Austria(Muhammad Amir Saddique)International Forum for Understanding held An Interactive Event and Exhibition for 2021″. Which was held on July 30, 2021 from 6:00-7.30pm CEST at the Vienna School of International Studies Favoritenstraße 15a, 1040 Vienna was titled “Breaking Free from Human Trafficking: An Interactive Event and Exhibition for 2021”.
Approximately 200 participants from 10 countries registered for the conference. The live broadcast on social media also generated a lot of interest. About 2,500 viewed the event on social networks. The moderators of the event, Heather Wokusch, Deputy Director, International Forum for Understanding and Billy Batware, Programme Officer, Civil Society Unit, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Welcoming
numerous renowned members of the International community and diplomatic representatives and introduced to the International Dialogue speakers at the event were among those who expressed their views, (Video Message) HRH Princess Eugenie, Co-Founder, The Anti-Slavery Collective. Monologue Performance Rania Ali debuts an original work about her lived experience with human trafficking and the aftermath: ‘Facing the Ghosts of Our Past’. Panel
‘Lived Experience Leads: Learning from Individuals Who Have Been Trafficked’. In January 2021, the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) launched the International Survivors of Trafficking Advisory Council (ISTAC), consisting of 21 leading individuals with lived experience in human trafficking. Panelists (alphabetically):
Kendall Alaimo, ISTAC and The University Alliance (remote), Malaika Oringo, ISTAC and Footprint to Freedom (remote) and Hyab Yohannes, ISTAC (remote) Multimedia,Laurent Ziegler, ISTAC
Muhammad Amir Siddique Roshni News and Citizen News. Special Discussion Tatiana Kotlyarenko, Adviser on Anti-Trafficking Issues for the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) Joins remotely to discuss the groundbreaking report: ‘GUIDANCE – Addressing Emerging Human Trafficking Trends and Consequences of the COVID-19 Pandemic’. (Video Message)
Ruchira Gupta, Social Justice Feminist campaigner and Founder of Apne Aap Women Worldwide. Expressing their views, the speakers said Human trafficking is one of the most horrendous crimes that can be committed especially when it involves children. Traffickers are exploiting 25 million people annually. These individuals are being used for the profit of their captors. This is a thriving financial institution that makes a profit of $150 Billion a year and is only growing. We cannot stand idly by and allow this to continue uninterrupted. Join the fight to identify these trafficking networks, cut their financial lines and help to recover the trafficking victims. Rescue children from commercial exploitation. From raising awareness about the dangers of human trafficking to providing restorative care and vocational training for survivors of child trafficking, we can to ensure the safety and well-being of children. Child trafficking in three ways: prevention, rescue, and restoration. Please rescue children from human traffickers and provide them with opportunities and support for a new path and future. Human Trafficking and Commercial Sexual Exploitation is inherently evil. It robs people of their God-given dignity and children of their innocence. It victimizes people all the world and large cities and small towns. The vast majority victims of trafficking and exploitation come from broken homes. Many report that they endured sexual and physical abuse, severe poverty, and involvement in the child welfare system. Most male victims experience homelessness before they are 18 years old. Out of desperation, many are forced or coerced to sell sex in order to survive. Human trafficking is the process of trapping people through the use of violence, deception or coercion and exploiting them for financial or personal gain. What trafficking really means is girls groomed and forced into sexual exploitation; men tricked into accepting risky job offers and trapped in forced labour in building sites, farms or factories; and women recruited to work in private homes only to be trapped, exploited and abused behind closed doors with no way out. People don’t have to be transported across borders for trafficking to take place. In fact, transporting or moving the victim doesn’t define trafficking – it can take place within a single country, or even within a single community. People can be trafficked and exploited in many forms, including being forced into sexual exploitation, labour, begging, crime (such as growing cannabis or dealing drugs), domestic servitude, marriage or organ removal. People trapped by traffickers are mostly trying to escape poverty or discrimination, improve their lives and support their families. Vulnerable people are often forced to take unimaginable risks to try and escape poverty or persecution, accepting precarious job offers and making hazardous migration decisions, often borrowing money from their traffickers in advance. When they arrive they find that the work does not exist, or conditions are completely different. They become trapped, reliant on their traffickers and extremely vulnerable. Their documents are often taken away and they are forced to work until their debt is paid off.
Closing words (Les Simm, Executive Director, International Forum for Understanding) We believe in a world where vulnerable people can find opportunities to provide for their families in safety and dignity, including safe migration mechanisms.We campaign to ensure that people have the right to move to look for jobs to provide for their families without stigma, and that every human being is protected regardless of their immigration status. End of the event the moderators finally thanked all the people who are in event.
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