WikiLeaks: US notes the country’s 4th world rank in people trafficking

Santo Domingo.- A WikiLeaks cable reveals that the United States stressed the country’s fourth world rank in trafficking of people in 2004, as stated in the report published the German Technical Cooperation, "Trafficking in persons, particularly women, in Central America and Dominican Republic."

It said the country currently competes with Brazil, Thailand and the Philippines which hold the two top shameful spots in the more than US$36 billion business, as revealed by Sweden’s International Organization for Migration (IOM).

However IOM local programs official Gina Gallardo called there line separating the top countries “fuzzy,” but noted that what’s certain is that Dominican Republic is among the first 10.

Quoted by elcaribe.com.do, the official said it’s also certain that there are as many as 60,000 Dominican prostitutes in Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.

The social anthropologist Tahira Vargas notes that it reflects new forms of slavery, based on the sale of the person, physical violence and racial discrimination in a world of fraud, lack of opportunities in the places of the destination, where deprived of basic rights by forcing the victims into sexual or domestic activities against their will, in workplaces and brothels.