the U.S. are the ones that are particularly vulnerable. The ones in foster care and the ones who are emancipating from foster care, they are vulnerable to the trusting relationship that these traffickers make the children believe that they have. Ms. Bass. Right. Ms. Lummert. They are exploiting the vulnerable situation and the lack of this trusting relationship or any protection system that is in place for them. Ms. Bass. Right, and I am sure you are aware that the age of emancipation, which is a term for which we probably should find a new one, is 18, but the average age that these girls are being trafficked is 12. Ms. Lummert. That is right. Ms. Bass. So, they are being recruited far before, well before they would reach the age of emancipation. So, hopefully, we can work together in the future. I work a lot with my colleague Tom Marino. We co-chair the Congressional Caucus on Foster Youth. And so, this has become a particularly important issue to us. Thank you. Mr. Smith. I would like to now yield to Tom Marino from Pennsylvania. Now we know, parenthetically, he was the U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, so a very accomplished prosecutor at that. Mr. Marino. Thank you. Karen is right, we work a great deal on foster care/ adoption. We see so many things taking place that we are trying to bring to the public's attention more and more here in the United States, particularly when it comes to the trafficking of young people, young girls. I, too, do not like the term that is used, this ``emancipation.'' It turns one's stomach to see what we see in our Caucus. I have a concern here. I was reading a report by the UNODC, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. It was gathered from 155 countries. And Executive Director Costa said that most countries, most of these 155 countries deny that there is any trafficking taking place. One question I have for the U.N. is, why do we have trafficking, human trafficking, tied up in a drugs- and crime- gathering unit? We should have a very aggressive, specific unit totally devoted to human trafficking, starting right here in the United States and in the U.N. In my last several months of U.S. Attorney in the Middle District of Pennsylvania, I guess it was about 7 or 8 years ago, we prosecuted one of the largest human trafficking rings. It took place in certainly Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and I think it went into Delaware, but I am not quite sure about that. We sent a couple of real bad fellows away for a very, very long time. And this was not a situation where they persuaded-- look, I am 61 years old--I call these ``young girls,'' out for sex. I mean, it was threats. It was taking hostage. It was beating these young girls. And if you would have heard the testimony coming from these victims, it would have broken your heart. But we put these guys away just about forever. I kind of miss those days from putting these culprits away. But this percentage of human trafficking within this report indicated that 79 percent of the human trafficking is for sex; 18 percent of it is from forced labor. And as a matter of fact, in West Africa--and it is usually children in forced labor--100 percent of the children that are trafficked, 100 percent of those trafficked are children in these areas, and most of it is close to home. So, the point I am painstakingly getting to is, once again, the United States steps up to the issue here at the U.N., but what is the U.N., in and of itself, doing? My patience is growing very, very thin with the United Nations. They talk a good game, but we don't see the results across the board on many issues, but particularly this issue. Ambassador Lagon. Mr. Marino, could I speak to that? Mr. Marino. Please. Ambassador Lagon. It is a good set of questions. I came to head the State Department's human trafficking office from the bureau that dealt with the U.N. And one of the threads in my career has been working on the U.N., including a book on international organizations I am about to publish. You asked really good questions. First, the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime has played a leading role because the original treaty in the U.N. on human trafficking was attached to a transnational criminal networks treaty. I think it is problematic where there to be a singularly U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime approach. It should not surprise you that coordination between different agencies of the U.N. is crummy, a technical term, crummy. Mr. Marino. To say the least. Ambassador Lagon. There are good actors. UNICEF does some good work. The International Labor Organization does some good work. Outside of the U.N. system, the International Organization for Migration does some very good work. The U.N. solution to a problem with coordination is to create multiple coordinating bodies, which don't really improve the situation. The U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, I think, would do a better job itself, to the degree that it is involved, if it would help train countries to implement laws. Because the major problem in human trafficking around the world is that countries have enacted laws and they have ratified this U.N. Palermo Protocol on trafficking, but they are not implementing it. Mr. Marino. But let me interrupt there because that looks good from a political standpoint, but if it is not enforced. And I think many times in these countries it is just for politics; okay, let's show the world that we are taking care of this. However, it boils down to revenue is certainly generated from child trafficking, particularly in the labor area, but also in the sex trade. So, these are countries that just, once again, give lip service. And we at the U.N., and the United States to a certain degree, we take it. Why are we not calling out in a general session of the United Nations--I would love to stand up there and read off the list of countries and the leaders of those countries, you know, where they have a law; some of them don't have a law, but what enforcement have they done? Ambassador Lagon. Right. Mr. Marino. I mean, it is about time we call these people out publicly. Ambassador Lagon. I entirely agree with you. So, two points. First, I think, despite the desire of the U.N. to have its own global report, the two that it has put out have not rivaled the State Department's report in their seriousness and completeness. And then, secondly, it is indeed exactly a problem of promises in rhetoric and on paper in laws and treaties, and not having action. I used to call this ``the loop,'' while I was head of the human trafficking office, a country would go up in its ranking when it passed a comprehensive law. And then, a couple of years later, you would see it wasn't enforcing it, and it went down again. Mr. Marino. I see my time is running out. But I say this with all good intentions. I would leave this position in a heartbeat if I had the authority and the team to go internationally and investigate and bring these people to justice. And I yield back. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Marino. Let me ask Ms. Lummert a couple of questions, if I could. In your testimony you list the unique contributions of faith-based partners in the fight against trafficking. How can the U.S. Government better include faith-based perspectives and expertise in the fight? I do want to thank you for your 6 years as administrator of grants to foreign victims found in the U.S. As your testimony clearly points out, more than 2200 survivors of trafficking and over 500 of their family members were served during that time. I was, frankly, deeply distressed, disturbed, and tried to find some legal way of changing it, and could not find it with a reluctant Senate and with the administration taking the position it took. But when Kathleen Sebelius put out her Request for Proposals and said that organizations that refer for abortion will be given preference, they sealed the deal, sadly, at HHS and picked the winners not based on competence and the ability to positively affect the lives of trafficking victims, but based on who does abortions. As you know, the HHS reviewers looked at your program and gave it superlative marks, and these were the independent-minded HHS reviewers who looked at what do you do, what is your capacity, and how well did you do it. And unfortunately, it went to other organizations that scored far below you, at least one which I found extraordinarily distressing. But it has been my experience--and you may or may not want to speak to this--that faith-based has been given an arm's length approach by many over the years. When we first did this bill, there was a large number of people who wanted to exclude the faith-based side. They did it with PEPFAR. They have done it with other programs of the Federal Government. I am the one who authored the conscience clause on PEPFAR. It won by two votes in the Foreign Affairs Committee. So, it was not a slam- dunk, so that faith-based healthcare could be included. So, my question, you know, you spoke eloquently about the initiative by Pope Francis to bring Christians, Orthodox, and Muslims together, but I think that is a new platform for further jumping off and doing more, particularly on the prevention and protection side. Because I have been in shelters all over the world, and so many of those shelters are run by faith-based organizations. And I have been astounded how much healing happens in a faith-based shelter where the love and almost like the 12-step program for AA. If it wasn't for the God side of it, some people would never get to that point where they can overcome their addiction to alcohol or drugs. And I have seen it time and time again, that joy in the eyes of a woman who has been trafficked and cruelly exploited, but with a smile on her face because she has found new hope in her own life. And Sister Eugenia, I have been to her programs in shelters in Rome and met women, one woman who was from Nigeria. As a matter of fact, Greg and I, he will recall this. She had been trafficked for 5 years, and this woman had joy unspeakable about her new life and was soon going to be getting married. I mean, she really had turned her life around through that shelter. And the same way in Lima, Peru; name the place, I have seen them. And so, how do governments, how does our Government stop this arm's length? I find it with the European Union approach. I am the Special Representative for Human Trafficking for the Parliamentary Assembly for the OSCE, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. My counterpart a couple of years ago, she and I used to fight over it--she said no faith- based in the shelters; they are not allowed. I was in Sarajevo at a shelter and they told me in the shelter they wouldn't allow any Muslims, Christians, or Jews, or anyone with faith, to come in and assist the women. I was not only shocked, but I was disappointed and argued with them for the better part of an hour. So, we need, it seems to me, to recognize the extraordinary value that faith-based brings to healing and prevention, so protection. If you could elaborate on that? Ms. Lummert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The meeting that I was at at the Vatican, one of the impetuses of that was the collaboration between law enforcement and the Catholic Church in England, and, in particular, for example, what they are doing there is the religious community, the religious Sisters are actually working in collaboration with Scotland Yard to identify victims of trafficking, because the law enforcement recognized that there is only so much they can do to identify victims of trafficking. And they recognized the Church can play a role in prevention, in awareness in the communities most at risk, and also in identifying more than the law enforcement can themselves. Here in the U.S. one of the initiatives that we have is working with the Customs and Border Patrol and the Inspection Officers to provide informational briefings on identifying victims of trafficking, in particular, children. And we have had positive response from that. The officers say that they feel like they can be more aware and know what to do as a result of those briefings. What we bring to that is child development expertise. We bring our expertise in knowing about particular cases of child victims of trafficking who have been identified in the U.S. and that education, then, is helpful to them. So, we are hoping to be able to expand that as an example of a collaboration with law enforcement. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Mr. Burns, you spoke, and it was very encouraging to hear, how the Philippines and Cambodia reacted to tier rankings, you said trafficking against women is truly enforced and that they are taking seriously their obligations, and it is making a difference in the lives of children. We have always believed, I and others, Mark Lagon I know as Ambassador, that when you chronicle something, when you honestly ascribe a real value to it pro or con based on the record, people stand up and take notice, particularly when there is a penalty phase down the line, or a potential one. What happens when we go the other way and take a pass, punt? When somebody should be dropped, as you said with Uzbekistan--and I do think, Dr. Uddin, you would like to see Burma as a Tier 3 country as well. You raised the question and I think your bottom line would be that it would be a Tier 3 country. When we don't do it, what happens to the victims and to trafficking in that country? Do we unwittingly enable it? Mr. Burns. I don't think I would go as far as to say that we enable it because I think the responsibility to govern the country still rests with the country, but we certainly don't help. I think what IJM would say is this goes to the point that the TIP office needs to be very independent. It needs to be free to, as I think Ambassador Lagon said, honestly and perhaps scientifically evaluate all the nations of the world and give them the appropriate tier ranking. So, we would favor anything that gives them more independence, such as we supported the bill to make them a bureau. But, yes, I think you can take the experience in the Philippines and see that the Philippines was quite motivated to protect its citizens because of the downgrading on its tier ranking. And had you not done that, they wouldn't have had that motivation and we would have had great difficulty getting them to enforce the law. Mr. Smith. Greg Simpkins and I and Piero, also on our staff, and two other Members were in the Philippines right after the typhoon. Mr. Burns. Yes. Mr. Smith. And frankly, there seemed to be among the NGO community definitely--we were with CRS most of the time and USAID--but there seemed to be a great recognition that children could be trafficked, and women, of course, under the cloud of a catastrophe. We met with two high-ranking officials, the Foreign Minister as well as the Health Minister, and they seemed to get it as well. So, would that comport with your view that they are very serious? Mr. Burns. Absolutely. In fact, my examples went to the government taking trafficking seriously in the Philippines. But the public, too--and this is probably a bit unique in the Philippines because the Philippines pays great attention to what the United States does--the public is very conversant in the trafficking issues. And I had people just on the street quote to me various aspects of the TIP Report. Mr. Smith. Dr. Uddin, you note in your testimony that one of the trafficking routes for Rohingya victims runs from Burma to Malaysia. You also note that Thai authorities have participated in the trafficking of Rohingya. Have Malay authorities also engaged in trafficking of Rohingya who have arrived in or moved to Malaysia? And what happens once they arrive in Malaysia? Mr. Uddin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the question. As of now, there is no report of Malaysian authorities, Malaysian police force or immigration involved in trafficking like there is in Thailand with Thai forces. When the victim arrives in Malaysia, they are reported to be confined into hard laborers and forced laborers, underaged laborers, things like that. We have not seen any reports of sex slavery issues in Malaysia, but if there are any, they are reportedly near the Thai border. But primarily the sex issues of underaged and women are along the border of Malaysia and Thailand. There are camps there. On the other side there is a wooded area, forested areas. There are some isolated islands. That is where it is taking place. According to reports, the Malaysian Government reportedly is sympathetic to Rohingya refugees more than Thailand, and according to the report, they have responded somewhat positively to Rohingya issues. There are no reports of brutality against refugees, what we have seen on the Internet and the pictures. The Thai police is doing it. The Thai Government is refusing it. So, as of now, we have not seen anything from the Malaysian side, but that is not to say that it could not happen in the future, because this problem is escalating, getting bigger on a daily basis. More people are leaving Burma. More people are leaving Arakan State. Approximately 40,000 refugees, people, have moved through Thailand in 2013. That is a lot of people, 40,000 people. So now, are we going to prevent that or is it going to be more than 40,000 this year in 2014? So, once things escalate and spill over to Malaysia, this sex trade thing can spill over to Malaysia. Even Indonesia, we didn't have many refugees in Indonesia a couple of years ago. Now we have several hundreds, probably in thousands, in Indonesia. This local issue in Burma in Arakan State, this normal local issue, is becoming a regional issue, and I am afraid it is expanding, escalating into a global issue. Mr. Smith. Thank you. Let me ask Ambassador Lagon, if you would speak to the issue of Vietnam, whether or not they ought to be a Tier 3 country, in your view? China as well, would you designate them or keep them on the Tier 3 list? You mentioned New Zealand and, then, the fact that there has not been any serious prosecutions in the last 9 years. That is one I didn't anticipate. Maybe why New Zealand? Regarding the Japanese businessmen who are traveling to Southeast Asia, I mean, what is Japan doing to mitigate this terrible problem of trafficking? And that would go from some parts of South America as well, particularly Peru. And then, finally, you also note in your testimony that many EU nations, member states, have been discussing stronger attempts at combating demand by focusing on enforcement on the buyers of commercial sex in general. How does the commercial sex industry, which I think is an absolute nefarious industry-- and I often get criticized for being whole-heartedly against it--and human trafficking overlap? Do you have any indication of the manner that an EU-wide ban on purchasing of sex would change the sex trafficking patterns of the EU? Ambassador Lagon. Lots of good questions. I will be brief. I am very concerned about the situation in Vietnam and the situation for Vietnamese citizens who migrate elsewhere, and the situation of labor recruiters. I also am concerned about trafficking within Vietnam, and I think it deserves close scrutiny for receiving the lowest of grades. As for China, you know, it is very good that it finally was subjected to the downgrade without any waivers. I think there are any number of reasons, some of which we talked about before--the demographic situation, and the vulnerability of North Koreans but also the movement of people within China without a social safety net which also makes them vulnerable to human trafficking. I, myself, am not in the trafficking office right now, but I don't see any grounds for raising China's ranking. I think we just need to look at the gap between a ranking and between a narrative. In the case of New Zealand, it is striking. You know what happens in the State Department? When there is a disagreement between a regional bureau and the trafficking office, and it is refereed at the most senior levels of the Department, if the trafficking office loses and the ranking is higher than it recommended, then it gets more of an opportunity to incorporate in the narrative the facts. And you will notice some gaps. A country which has not found a victim or prosecuted a perpetrator in 7 years is one for which you have to ask the question, is it really meeting the minimum standards? It shouldn't get credit for just doing good work in less-developed countries in the region. Of the many problems in Japan, I am concerned about those who are tourists elsewhere. It is a fact that there are Westerners who are child sex tourists and customers of commercial sex that drive sex trafficking in the Asian region, but, in fact, there are Asian tourists that are the major drivers. And the Japanese tourists are among them. Government authorities and businesses in Japan need to take responsibility for that. On your final question about the commercial sex industry, I do not believe that prostitution and sex trafficking are one and the same, but prostitution is the enabling environment. If there was not a sex market, there would not be these huge profits to be made by sex traffickers. The situation of human trafficking around the world is one in which the traffickers reap big profits and seeks out a situation of low risk. I believe that if Europe as a whole took on the Nordic model, then some of the successes that one sees in Sweden would be enjoyed elsewhere. And the opposite model has been a manifest failure, most markedly seen in the case of Germany. Mr. Smith. Let me ask you, Mr. Campbell, very quickly, the ILO Convention 182 enforcement, you know, the deployment of the ILO monitoring team, you did mention in your testimony that they were hindered, and yet, they still were able to come to some very profound conclusions. Could you just say how large was the team? How were they hindered? Were they threatened? Were people who talked to them threatened? Did they have to find clandestine ways to make contact with people, so that they could take accurate notes about what was happening? Mr. Campbell. Sure. Thank you for that great question, because it is complicated. The reason the ILO is hindered is because they view themselves as a body of social partners. That would be the governments, the employers, and the trade unions. It is the only U.N. agency that is set up with those tripartite partners. In the case of Uzbekistan, those partners are one and the same. The government, the trade union, and the employers are all agents of the government. They are not independent. So, therefore, the ILO social partner model breaks down significantly when entering into Uzbekistan. The way that the monitoring was conducted from the methodology in their report was one ILO monitor ran a team of up to 40 local government officials who were designated by the Uzbek Government. The Uzbek Government required the ILO to only look at and report on violations of Convention 182; 182 is the Convention on the Worst Forms of Child Labor. Included in that Convention as a worst form of child labor is forced child labor. But, with that extremely-limited definition, the ILO was not allowed to look at the issue of forced labor generally. So, therefore, they had to find very creative ways to get that information out in their report. For example, they had quotes that said, ``We have concerns about the way labor is recruited.'' They can't come right out and say it because the report has to be approved by all the social partners, and in this case the social partners were the Uzbek Government. And so, I think in a different way that they were interfered with. And again, I am not holding the ILO responsible for this. It is their constitution. They have to follow their own rules. I suppose in this regard what I would say is that there were efforts across the country in advance of the ILO getting there to make sure that people who were going to report out on the harvest were saying what they were supposed to say. In one very stark example--and this is just a real shame--a journalist, his name was Sergei Naumov, he was just days before the ILO appeared in his area, where he had been documenting the continued enforcement of labor to harvest cotton; he was photographing it. He was arrested, held incommunicado for eight, I think between 8 and 10 days. I will have to double- check. He was not allowed to communicate out that he was even arrested and all of that happened while the ILO was out there trying to monitor in that region. So, I think the government has made extreme efforts in order to look like they are cooperating with the ILO, but they have used some very unknowable procedures, and they are very difficult to understand from the ILO perspective because it is all within the ILO. They have used some procedures to their advantage. I would strongly encourage the International Labor Organization and its social partners, which work very well together on this issue--the employers and the unions is the only case at the ILO where the International Organization of Employers and the International Trade Union Confederation are on the same page. This is a tremendous opportunity. Unfortunately, we are not, as an international community at the ILO, looking at the issue of Convention 105. Convention 105 prohibits the mobilization of labor for economic activity by a government. That is exactly what is going on here. And so, therefore, I hope this year the International Labor Organization at its meetings this summer, at the Committee on Application of Standards, will take up the issue of Convention 105. By doing so, the Uzbek Government will no longer be able to deny they violate that Convention. They are only able to do it now because they keep trying to push us in a different direction. They are trying to say, ``See, look. Look at what we are doing for our children.'' They want us to ignore what is happening to the adults. Unfortunately, the ILO's hands are tied in this manner, but they will have a decent work program. And I hope that they can start these conversations. But, again, they have agreements to begin talking about talking about the problems. What we need is action, and that is not what is happening. Thank you. Mr. Smith. Just a couple of final questions. Again on New Zealand, we have had more trafficking prosecutions in my congressional district than the entire country of New Zealand. We just had a recent one in Lakewood, New Jersey, for example. And in and around the Super Bowl, in the days and weeks leading up to it, 70 women were liberated, including 25 minors, and some 40 pimps were arrested in connection--some were already being put under surveillance before the Super Bowl, but it was all released right around the Super Bowl time. In regards to the TVPA, in my opinion there has been somewhat of a disconnect between we do the right thing on, at least we hope we do, designating countries, and that is a tug- of-war within the State Department. The reason why we are having this hearing is to give advanced notice to the TIP office and others where you and us and others are thinking they ought to be going, because you are experts in the field. But the second shoe to drop is the penalty phase, and that often lags to the point of nothing happens. And if you don't do something enough, the offending countries say it is a worthless gesture. Why have penalties if you are not going to impose them? Nowhere is that more clear than in the International Religious Freedom Act, where time and again individual countries are named as a Country of Particular Concern and they never get sanctioned. Anyone who would want to touch on that? Your thoughts on that? The penalty phase, China, were they ever penalized for being a new Tier 3 country? You mentioned, Ambassador Lagon, about Japan. Why is Japan given such a non-look, if you will. As you said, they have not signed onto Palermo. There has not been a whole lot done there, and there are problems with sex tourism, particularly of Japanese businessmen. Ambassador Lagon. Well, actually, the question on Japan is whether it goes down from Tier 2. Let me say that one of the greatest sources of friction that I have faced in my time as the Ambassador was the concern of Japan that it was not getting Tier 1 like every other G7 country. Even the U.S. Embassy, where there is often resistance to taking up tough human rights and human trafficking issues, was adding things to the list that we were taking to the Japanese Government about what it needed to do. As far as the sanctions that would go along with Tier 3, it is odd that the countries that get sanctions are the ones that already have sanctions. I will say that the moral opprobrium, the stigma, that goes along with the lowest ranking may be the most powerful element of Tier 3. But the United States is leaving on the table leverage that it might have by actually using those sanctions. And some of the cases that my colleagues have pointed out here of the United States using its voice and vote in international financial institutions show another way that the United States could help assert pressure. I will say that when Moldova faced Tier 3, its designation with status from the Millennium Challenge Corporation was put under threat when the United States gave it Tier 3 in 2008. That really matters. Mr. Smith. Yes? Mr. Campbell. Congressman, on the issue of sanctions, I think it is important to recognize that it is not just an issue of sanctions. And the voice and vote I think is the best example. What it is, it is a common-sense policy to avoid investing in a forced labor system in Uzbekistan. I wouldn't view it as a sanction. I would view it as an instruction that the United States Government should be avoiding what we prohibit already, which is investing in forced labor. And so, I would say that it should be a matter of course that, when a government is downgraded to Tier 3, if the international financial institutions are going to invest in those sectors that are the cause of that downgrade, we must, as a matter of course, use our voice and vote to prevent that from happening. Otherwise, we will just be throwing money after or into a forced labor system. Mr. Smith. Yes, like to add anything, Dr. Uddin? Mr. Uddin. Yes. I would like to see that the waiver of the Burmese Government, President Obama giving the waiver, we need to monitor that very closely and designate any improvement. If there is no improvement, it has to be reevaluated. I would love to see the Burma, the great country that I know of, coming off this list, of Tier 2, from Tier 3 to Tier 2, Tier 1, and gone. I would love to see that, but we know what needs to be done. We need to make sure that the Burmese Government knows, and they know, also, what needs to be done, so they can get off the list. And I would like to give the opportunity to the Burmese Government with this incentive, this waiver. And we hope that the Burmese Government will take a look at it seriously and, then, address the issue on the ground, the root cause of the issue, rather than chasing the smugglers, arresting the smugglers, traffickers, and punishing them. That is clipping the tip of the leaves, not the roots of the tree. So, that is what we hope, that the Burma Government will cooperate with the international community and resolve the issue on the ground. I am sure that the rest of the sequence of events can be prevented. Mr. Smith. Would anybody else like to add anything before we close? [No response.] You have been very gracious with your time. A thousand pardons for all those interruptions. But this transcript will be used. We will share it with our leadership, Republican and Democrat. We will get it down to the TIP office, make sure that Ambassador Luis CdeBaca, who is very responsive and very capable, will have the benefit of your testimonies. And as soon as we get a transcript, he will have the benefit of your incisive answers to questions, so that they have the most informed input from people who are truly expert. And that is the five of you. So, thank you. The hearing is adjourned. [Whereupon, at 5:16 p.m., the meeting was adjourned.] A P P E N D I X ---------- Material Submitted for the Record [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] Material submitted for the record by the Honorable Christopher H. Smith, a Representative in Congress from the State of New Jersey, and chairman, Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] [all]