The Sydney Morning Herald
Geesche Jacobsen, Crime Editor
November 26, 2010

This is in relation to the report on Labour trafficking that’s available on our site under Digital Downloads section within Australian Material.

THEIR position is akin to modern slavery, but people who have been trafficked to Australia to work for little pay in appalling conditions are often kept not by chains but physical or cultural isolation, threats of violence, obligations to repay debt, or the promise of permanent residency, a report says.

The report on labour trafficking by the Australian Institute of Criminology says the problem in Australia is underestimated and ranges from slavery to industrial breaches.

It focuses not on the better-known exploitation of women in the sex industry but draws attention to the approximately half a million migrant workers who could be exploited in industries such as agriculture, construction, cleaning, meat works and manufacturing. read more..

Federal member for Adelaide
Kate Ellis
November 24, 2010

Minister for Home Affairs and Justice Brendan O’Connor has announced another $1.6 million will be invested in tackling human trafficking including sex and labour exploitation.

The announcement was made at the third National Roundtable on People Trafficking at Parliament House in Canberra on Wednesday, 24 November. The forum brings together anti-trafficking groups, unions, industry bodies and Ministers with a role to play in this important transnational issue.  read more..

Australia.to NEWS
November 22, 2010

Today, I am pleased to present to the Parliament the second report of the Anti-People Trafficking Interdepartmental Committee. People trafficking is a heinous crime which involves serious contraventions of human rights. It is a sobering and shocking fact, that in the 21st century, all around the world, slavery and servitude remain the daily reality for very many of our fellow human beings, and Australia is not immune. People traffickers recruit, transport, transfer, harbour or receive their victims through force, coercion or other means in order to exploit them. Globally, people trafficking takes many forms: forced or bonded labour; domestic servitude and forced marriage; sexual slavery; organ harvesting; and the exploitation of children such as through forced begging, the sex trade and abduction for warfare.

The motivation for this crime is simple – profit: the International Labour Organization has estimated that it nets traffickers $32 billion US every year. The impact of this crime on victims is traumatic and has lifelong consequences. read more..

The Minister for Justice, the Hon Brendan O’Connor MP is convening the third meeting of the National Roundtable on People Trafficking in Canberra on 24th November 2010. ACRATH is one of the organisations to again be invited to attend the Roundtable meeting and will be represented by the National Chair, Sr Louise Cleary csb.

Aid to the Church in Need
Eva-Maria Kolmann
November 22, 2010

“We love you, Robert. Please come home! From your parents and your brothers and sisters”. These, and other messages like them are regularly heard on the children’s programme of the Catholic diocesan radio station “Radio Wa’ of Lira in northern Uganda. They are addressed to children who have been abducted by the rebels of the so-called Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) and forced to become child soldiers. Many of the surviving children no longer dare to return home, after having been deliberately forced by the rebels to kill or mutilate neighbours and even close family members in their own home villages, or to burn down their houses. By doing this, the rebels hope to make it impossible for them to return home. Other children simply do not dare to try and escape their tormentors. Through the radio broadcasts the Church is hoping to give them the courage to try and get back to their families. And so the children’s programme “Karibu”, (or Welcome!), also features former child soldiers who have managed to escape, telling their story and about their new life, in the hope of encouraging other children. These broadcasts are listened to, even in the bush, and as a result, over the course of time, over 1,500 child soldiers have managed to flee their captivity because Radio Wa gave them the courage to believe in a new life. The rebels were so enraged, in fact, that in September 2002 they attacked the radio station and set fire to it. But the radio mast was undamaged and so Radio Wa – “Our Radio”, as the name means – continues to this day to broadcast its programmes, in an effort to bring peace and reconciliation to Uganda. read more..

Australian Labor
Brendan O’Connor
November 19, 2010

Minister for Home Affairs and Justice Brendan O’Connor today released the second annual report of the Gillard Government’s Anti-People Trafficking Interdepartmental Committee.

The regular reports began last year in response to an Australian National Audit Office recommendation that systematic reporting of human trafficking initiatives may help focus and co-ordinate the important work being done across government.

“This report outlines the strong contribution that the Gillard Government has made in the last year to combat human trafficking in the region and on home soil,” Mr O’Connor said. read more..

ABC Radio Australia
Linda Mottram
November 19, 2010

The Australian government has warned that people trafficking into Australia, largely from Southeast Asia, is under reported – but there is a new report that suggests South Korea was the main source country for trafficked sex workers to Australia in the past year. Many of the cases involve the sex industry, but there’s growing concern that more and more cases are found in other sectors. The issues will be discussed at a national round table meeting in Canberra next week – along with proposals to add new offences to the Australian criminal code.  read more..

Listen: Windows Media

Minister for Home Affairs and Justice
The Hon Brendan O’Connor MP
November 19, 2010

Minister for Home Affairs and Justice Brendan O’Connor today released the second annual report of the Gillard Government’s Anti-People Trafficking Interdepartmental Committee.

The regular reports began last year in response to an Australian National Audit Office recommendation that systematic reporting of human trafficking initiatives may help focus and co-ordinate the important work being done across government.

“This report outlines the strong contribution that the Gillard Government has made in the last year to combat human trafficking in the region and on home soil,” Mr O’Connor said.  read more..

Women religious from throughout Australia will descend on Canberra next week (November 22-24) to discuss human trafcking with federal politcians, community leaders, academics union bosses and foreign embassy staff Members of ACRATH (Australian Catholic Religious Against Trafcking in Humans) will discuss global and local issues with policy makers in a bid to prevent trafcking of people into Australia. The Sisters will also ask politicians to play a bigger role in internatonal prevention.

The fourth annual visit, involving almost 50 meetngs with key policy makers, comes at a crucial tme. The Federal Government has convened a Natonal Roundtable on Human Trafcking on Wednesday (November 24) to examine trafcking issues and some major announcements are expected.

Brigidine Sister Louise Cleary, who is Chair of the Australian Catholic Religious Against Trafcking in Humans (ACRATH), will partcipate in the Natonal Roundtable and will also be a part of the week-long delegaton to Canberra.

Many federal politcians from all partes have agreed to meet the Sisters, including the Minister for Home Affirs and Justce, Brendan O’Connor, Minister for Women, Kate Ellis, and Liberals Judi Moylan and Phillip Ruddock. CFMEU union leaders are also keen to discuss labour trafcking in the constructon industry.  read more..

Australian Federal Police
November 12, 2010

A 30-year-old Chinese woman is scheduled to appear before Melbourne Magistrate’s Court today after being charged by the Australian Federal Police (AFP) for allegedly trafficking women from China for the purposes of sexual exploitation.

It will be alleged in court that the woman arranged for two women to travel to Australia under the false pretence of furthering their study in Australia. They were then forced to work as sex workers in exploitative conditions in Melbourne and Sydney.

In addition to the arrest, officers from the AFP’s Transnational Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking Teams (TSETT) executed four search warrants on premises in South Melbourne, Richmond, Heidelberg West and Balwyn last night. read more..