Official: Stop profit from human trafficking

Friday, Dec. 23, 2016

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Eradicating the “heinous crime” of human trafficking requires cracking down on those who profit from it, said a Vatican diplomat.

The Vatican urged nations “to recognize trafficking in human beings as one of the most heinous crimes” and to recognize “their moral duty to address it properly and indeed eradicate it,” said Msgr. Janusz Urbanczyk, the Vatican’s permanent representative to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

He made his comments Dec. 15, during a meeting of OSCE in Vienna. OSCE includes 57 countries in Europe, Central Asia and North America.

In his talk, Msgr. Urbanczyk said greater attention should be given to eradicating the trafficking and enslavement of children. Children can be ensnared by traffickers when they are “enslaved and fall prey to exploitation as child laborers or soldiers, fall into the criminal network of drug trafficking or into the mire of pornography,” he said. When children are forced to flee from conflict and persecution, they also risk isolation and abandonment.

Demand for goods and services linked to child slavery “drives their exploitation and abuse,” he said.

“Thus, the only way to stop the multiple forms of child slavery effectively is to take more rigorous and effective actions against those who profit from such abuse,” he said.