Rwanda is a source and, to a lesser extent, transit and destination country for women and children subjected to forced labour and sex trafficking, a new report claims.According to the 2012 Trafficking in Persons report released last week by the US State Department, Rwandan women and children are recruited and transported to countries like Uganda, Kenya, Zambia, China and in Europe, where they are subjected to forced agricultural and industrial labour, domestic servitude, and prostitution.“Older females offer vulnerable younger girls room and board, eventually pushing them into prostitution to pay for their keep. In limited cases, trafficking is facilitated by women who supply other women or girls to clients or by loosely-organised prostitution networks, some operating in secondary schools and universities,” said the report.It adds that children in Rwanda-based refugee camps are victims of trafficking to Uganda and Kenya at the hands of other refugees.The report cites a January 2012 case where several Congolese refugee children from the Nyabiheke refugee camp in Gatsibo District alleged that another refugee lured them to Uganda through enticement of jobs, only to be exploited in brothels.The Police spokesman Supt. Theos Badege admitted that Rwanda could be a transit route but denied it is a destination. “At least for transit yes. It’s a source to some extent, but we are seriously dealing with it.” Badege spoke of the arrest in April of two suspects, Valentin Rukimbira and Walter Bwanakweli, accused of trafficking girls to Asian countries for commercial sex - whose trial began early this month at the Intermediate Court of Nyarugenge.Atleast three girls have so far come forward to testify against the suspects, saying they had been recruited by the duo on promises of well-paying jobs in China.Following the duo’s arrest, the Chinese Embassy in Kigali in April announced new stringent requirements people seeking a visa to China would have to fulfil.The Rwandan National Police (RNP) registered seven cases of human trafficking in 2011, according to sources. But The New Times could not get information on the outcome of these cases. The report, was unveiled by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the State Department, highlighting the horror of individual cases in 186 countries and territories. Clinton estimated that up to 27 million people are living in slavery around the world. But the report showed that as governments become more aware of the issue, instigating tough new laws and programmes to help victims, progress is being made in wiping out what it called the “scourge of trafficking.”In the report, governments full in compliance in addressing trafficking are given the highest status of Tier 1.In the region, Rwanda and Tanzania show progress, getting Tier 2 status while governments unable to demonstrate compliance with minimal standards, such as in Sudan, are given Tier 3 status and can be subject to significant economic sanctions.A limited number of foreign nationalso according to the report, are moved through Rwanda to be exploited in third countries.The report’s numbers on prosecution of trafficking paint a dismal picture. In the last eight years, the number of government prosecutions around the world for human trafficking has declined, from 6,885 in 2004 to 5,694 in 2011.In Rwanda, the government demonstrated some improvements in its anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts during the reporting period, as it prosecuted trafficking offenders and trained additional police officers in trafficking-related topics. “It failed, however, to convict any traffickers.”The report hails Rwanda as the only African country in which the government is undertaking virtually all activities related to the demobilisation and reintegration of former child soldiers, some of whom are trafficking victims. “The government prosecuted at least two trafficking offenders under its child kidnapping law, but failed to convict any trafficking offenders,” it says.The report, whose major theme of this year is victim protection, emphasises the need for governments around the world to cease arresting victims of trafficking.It acknowledges that during the reporting period, the government referred sex trafficking victims to protective services and trained more police officers as gender-based violence specialists.Supt. Badege says human trafficking is taken as a serious concern in the country, even when it involves one person, because it’s an international crime – but he adds it’s not taking place on large scale as the report portrays it. “In collaboration with other relevant institutions, like immigration authorities, we have stepped up strict border controls and sensitisation to report suspicious cases,” he told The New Times at the weekend.The report calls on the government to establish a system to assist foreign trafficking victims with relief from deportation; and build capacity to screen for trafficking victims through increased collaboration between the police and the Ministry of Gender and Family Promotion or NGOs.ProsecutionArticle 28 of the Law on Prevention and Punishment of Gender-Based Violence (Law No. 59/2008) outlaws, but does not define, sex trafficking and prescribes sufficiently stringent punishments of 15 to 20 years’ imprisonment, penalties that are commensurate with those prescribed for other serious offences, such as rape.While Article 8 of the Law Regulating Labour in Rwanda (13/2009) prohibits forced labour and Article 167 prescribes sufficiently stringent punishments of three to five years’ imprisonment; Article 72 prohibits subjecting children to slavery, child trafficking, debt bondage, forced labour, armed conflict, and child prostitution and Article 168 prescribes punishment of six months to 20 years’ imprisonment for these offences.Out of the 185 countries included in the 2012 report, only 33 complied fully with laws in place to end human trafficking, putting them at the top of a four-tier ranking system.
