Ethiopia
Increased traffic in Ethiopian women discovered

afrol.com, 28 February - The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) office in Addis Ababa yesterday launched a study to assess the situation of Ethiopian women who are trafficked to Arab countries. The study has documented several cases of physical abuse, confirming earlier warnings that there exists a network of women traffickers. 

Working with the Women's Affairs Office of the Prime Minister, IOM has been interviewing former trafficked women and others who said they planned to go abroad to work. The IOM is an intergovernmental body, "committed to the principle that humane and orderly migration benefits migrants and society."

The preliminary study interviewed 36 women, mainly focusing on their experiences in Lebanon, the IOM yesterday informed. The women had told IOM that they have been physically abused. 

There are an estimated 12,000-14,000 Ethiopian women currently working in Lebanon, mainly as servants. Local newspaper reports indicate that between 1997 and 1999, 67 Ethiopian women died while working in Arab countries. Many others have never been heard from again. Some women have managed to return home but with broken legs, arms, and backs or with acid burns and other physical abuse.

The IOM Chief of Mission in Addis Ababa, Meera Sethi said, "This is just the tip of the iceberg. We need a regional study, because the problem is not confined to Ethiopia. We have information that Kenyan and Eritrean women also suffer the same fate. Any solutions we come up with from this study can also be applied to Kenya and Eritrea."

The IOM study confirms earlier warnings that there exists a network of women traffickers in Ethiopia. Women have been trafficked both within Ethiopia and abroad. There have been continued reports that poor rural families sold their young teenage daughters to Ethiopian hotel and bar owners on the main truck routes. Last year, there was also published a report that a girl was sold by her father to a local man in exchange for cattle; the girl's mother brought the case to the Ethiopian Women Lawyer's Association. At year's end, the case was being prosecuted in the courts as the first case of this kind in Ethiopia.

There have also been numerous accounts of young girls travelling to the Middle East to work as house servants and nannies, some of which are abused, including sexually. According to a US government report there is "a network of persons based in the tourism and import-export sectors who are involved heavily in soliciting potential clients, recruiting young girls, arranging travel, and fabricating counterfeit work permits, travel documents, and birth certificates". 

The law and the Constitution prohibit trafficking in persons and the government is working on a revision of the federal civil and penal codes to increase the penalties for traffickers. Last year, training programs were implemented for police officers on the criminal aspects of trafficking. There are several organisations working on the issue of trafficking in Ethiopia, some of which also provide protection for trafficking victims. 

IOM and the Ethiopian Women's Affairs Office are also working on ways to increase awareness of the problem amongst potential victims and institutions working with women, and to develop strategies for the return and reintegration of the victims.

According to the IOM, migrant trafficking is an increasing phenomenon, and "the involvement of individual criminal and organized networks appears to be widespread." When migration is illegal and organised by criminal networks, migrants are exposed to higher risks of exploitation. "Well-known examples include women who arrive on entertainment visas, only to find themselves forced into sex work," according to the IOM. "In such situations the migrants are not only economically exploited, but may also be subjected to sexual abuse, violence, maltreatment and other violations of their fundamental human rights."

Sources: IOM and US State Department 

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