[Senate Hearing 118-82]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
S. Hrg. 118-82
EXAMINING U.S. AND GLOBAL COMMITMENTS
TO COMBATTING HUMAN TRAFFICKING
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
JUNE 22, 2023
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available via http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
53-198 PDF WASHINGTON : 2023
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey, Chairman
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire MARCO RUBIO, Florida
CHRISTOPHER A. COONS, Delaware MITT ROMNEY, Utah
CHRISTOPHER MURPHY, Connecticut PETE RICKETTS, Nebraska
TIM KAINE, Virginia RAND PAUL, Kentucky
JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon TODD YOUNG, Indiana
CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
BRIAN SCHATZ, Hawaii TED CRUZ, Texas
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois TIM SCOTT, South Carolina
Damian Murphy, Staff Director
Christopher M. Socha, Republican Staff Director
John Dutton, Chief Clerk
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Menendez, Hon. Robert, U.S. Senator From New Jersey.............. 1
Risch, Hon. James E., U.S. Senator From Idaho.................... 3
Dyer, Hon. Cynthia, Ambassador-at-Large, Office to Monitor and
Combat Human Trafficking, United States Department of State,
Washington, DC................................................. 4
Prepared Statement........................................... 5
Walsh, Johnny, Deputy Assistant Administrator for Democracy,
Human Rights, and Governance, United States Agency for
International Development, Washington, DC...................... 8
Prepared Statement........................................... 10
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
Responses of Ambassador Cynthia Dyer to Questions Submitted by
Senator Marco Rubio............................................ 23
Responses of Mr. Johnny Walsh to Questions Submitted by Senator
Marco Rubio.................................................... 26
(iii)
EXAMINING U.S. AND GLOBAL COMMITMENTS TO COMBATTING HUMAN TRAFFICKING
----------
THURSDAY, JUNE 22, 2023
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:45 a.m., in
room SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Robert
Menendez, chairman of the committee, presiding.
Present: Senators Menendez [presiding], Risch, Ricketts,
and Young.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT MENENDEZ,
U.S. SENATOR FROM NEW JERSEY
The Chairman. This hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee will come to order.
It has been more than two decades since Congress passed the
Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act and yet,
today men, women, and children are still bought and sold in
virtually every country in the world.
It is an absolute travesty that traffickers are preying on
Venezuelans fleeing for their lives from their country, on
migrants desperate to escape hunger and conflict in the Horn of
Africa, and it is despicable that they take advantage of
Putin's invasion to exploit Ukrainian refugees, 90 percent of
whom are women and girls who are desperate for protection from
sexual violence.
The vast majority of trafficking victims are women and
girls. If we are serious about combatting human trafficking,
the United States must redouble our support for policies and
programs that empower women and girls, as we tackle the root
causes that open the door to such exploitation.
Ms. Dyer, Mr. Walsh, I commend the work both of you and
your departments are doing. I know it is not easy and we have
made meaningful steps in recent decades, but despite elevating
the issue to a global scale and putting in place legal
frameworks to hold traffickers to account, about 25 million
people still live in what amounts to slavery. Traffickers still
rake in an estimated $150 billion annually.
I hope our witnesses will speak about what the United
States is doing to address the root causes that leave people
vulnerable and the prevention efforts to stop would-be
traffickers: ending extreme poverty; ending gender-based
violence so that many women and girls endure--so that many
women and girls endure--whether it is sexual exploitation,
domestic servitude, and forced marriage; and fixing a broken
migration system here in the United States that allows coyotes
and other human smugglers to force children into debt bondage.
Forced labor trafficking is ultimately the result of
governments failing to protect workers' rights. When employers
do not respect labor laws, it creates an environment where
workers are vulnerable to exploitation.
Any approach to combating trafficking must begin with
empowered workers who can stand up for themselves. That means
reforming labor laws to protect migrant and domestic workers.
These victims of human trafficking are cooking, cleaning,
gardening, and taking care of children. They often work 16
hours a day for little or no pay.
I have fought to make sure that the State Department's
Trafficking in Persons Report, which just came out last week,
serves as an unbiased powerful tool to combat trafficking. I
have pushed back against Administrations of both parties who
would have politicized the report because I believe this is a
problem that needs to be addressed in a bipartisan manner.
Senator Risch and I have reintroduced the International
Trafficking in Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, which
passed the Senate in the last Congress.
It will strengthen our ability to hold governments
accountable and expand prevention efforts at the U.S. Agency
for International Development, and it will help combat
trafficking of domestic workers by diplomats and U.N. officials
here in the United States.
We also need to hold governments accountable for their
failure to take basic steps to address human trafficking. I am
talking about holding China accountable for its reprehensible
use of forced labor in its Belt and Road Initiative.
I am talking about holding Russia and Cambodia and Eritrea
accountable. I am talking about holding the United States
accountable as well.
I will end by noting that this year the government settled
a case where more than 100--mostly Spanish-speaking children--
were working graveyard shifts at our nation's largest
slaughterhouses. That is dangerous work, hazardous machinery,
industrial chemicals, extreme temperature changes. Some of them
were just 13 years old. To me, that is completely outrageous
and unacceptable.
The head of the Alabama Office of Homeland Security
investigation said, ``As the government, we turned a blind eye
to their trafficking.'' The New York Times article went on to
say, ``he teared up as he recalled finding 13-year-olds working
in meat plants.''
This is not a problem limited to some far-flung corner of
the world. It is a problem we see at our southern border and it
is a problem that stretches into the American heartland.
We, in the United States need to be doing everything in our
power to end global human trafficking. I think we can do
better, I think we can do more, and I look forward to doing
that.
With that, let me turn to the ranking member, Senator
Risch, for his remarks.
STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES E. RISCH,
U.S. SENATOR FROM IDAHO
Senator Risch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I am hopeful
that our bill will get completely through the process. There is
absolutely no reason it should not.
As we all know, millions of people are trafficked every
year. Traffickers prey on the most vulnerable, trapping them in
a horrific cycle of abuse that often goes overlooked.
The children, young adults, women, and men that are coerced
into forced labor and sex trafficking have their autonomy
stripped and livelihoods damaged. Addressing this global
scourge requires an international commitment.
The United States is the leading global voice on combating
human trafficking and has been so for decades. We provide
training, consultations, and aid to civil society and
government actors around the world to better prosecute
traffickers, prevent further trafficking, and protect victims.
It is shame, however, that some governments participate in
state-sponsored patterns of trafficking and further victimize
the most vulnerable. Other governments become indifferent to
trafficking and offer no permanent solutions to ending the
pattern in their countries.
Thankfully, there are some countries that have put
significant investment to combating trafficking and protecting
victims. We recognize their efforts and thank them for this
enduring pledge.
I look forward to hearing today about what the Department
sees as the biggest challenges and the biggest opportunities. I
equally look forward to hearing more about USAID's important
role in combating trafficking and what more can be done.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you, Senator Risch.
We have the distinct honor to welcome Cindy Dyer, our
Ambassador-at-Large to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in
Persons, and who leads the State Department's Office to Monitor
and Combat Trafficking in Persons.
Ambassador Dyer is a human rights advocate and lawyer with
three decades of experience working at the local, national, and
international levels to prevent and respond to human
trafficking, sexual assault, and domestic violence.
We are also honored to welcome Johnny Walsh, the senior
bureau official at the Bureau for Development, Democracy, and
Innovation at the U.S. Agency for International Development.
Prior to his current role, Mr. Walsh served as USAID's
deputy assistant administrator for Democracy, Human Rights, and
Governance. Previously, he served as a senior expert at the
United States Institute of Peace, a senior policy adviser for
the Middle East and South Asia with the U.S. mission to the
United Nations, and as the State Department's lead advisor on
the Afghanistan peace process.
We welcome you both. We appreciate your willingness to come
and share insights with us. Your full statements will be
included in the record without objection.
I would ask you to summarize in about 5 minutes or so, so
we can have a conversation and, Ambassador, we will start off
with you.
STATEMENT OF THE HON. CYNTHIA DYER, AMBASSADOR-AT-LARGE, OFFICE
TO MONITOR AND COMBAT HUMAN TRAFFICKING, UNITED STATES
DEPARTMENT OF STATE, WASHINGTON, DC
Ambassador Dyer. Chairman Menendez, Ranking Member Risch,
thank you so much for the opportunity to appear before you
today to discuss the Department of State's efforts to combat
human trafficking and for your leadership on human trafficking.
I especially want to thank Chairman Menendez, Ranking
Member Risch, and Senators Kaine and Rubio for sponsoring the
International Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization
Act of 2023, which recently advanced through this committee.
Just last week, Secretary of State Blinken presented the
2023 Trafficking in Persons Report. The TIP Report, which my
office produces annually, contains narratives detailing global
anti-trafficking efforts including those of 188 countries and
territories worldwide including the United States.
It is the world's most comprehensive resource of
governmental anti-trafficking efforts including our own and
reflects the U.S. Government's commitment to global leadership
on this key human rights, law enforcement, and national
security issue.
This year's report contains some good news. Across all data
points included in the global tally including trafficking
prosecutions, convictions, and victims identified, there were
increases reported compared to prior years.
This progress is due to real change in policies and ongoing
improvements in governments' collection and reporting of law
enforcement data. Convictions continued to increase and
identifications of victims and potential victims increased by
nearly 25,000, although neither was back to prepandemic levels.
This year's TIP Report includes 20 countries with ranking
downgrades including Slovenia and Namibia from Tier 1, and the
Dominican Republic and Egypt among 11 other governments down
from Tier 2 to Tier 2 watch list. There were 24 whose ranking
improved, including two countries, Denmark and the Seychelles,
upgraded to Tier 1.
While the tier rankings are important, the TIP Report is
above all the U.S. Government's principal diplomatic and
diagnostic tool to guide relations with foreign governments on
human trafficking with the narrative and recommendations a
roadmap to improvement and the rankings a means to encourage
governments to increase and improve their anti-trafficking
efforts year after year.
The TIP Report also includes an introductory essay on how
effective efforts to combat human trafficking require
partnership to complement and support the ``3P'' paradigm of
prosecution, protection, and prevention, a topic I shall return
to in a moment.
The report also includes special interest boxes on a
variety of timely subjects and emerging trends we have
documented including forced criminality in cyber scam
operations, unscrupulous online labor recruitment, the
challenges faced by survivors who are boys and men, and audit
deception.
Cyber scams in Southeast Asia including in Burma, Cambodia,
Laos, Malaysia, and the Philippines are a growing form of
forced criminality affecting victims worldwide.
The 2023 TIP Report narratives revealed that victims from
at least 35 countries and areas have been identified. The scope
of these operations is shocking. An International Justice
Mission report, for example, estimates that up to 100,000
people in Cambodia are working in scam operations.
These schemes often target young and educated
professionals, including Americans, who respond to virtual
offers of employment only to have traffickers seize their
passports and coerce them into enticing strangers online to
join fake cryptocurrency investment schemes, deposit money into
gaming accounts, or buy into false romance and investment
schemes.
I spoke about the need to address forced criminality amid
cyber scams at the OSCE's 23rd Alliance Against Trafficking in
Persons in April and earlier this month Principal Deputy
Director Kari Johnstone spoke at the OSCE and Council of Europe
about this growing menace, and we are focused as always on
promoting a victim-centered and trauma-informed approach so
that victims are not inappropriately penalized solely for
unlawful acts they committed as a direct result of being
trafficked.
Turning back to this year's TIP Report, the introduction
focuses on a fourth critical P; partnership, which has long
been essential to the success of the 3P framework.
As ambassador, I am focused on implementing key actions to
advance an effective anti-trafficking response including
addressing human trafficking in the context of the impact of
Russia's war, documenting and decrying human rights trafficking
in Xinjiang and elsewhere in the People's Republic of China, as
well as the PRC's Belt and Road Initiative, engaging with
survivors, and preventing human trafficking in global supply
chains.
Chairman Menendez and Ranking Member Risch, thank you again
for holding today's hearing and this committee's steadfast
commitment to combating human trafficking.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Dyer follows:]
Prepared Statement of Ambassador Cindy Dyer
Chairman Menendez, Ranking Member Risch, and distinguished Members
of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you
today to discuss the Department of State's efforts to combat human
trafficking, and for your leadership on human trafficking. I especially
want to thank Chairman Menendez, Ranking Member Risch, and Senators
Kaine and Rubio for sponsoring the International Trafficking Victims
Protection Reauthorization Act of 2023, which recently advanced through
this committee.
Just last week, Secretary of State Blinken presented the 2023
Trafficking in Persons Report. The TIP Report, which my Office produces
annually, contains narratives detailing global anti-trafficking
efforts, including those of 188 countries and territories worldwide,
including the United States. It is the world's most comprehensive
resource of governmental anti-trafficking efforts--including our own--
and reflects the U.S. Government's commitment to global leadership on
this key human rights, law enforcement, and national security issue.
overview of 2023 tip report
This year's report contains some good news. Across all data points
included in the global tally--tracking prosecutions, convictions, and
victims identified--there were increases reported compared to prior
years. This progress is due to real changes in policies and ongoing
improvements in governments' collection and reporting of law
enforcement data. Convictions continued to increase, and
identifications of victims and potential victims increased by nearly
25,000--although neither was back to pre-pandemic levels.
This year's TIP Report includes 20 countries with ranking
downgrades, including Slovenia and Namibia from Tier 1, and the
Dominican Republic and Egypt among 11 other governments down from Tier
2 to the Tier 2 Watch List. There were 24 whose ranking improved,
including two countries--Denmark and the Seychelles--upgraded to Tier
1.
There were also 19 upgrades to Tier 2. Five countries were
downgraded to Tier 3 and three countries were upgraded from Tier 3.
Nineteen countries and territories remained on Tier 3, for a total of
24--the second-highest number since the report began. Tier 3 included
11 countries with an ongoing finding that they engaged in a ``policy or
pattern'' of state-sponsored human trafficking.
While the tier rankings are important, the TIP Report is, above
all, the U.S. Government's principal diplomatic and diagnostic tool to
guide relations with foreign governments on human trafficking, with the
narrative and recommendations a roadmap to improvement, and the
rankings a means to encourage governments to increase and improve their
anti-trafficking efforts year after year.
The TIP Report also includes an introductory essay on how effective
efforts to combat human trafficking require partnership to complement
and support the ``3P'' paradigm of prosecution, protection, and
prevention, a topic I shall return to in a moment. The Report also
includes special-interest boxes on a variety of timely subjects and
emerging trends we have documented, including forced criminality in
cyber scam operations, unscrupulous online labor recruitment, the
challenges faced by survivors who are boys and men, and audit
deception.
Cyber scams in Southeast Asia--including in Burma, Cambodia, Laos,
Malaysia, and the Philippines--are a growing form of forced criminality
affecting victims worldwide; the 2023 TIP Report narratives reveal that
victims from at least 35 countries and areas have been identified. The
scope of these operations is shocking. An International Justice Mission
report, for example, estimates that up to 100,000 people in Cambodia
are working in scam operations. These schemes often target young and
educated professionals, including Americans, who respond to virtual
offers of employment, only to have traffickers seize their passports
and coerce them into enticing strangers online to join fake
cryptocurrency investment schemes, deposit money into gaming accounts,
or buy into false romance and investment schemes.
I spoke about the need to address forced criminality amid cyber
scams at the OSCE's 23rd Alliance Against Trafficking in Persons in
April, and earlier this month, Principal Deputy Director Kari Johnstone
spoke at the OSCE and Council of Europe about this growing menace. TIP
Office staff recently returned from Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand, where
they learned more about these cyber scam operations and facilitated
discussions around the scam centers at a Mekong dialogue organized by
the Stimson Center and our East Asian and Pacific Affairs bureau.
Through our Emergency Victim Assistance program, our foreign assistance
has helped 208 victims from 16 countries and areas return home after
being exploited in such centers and get urgent care they need. Our new
programming in the region will focus on preventative measures and
protection for the thousands of victims being held there, including a
crucial plus up, from existing funds, for emergency victim assistance.
And we are focused, as always, on promoting a victim-centered and
trauma-informed approach, so that victims are not inappropriately
penalized solely for unlawful acts they committed as a direct result of
being trafficked.
tip office foreign assistance priorities
Thanks to sustained support from Congress, in particular the
groundbreaking Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) of 2000 and
its subsequent reauthorizations, including, we hope, one later this
Congress, the Department has a well-established set of tools to draw
upon in the fight against human trafficking.
Among these tools is our foreign assistance. The TIP Office is
proud to bring targeted resources to support grassroots, national, and
international nongovernmental organizations, and government-NGO
partnerships. Since 2001, the TIP Office has leveraged more than $700
million in foreign assistance to support nearly 1,000 anti-trafficking
projects to address sex trafficking and labor trafficking worldwide.
Our work has impact. For example, in just the past year, TIP Office
assistance provided more than 15,000 victims, including more than 1,500
children, with direct services such as shelter, healthcare, counseling,
legal assistance, or education. Nearly 5,000 victims of trafficking
received legal services, increasing their access to justice. Our
Office's programs trained more than 6,000 criminal-justice actors,
contributing to the adjudication of 148 cases with convictions, and
strengthening 73 anti-trafficking laws and policies worldwide.
The TIP Office's Child Protection Compact (CPC) Partnership program
is an innovative and effective program that harnesses the strengths of
governments and civil society in advancing the fight against child
trafficking. CPC partnerships are multilayered and sustained
partnerships between the United States and foreign governments. After a
rigorous review of potential countries and establishing an actionable
theory of change, the U.S. and partner governments will make non-
binding commitments to provide financial and/or in-kind resources in a
sustained effort to fight child trafficking via projects that engage
all relevant stakeholders, including law enforcement, service
providers, the judiciary, teachers, health officials, and survivors.
These collaborations, with partner governments investing resources
alongside the U.S. Government, have been effective from Peru to Ghana
to the Philippines and beyond.
Our Office is building on this model, incorporating lessons learned
along the way, to leverage foreign assistance through sustained
government-to-government partnerships to spur progress to combat human
trafficking in more countries. We call this new initiative the
Partnership to Prevent Trafficking in Persons. Through existing
allocations, the program will focus on all victims of trafficking, not
only children, and support progress across the 3 Ps of Protection,
Prosecution, and Prevention. We are in active discussions to kick this
program off. We anticipate putting out a Notice of Funding Opportunity
soon to jump start this exciting new endeavor and hope to sign an
arrangement with a partner government by the end of this calendar year.
2023 tip report introduction--partnership
Turning back to this year's TIP Report, the introduction focuses on
a critical fourth ``P''--partnership--which has long been essential to
the success of the ``3P'' framework.
Partnership flows through and infuses all our efforts. Human
trafficking is a global threat that is beyond the capacity of a single
organization, agency, sector, nation, or even international
organization to address. Therefore, effective strategic partnerships
must be the lifeblood of any successful effort, harnessing the
perspectives, knowledge, and capabilities of a wide variety of actors,
from whole-of-government to the private sector to the community of
trafficking survivors. Our introduction this year highlights examples
of these successful partnerships that are as instructional as they are
inspirational.
Partnerships with Survivors
Collaborating with survivors as experts and equal partners is
critical to understanding the realities of human trafficking and
establishing effective victim-centered, trauma-informed, and culturally
competent anti-trafficking policies and strategies. The United States,
with its Advisory Council on Human Trafficking and Human Trafficking
Expert Consultant Network, has served as a role model for many
countries. For example, in 2022, Israel established a national anti-
trafficking advisory committee that includes survivor members and
advises on a range of topics. Other countries, including Bangladesh,
Botswana, Finland, Iceland, North Macedonia, and Uganda have engaged
survivors in national anti-trafficking efforts within the past 2 years.
Countries such as Australia, Canada, and the United States have
committed to engaging individuals with lived experience through their
national action plans. Furthermore, as noted within the country
narrative, during this reporting period the Government of Australia
piloted a survivor advisory council, which provided guidance on
government policies, including review of the legislative framework.
Intragovernmental/Interagency Cooperation
Governments that act as a splintered collection of fractured
agencies and bureaus are nowhere near as effective as governments that
act in a unified and cohesive manner: Interagency and intragovernmental
coordination are essential. Adopting a whole-of-government approach
enhances opportunities for government agencies to partner with one
another to implement and enforce national trafficking laws more
effectively, provide protection and services to survivors, coordinate
prevention activities, address information gaps, incorporate survivor-
and trauma-informed approaches, plan and pace strategic national
initiatives, and streamline or coordinate on overlapping efforts.
In Argentina, for example, the government's Federal Council for the
Fight against Human Trafficking and Exploitation promotes
intragovernmental coordination on anti-trafficking efforts. The
Council's biannual meetings facilitate collaboration between provincial
and federal anti-trafficking authorities and allow representatives of
Argentina's 24 jurisdictions to review the activities of the Federal
Government's Executive Committee for the Fight Against Trafficking and
Exploitation of People and the Protection and Assistance of Victims.
Here in the United States, Secretary of State Blinken leads the
President's Interagency Task Force to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in
Persons, a cabinet-level entity that includes representation from
across the U.S. Government. The task force's Senior Policy Operating
Group, which I have the privilege of chairing, convenes throughout the
year to help coordinate and implement the work. Through both of these
mechanisms, the U.S. Government is committed to implementing the U.S.
National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking and ensuring that this
fight remains a top priority.
Civil Society Partnerships
Governmental partnerships with civil society, from grassroots
community organizations to international non-governmental
organizations, are also essential for combating human trafficking
worldwide. These civil-society groups often have critical know-how,
community relationships, and on-the-ground expertise that governments
do not. For example, in Niger, the Government's National Agency for the
Fight against Trafficking in Persons and the Illicit Transport of
Migrants works closely with IOM on victim referral and protection
efforts, including by collaborating to implement and train frontline
officials on the national-referral mechanism.
The last few years have been particularly challenging and have
further illuminated the importance of robust partnerships. Human
trafficking is a global menace, a crime that exists in every country
and affects people of every age, ethnicity, and gender, with
historically and systematically marginalized groups often at greatest
risk. The COVID-19 pandemic, inflation, Russia's war against Ukraine,
and disruption caused by climate change and Russia's nefarious impacts
on global food and energy supplies have exacerbated poverty and
economic inequality, heightened job insecurity in many sectors,
diminished access to justice and services, disrupted global supply
chains, and contributed to new waves of risky migration. All of these
factors, and others, have heightened the risk of trafficking around the
world.
But we are not helpless. Today, more than ever, the United States'
sustained leadership and commitment to combating trafficking in all its
forms is critical.
As Ambassador, I am focused on implementing key actions to advance
an effective anti-trafficking response, including addressing human
trafficking in the context of the impact of Russia's war; documenting
and decrying human trafficking in Xinjiang and elsewhere in the
People's Republic of China as well as the PRC's Belt and Road
Initiative; engaging with survivors and underserved communities; and
preventing human trafficking in global supply chains and in the U.S.
Government's procurement of goods and services.
Chairman Menendez and Ranking Member Risch, thank you again for
holding today's hearing and this Committee's steadfast commitment to
combating human trafficking.
The Chairman. Thank you, Ambassador.
Mr. Walsh.
STATEMENT OF JOHNNY WALSH, DEPUTY ASSISTANT ADMINISTRATOR FOR
DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND GOVERNANCE, UNITED STATES AGENCY
FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Walsh. Thank you, Chairman Menendez. Thank you, Ranking
Member Risch.
Thank you for your leadership on combating human
trafficking and the opportunity to speak here today. This is
such an awful crime all over the world including at home, as
you rightly pointed out.
I would just start by saying I think that those who
dedicate their lives to fighting it are doing genuinely heroic
work so I just want to acknowledge the amazing efforts of staff
who work specifically on countering trafficking at USAID and at
the State Department and then the huge network of activists,
civil society, our implementing partners who work with us,
really, all over the world.
More concretely, since 2001 USAID has provided a little
over $370 million in counter-trafficking assistance in 88
countries. Currently, USAID supports C-TIP efforts, some of
them standalone and some of them more directly integrated with
our other development work in 35 countries.
In FY 2022, we obligated $32.5 million into counter-
trafficking work globally. That is more than $3 million above
our earmark, which indicates how important our missions
consider this work on their own among the many priorities that
they are trying to address.
As I say, beyond our direct counter-trafficking programming
a large fraction of USAID's international development work
helps to counter trafficking either by addressing its root
causes--which range from conflict to corruption to poverty,
gender-based violence, natural disasters, a lack of
opportunity--or by building local capacity in ways that are
directly relevant to the fight against trafficking, for
example, supporting stronger judicial systems, supporting the
rule of law.
I think that USAID's effectiveness in this work rests on a
strong in-country presence where we are working through our
missions. That allows us to design and effectively monitor our
work in a way that is informed by and adaptive to a very local
context on the trafficking problem as it exists in any given
place.
Similar to the State Department, we embrace what we call
the four Ps: prevention, protection, prosecution, and
partnership. That is how we break down our work in this regard.
First, to touch on prevention, we worked, for example, to
raise awareness of trafficking, particularly with vulnerable
groups, high-risk communities that are often preyed upon. That
can mean promoting public information and education campaigns.
These will cross source transit and destination countries for
trafficking.
As one example, in Colombia, USAID is working in high-risk
communities to protect the rights of Venezuelan migrants who
are vulnerable to trafficking, and this program does many
things, but in this context it raises awareness about the
different methods of exploitation.
We complemented that by training almost 4,000 service
providers on how to address gender-based violence over the last
year--that is just one example--to touch on prevention.
Second, to protect trafficking survivors, USAID's approach
and the State Department's approach is survivor-centered and it
is trauma-informed and so we support reintegration assistance
for survivors.
That often means psychosocial and medical services. It can
mean legal assistance, safe and secure accommodations for
people who may still be at risk, access to employment, to
business opportunities--all of this to help survivors rebuild
their lives and to avoid being revictimized.
Third, on prosecution, this lives principally with others,
but USAID absolutely helps with the development, for example,
of anti-trafficking laws with significant penalties for
traffickers and protections for victims.
We provide victim-centered training and technical
assistance for law enforcement officers, for prosecutors, for
judges, so that they are maximally effective and compassionate
in helping trafficking survivors and prosecuting perpetrators.
As an example, we are working across the Caribbean region
through our Caribbean regional mission to improve the
prosecution of trafficking cases.
We help countries develop or strengthen national referral
systems--referral mechanisms so that means training local law
enforcement to better screen and identify and investigate
trafficking cases.
Fourth, on partnerships I would just say there is no way to
do this alone. We work across governments, civil society,
faith-based organizations, advocacy organizations. We are all
in it together and we view it as an all-hands-on-deck approach.
As one example, in Senegal, USAID has used partnerships
across each of the categories that I named to promote a
coordinated community-based almost whole-of-society approach to
combat forced child begging and it is hard to think of a
population more vulnerable to exploitation than children who
are begging.
We can build on years of lessons from prior programming and
we can work with government, religious leaders, community
leaders, local shelters to reduce forced child begging,
especially in urban areas where this program operates.
The last thing I will say for the moment is in December of
2021, USAID revised our whole-of-agency C-TIP Counter-
Trafficking Policy to align with the U.S. Government's revised
National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking and a couple
of the priorities that we really brought out to infuse into the
work of our field missions are, as I say, survivor-centered
approaches, partnerships across government, civil society,
private sector, to work together against trafficking, better
coordination with other parts of the U.S. Government, extensive
use of evidence and learning which we gather from all of our
trafficking programs and apply to our work, going forward, and
delineating clear roles and responsibilities for staff across
USAID, for example, if they detect trafficking adjacent to any
of our own programs.
This revised policy--its associated C-TIP Field Guide help
our missions to design, implement, monitor, and evaluate their
work and together they serve, in effect, as in our minds our
implementing guidance for USAID for the TVPA.
Chairman Menendez, Ranking Member Risch, thank you for
calling this hearing. We emphatically share the belief that no
single entity--whether it be the government, our implementing
partners, different parts of our government--can do this alone
to combat a crime as complex as trafficking.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Walsh follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Johnny Walsh
Chairman Menendez, Ranking Member Risch, distinguished Members of
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; thank you for your leadership
on combating human trafficking and the opportunity to be here today to
discuss USAID's work on addressing human trafficking through the 4 Ps
of protection, prevention, prosecution, and partnerships, our revised
Counter-Trafficking in Persons (C-TIP) Policy, and our C-TIP Code of
Conduct.
The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates that human
trafficking and forced labor are responsible for an estimated $150
billion in illicit profits per year. In 2022, the ILO estimated that
27.6 million people were in forced labor. With an issue of this
magnitude, partnership, coordination, and empowerment of trafficking
survivors are essential to addressing the root causes and long-term
effects of human trafficking.
Since 2001, USAID has provided over $370 million in assistance in
88 countries, and currently supports C-TIP efforts in 35 countries. In
Fiscal Year (FY) 2022, we obligated $32.5 million for C-TIP activities
globally and continue to integrate C-TIP strategies into other
development programs. Our C-TIP work addresses root causes such as
conflict, corruption, poverty, gender-based violence and gender
inequality, socioeconomic and structural inequalities, racism, natural
disasters, lack of educational and job opportunities, and shortfalls in
basic social services. Through crucial investments to address these
issues, USAID's C-TIP efforts also advance USG national security
interests by preventing or mitigating conflict and displacement and
strengthening the capacity of national and local institutions that
promote stability. USAID's effectiveness rests on a strong in-country
presence, allowing us to design and monitor well-run interventions
informed by local context.
4ps of prevention, protection, prosecution, and partnerships
USAID supports stand-alone C-TIP projects as well as integrating C-
TIP interventions into our wider development portfolio using the 4Ps
framework.
Prevention
USAID has worked to prevent trafficking by raising awareness in at-
risk sectors and communities, strengthening government institutions and
nongovernmental actors, promoting behavior change, and addressing
cultural and social norms related to TIP in source, transit, and
destination countries.
In Bangladesh, for example, USAID's Fight Slavery and Trafficking
in Persons (FSTIP) project is reducing vulnerability to TIP by
enhancing public awareness of human trafficking and its dangers. USAID
supported the Government of Bangladesh to finalize and launch a
Comprehensive Survivor Service Guideline that outlines a comprehensive
step-by-step process for service providers supporting trafficking
survivors. USAID has already trained 35 government officials and nine
NGO members on the comprehensive survivor service guidelines.
Protection
To protect TIP survivors, USAID's approach is survivor-centered and
trauma-informed as we integrate mental health and psychosocial support
into programming. USAID-funded activities provide services for physical
and emotional healing, legal assistance, safe and secure
accommodations, and access to workforce development opportunities. For
example, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, USAID is supporting nine local
organizations to provide legal and practical protections for survivors
and strengthen the capacity of government institutions and non-
governmental organization-managed shelter providers to protect victims.
As a result of our direct support to victims, the Prosecutor's Office
confirmed an indictment against one person for human trafficking.
USAID's support was recognized by the Prosecutor's Office for the
specialized services of legal advice and representation of the minor
victim in the Court, continuous communication, developing a trustful
relationship, and supporting the minor victim.
prosecution
USAID supports efforts to develop effective anti-trafficking laws
with significant penalties for traffickers and protections for
trafficking victims, as well as providing victim-centered training and
technical assistance for law enforcement officers, prosecutors, and
judges. USAID also works to improve victims' access to legal and
justice-related services.
USAID supports both bilateral and regional efforts to improve the
identification and referral of trafficked persons to social services.
For example, USAID is supporting a regional response in Barbados, St.
Lucia, Antigua and Barbuda, and Trinidad and Tobago to improve the
screening and identification of victims and the prosecution of TIP
cases. The project is in the start-up phase, but the Police Special
Victims Unit Director in Barbados has already indicated that USAID's
support through specialized and advanced training to the team led to an
increase in police screening of TIP cases.
Partnerships
Countering TIP requires effective coordination across a broad range
of stakeholders. Therefore, USAID works closely with local, national,
regional, and global networks, as well as representatives of civil
society, government, the private sector, labor unions, media, and
faith-based organizations to expand the range of services and address
root causes.
In Senegal, USAID is mobilizing local government, religious actors,
and community-based organizations for a coordinated approach to prevent
and reduce forced child begging in urban areas. These locally-led
initiatives then serve as models to fuel advocacy at the national level
and mobilize key stakeholders for a reform of the koranic school
system.
revised c-tip policy
In December 2021, USAID revised its C-TIP policy to align with the
U.S. Government's revised National Action Plan to Combat Human
Trafficking and its related priorities to elevate gender revised and
racial equity and end forced labor in global supply chains. Through
updated programming objectives to guide C-TIP activity design, the
Policy promotes:
Integrating survivor-centered approaches into programs and
policies that empower the individuals and communities we serve;
Partnering with host country governments, civil society, and
the private sector to counter human trafficking;
Enhancing coordination within USAID and with other U.S.
Government agencies;
Drawing on the best available evidence to inform our
programming; and
Providing clear roles and responsibilities for staff across
USAID to implement effective C-TIP programming.
USAID takes an inclusive approach to engage marginalized
populations and vulnerable communities as partners and leaders. We are
committed to a survivor-centered approach that empowers people with
effective psychosocial services, delivers legal assistance that meets
their needs, provides safe and secure accommodations, and offers access
to meaningful work.
USAID's revised C-TIP policy emphasizes rigorous research
methodology to better understand what is working and what is not, and
to continually learn lessons and adapt to changing threats such as the
rise in online sexual exploitation of children.
USAID continues to provide technical support and guidance to USAID
Missions to implement the revised C-TIP Policy, including through our
C-TIP Field Guide, which we revised in January 2023. The Field Guide
helps Mission staff to design, implement, monitor, and evaluate C-TIP
investments based on the 4Ps approach at every stage of the program
cycle, from country strategic planning to activity design to
evaluation. The Guide provides recommendations for integrating C-TIP
activities into larger development programs, designing stand-alone
activities, using a survivor-centered approach, and developing more
comprehensive identification and referral protocols to assist victims.
c-tip code of conduct
Through the implementation of our Code of Conduct, USAID seeks to
be a leader among donor organizations in preventing trafficking. As a
baseline, the Code explicitly prohibits USAID personnel from in any way
engaging in, facilitating, or supporting trafficking in persons,
procuring commercial sexual acts, or using forced labor during duty or
non-duty hours. Employees must report suspected violations of federal
trafficking laws by USAID contractors or assistance recipients to the
Office of the Inspector General (OIG), and relevant contract or
agreement officers. The Code also obligates employees to report
suspected violations of the Code by other employees. Training on the
Code is mandatory for all USAID personnel.
Chairman Menendez and Ranking Member Risch, thank you for calling
this hearing on combating human trafficking. USAID shares the belief
that no single entity, whether it be a government, a civil society
organization, a private sector actor, or other stakeholder, can
effectively combat a crime as complex as trafficking alone. We are
grateful for the opportunity to share our experience in combating
trafficking with the Committee.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
The Chairman. Thank you. We will start a round of 5-minute
questions.
Ambassador, you mentioned in your remarks some countries
who were downgraded, including the Dominican Republic, to a
Tier 2 watch list. Is that because of what is happening to
laborers at the sugar mills that are taking place? I saw some
reports of labor issues there.
Ambassador Dyer. Thank you for that question. The reason
that the Dominican Republic was downgraded--the full details
are in the narrative, but the highlight is that they are not
appropriately screening their migrant workers nor are they
referring migrant workers to services and they are not offering
services to those who have been identified as trafficking.
This was a case where we actually spoke about it in-depth
and we were very concerned about this systematic exclusion of
providing services and even referring or screening the victims.
That was the reason for their being downgraded.
The Chairman. I see. There are labor reports about the
sugarcane refineries in the Dominican Republic using underage
individuals and basically not providing certain fundamental
labor rights to its citizens. I would commend that to your
attention as well.
Cuba is once again a Tier 3 country in the annual
Trafficking in Persons Report. The Cuban regime actively
employs forced labor practices through its foreign medical
missions program.
As the TIP Report notes, by the end of 2021, Cuban medical
missions were exported to close to 60 countries, where such
workers were regularly threatened, denied salaries, forced to
work under exploitive conditions, and had their travel
documents seized.
Obviously, the Cuban regime will not end this inhumane
practice. What concrete actions has your office taken to
elevate the voices of victims of the Cuban regime's human
trafficking scheme and to develop a diplomatic campaign to end
these forced labor practices once and for all?
Ambassador Dyer. Thank you for flagging this critical human
rights abuse.
I think the most important thing that the office is doing,
number one, is in addition to calling out Cuba's horrible
state-sponsored trafficking of their medical personnel in the
Cuban narrative, we actually call out every country who is
hosting and therefore providing money and supporting Cuba in
that state-sponsored program.
We listed this in 56 country narratives in the Trafficking
in Persons Report and this--as you know, this TIP Report is
what drives our foreign diplomacy. We are not only calling it
out in the Cuban narrative, but also in the 56 country
narratives that are by their using these medical personnel
supporting that regime.
The Chairman. This is a set of circumstances where Cuban
doctors and other medical personnel are sent to other
countries.
The country pays Cuba, not the medical professionals. They
take the passports away of these medical professionals so that
they cannot leave and they are, in essence, hostage and it is
the equivalent of slave labor, from my perspective.
These countries who are participating in this is equally as
vile as the Cuban Government's use of these individuals in a
human trafficking case.
Let me ask you this, Ambassador. The Government
Accountability Office investigation in 2020 concluded that
evaluating the effectiveness of anti-trafficking foreign
assistance is difficult due to limited data, a focus on outputs
versus--over outcomes and limited evaluation resources, among
other factors.
What steps are you and the Department taking to sharpen our
ability to successfully evaluate the effectiveness of our
counter-trafficking assistance?
Ambassador Dyer. The effectiveness of our program is of
paramount concern to both me and to the entire office.
Ironically, I was a Trafficking in Persons Office grantee back
when I was leading the human rights department at an NGO so I
am super focused on making sure that we are using our money in
the best way possible.
We are--actually the GAO reports that have come out
recently have not only given us sort of--they have supported
that what we are doing is unique and effective, but they
absolutely have given us specific areas for improvement, and we
agree with those areas for improvement and we are making
specific changes including there was a recommendation to
standardize our processes and so we are doing that in our
international programs department.
We are increasing accountability by setting target
indicators in each of our grants and we are establishing, which
I think is really important to make sure that we are using the
money in the most efficient way possible--we are establishing
sustainability plans for each of our grants so that when the
money pulls out we know that our good work will continue to
remain in force.
The Chairman. Finally, Mr. Walsh, speaking about
effectiveness of anti-trafficking programming, we know that
human trafficking has evolved since the TVPA was first passed
in 2000, and that our efforts at addressing human trafficking
have had some modest success worldwide.
I heard your testimony. In my own personal perspective, I
think there is much more USAID could be doing. What type of
anti-trafficking programming or advocacy has been most
effective and what types of our foreign assistance have fallen
short and can be improved?
Mr. Walsh. Thank you for the question.
I think that the problem varies so much from region to
region that our instances of most effective programming are
often very different from each other and tailored to local
circumstances.
As examples of where I think we have been very effective, I
would cite, for example, in Southeast Asia we have a number of
programs in different countries to target trafficking in the
fisheries industry, and because it is offshore, because it is
often taking advantage of migrant labor, these are populations
that are very prone to being exploited.
I think we have used the full range of our toolkit,
including very modern technological solutions that are still
very useful to a vulnerable population: so, for example,
reporting mechanisms such that someone who is being held
against their will on a ship in some facility adjacent to the
fisheries industry has a lot more ability to access authorities
than they maybe had in 2001 when this all started, and that is
us trying to be flexible.
We pair that with a host of civil society organizations
that are advocating with the governments of Southeast Asia to
apply pressure, to tighten safeguards, to work with law
enforcement to watch for this, and with support to victims, to
survivors after we have found them.
Now that applies to lots of industries. I single out the
fisheries one as one where we found especially exploitative
circumstances that has grown in recent years, but by the same
token, I think we have tried to help on the migration crisis in
the Western Hemisphere by working in both source and transit
countries in a variety of ways.
For example, in Guatemala one effort that we are--that we
think has been especially useful is called--forgive me, I am
not a Spanish speaker--but El Refugio de la Ninez and it is a
shelter providing a full range of services to trafficking
survivors aimed at providing immediate emergency care,
psychosocial help, mental support, often physical and medical
support, but also helping them to reintegrate into their own
communities.
Sometimes they are from Guatemala and sometimes they
started somewhere else, but having a shelter like that and a
network of very professionalized support can help reduce the--
for those who were migrants who were exploited on the way--can
help reduce the likelihood of remigration, can help target
those root causes that send people onward in the first place,
and it has been embraced by a lot of the civil society
community there.
I could give--there are other examples. Ukraine is a
completely different context, obviously, but I think the fact
that we were doing years and years of trafficking work--
counter-trafficking work in Ukraine before Putin's further
invasion last year gave us this huge base to build upon such
that when just the calamity of especially early February 2022
hit, there was already in place a national hotline with 6,000
people responding to reports of trafficking and, as the problem
radically changed, there were tools in place to support that. I
think that is true across a lot of Ukraine efforts, but it is
especially true here.
In each of those cases, those are missions targeting local
circumstances on their own. We have a fairly decentralized
model, but I think that is where it is effective because the
problem is so different in those places.
The Chairman. Well, I would like to have my staff follow up
with you on----
Mr. Walsh. Of course.
The Chairman. --a few ideas that we have and some
perspectives.
Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Thank you.
Madam Ambassador, you described the situation with scam
operations, particularly in Asia, and the forced criminality. I
guess we do not usually think of that sort of thing when we
think of human trafficking.
Obviously, the intersection of those two is interesting.
Could you give us some specific examples of how that works so
we can kind of think about this a little more clearly?
Ambassador Dyer. Thank you so much for that question
because it is a really emerging issue that is of critical
importance for us to better get our arms around.
What we are seeing happening is that there are frequently
Chinese criminal gangs that are behind this. They are posting
job opportunities on Facebook and other social media places
that appear to be legitimate, and interesting----
Senator Risch. In China or in other places?
Ambassador Dyer. They are posting these in--all over the
world. We have identified victims from 35 countries. Many times
they are from the Philippines and Malaysia, Indonesia, but we
have identified individuals from Japan, the United States, the
U.K.
Senator Risch. It is emanating from China?
Ambassador Dyer. Yes.
Senator Risch. That is where I get a little confused. How
do they enslave someone an ocean away from them? How do they do
this? Is it----
Ambassador Dyer. They post the job. The individual accepts
the job. They are frequently transiting through Thailand or
Cambodia. Frequently they are going to these compounds. A lot
of these are leftover empty buildings from COVID. They are
frequently located in Cambodia, in Burma, across the border
from Thailand.
Individuals think they are going for a legitimate IT job
that is going to utilize their skills--linguistic skills, IT
skills.
When they get there, they are literally locked in a room
and they are not allowed to leave, and they are given a quota
of how much money they have to get from scam operations and if
they do not make that quota they are tortured. They are
deprived of food and water. They are under intense pressure to
meet this quota.
Some of these--the reason we know how this is happening
some of them have escaped to tell us about it. There was
recently--and this was actually in the news--a cyber scam
compound in the Philippines where more than a thousand
individuals were located and freed.
They were from all over, as we said, 35 countries,
targeting a unique population that is not normally what we
think of as the target or vulnerable to trafficking because
these are people with education, linguistic skills, and often
IT skills.
Senator Risch. Interesting. Did you say you had people that
got caught up in that even from the United States? Is that----
Ambassador Dyer. Yes, sir. To my knowledge, so far there
was one individual from the U.K., one individual from the U.S.,
one individual from Japan--we actually spoke about it when I
had the opportunity to visit Japan earlier this year--and then
many individuals from other Southeast Asian countries, but
really there are individuals from Africa.
Because one of the benefits is if they get a broad target,
then that individual can target secondary victims for their
online scams from the country that they are from. They sound
like a person from the U.K., the U.S., a country in Africa, and
they are more effective at running these romance scams and
fraudulent scams.
Senator Risch. They are lured there and then held against
their will once they get there?
Ambassador Dyer. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.
Senator Risch. My time is limited here, but I do want to
touch on what I think is probably the most obvious matter we
hear about in the news and that is the Uyghurs in China.
Tell me about that. What do you do about that? What is the
efforts that are being targeted at that?
Ambassador Dyer. I think this is a situation where we need
to use all tools available. It is not something that there is
going to be a silver bullet for.
Thank you. I appreciate you raising this issue.
As you will note, the Trafficking in Persons Report goes
into significant detail about the PRC's inappropriate, horrible
human rights abuses, specifically their forced labor of Uyghurs
and other ethnic and religious minorities, frequently located
in the Xinjiang autonomous region.
We are holding--so one tool is call it out in the TIP
Report, not only what China is doing, but also which we also
call out in the TIP Report, places where this is occurring in
other countries.
For example, we flag in the TIP Report that China's Belt
and Road Initiative is impacting 13 countries and so that is
brought up in each of those countries' narratives so that those
countries can be more aware of what is going on and more
proactive to ensure that their own citizens are not falling
prey to China's tactics as well as Chinese citizens.
In addition to formal Belt and Road Initiative projects, we
also have identified PRC-affiliated projects--not Belt and Road
Initiative, but just PRC-affiliated, and we have followed up
forced labor trends in 14 additional countries where this is
called out.
I think that in addition to the TIP Report we need to use
and we are using our diplomatic and multilateral diplomacy--
bilateral diplomacy--to talk to these countries to make sure
that people are not unwittingly supporting these programs under
the guise of getting infrastructure in their country.
A third important area is the Trafficking Persons Office
participates in the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force where
we are aggressively working on implementing, thanks to
Congress, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act.
We are adding entities to this list so that we can make
sure that Americans are not unwittingly using goods and
products that were made by individuals held in slavery in the
Xinjiang autonomous region.
Senator Risch. Well, it is a difficult subject because at
the same time that we are trying to tamp down the things that
are going on between U.S. and China, China is very sensitive to
this. They deny it is going on. They deny it is going on and
say that we are dead wrong on that. How do you thread that
needle?
Ambassador Dyer. Very carefully, sir. Very carefully.
I think that we have to both try to improve that diplomatic
relationship. I actually believe that we can do what we can
from afar. We can work on those--the Uyghur Forced Labor
Prevention Act. We can try to prevent goods from coming in and,
certainly, we can encourage other countries to do a better job
of making sure that they are not unwittingly supporting China
through these infrastructure projects.
Of course, the best way would be if China changed
themselves and that is only going to happen, as you wisely
pointed out, if we can have a better relationship with them.
That would be the most, pardon me, direct way. I think that
we need to use every single one of those tools because this is
a problem that is going to require it.
Senator Risch. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My time
is up.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Senator Ricketts.
Senator Ricketts. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to
our panelists for talking about this important topic.
Human trafficking is a despicable crime and not only does
it inflict severe trauma on its victims, but it demonstrates
just a sickening disregard for human dignity.
As governor of Nebraska, I worked with my attorney general,
Doug Peterson, and my wife, our First Lady Susanne Shore, to be
able to combat human trafficking in our state--with Interstate
80 going through, it is a corridor for this--and we had a four-
part plan to do that.
One was raising awareness with regard to the public by
using rest areas, educating emergency room docs, letting the
public know you got to be aware for people who have lost
control of their phone--who do not have control of their phone,
do not have control their ID.
In emergency rooms, if you have, for example, a barcode
tattoo--those sorts of things. In our Nebraska Department of
Health and Human Services, we have focused on trying to raise
that awareness from that standpoint.
We also, secondly, passed laws to strengthen the penalties
for human trafficking and be able to prosecute those cases more
effectively.
Third, we empowered law enforcement to more effectively
apprehended criminals through our Operation United Front human
trafficking investigation that spanned 12 states.
Then, finally, we increased the support for survivors who
need care and support--I think, Mr. Walsh, you were talking
about that as well--after experiencing human trafficking.
Ambassador Dyer, how are U.S. domestic efforts to combat
human trafficking perceived internationally and how do these
perceptions positively or negatively affect U.S. foreign policy
efforts in this area?
Ambassador Dyer. First of all, Senator, thank you so much
for your work in Nebraska. I noted, as you were talking about
the things that you focused on, that they covered all three of
the Ps--we have prevention, prosecution, and protection. Thank
you for your leadership on that.
With regard to the U.S. domestic efforts, we cover in our
TIP Report the U.S. efforts and as you will see, we cover them
in a great deal of detail and we have assessed that overall the
U.S. is actually doing a really good job. We maintain our
position as a leader in this space.
We are increasing not only identified victims, increased
prosecutions, identified increasing numbers of victims who are
receiving services, as you wisely pointed out, from government-
funded programs. All of this is laid out.
Obviously, as every country, even those that are on Tier 2,
we have room for improvement. We absolutely have room for
improvement.
One of the things that we have specifically said is that we
need to do a better job of making sure that victims of
trafficking are not held or penalized for crimes that they were
forced to be doing.
Senator Ricketts. I got to believe that helps us when we
are trying to make the case internationally that other
countries need to do more as well.
Ambassador Dyer. I completely agree with you, sir.
When we are engaging in our bilateral and multilateral
diplomacy, it helps our position when we are recommending
changes to other countries when we can say, look, we hold
ourselves accountable, too.
We recognize when we do stuff good and we recognize when
there is room for improvement, and I think that that really
strengthens our case and makes that diplomacy much more
effective.
Senator Ricketts. I want to switch gears and build on what
Senator Risch was talking about with regard to the Uyghurs in
Xinjiang province, and about a million Uyghurs have been put
into these forced labor camps and about 100,000 are actually
doing this forced labor--I should say reeducation camps, the
million--the 100,000 in forced labor.
This is just despicable what the PRC is doing, and I
certainly understand the challenges that we have in trying to
raise awareness with the countries that are supporting this.
What further actions does the State Department plan to take
to implement the UFLPA and its coordination with the Forced
Labor Enforcement Task Force participation?
Ambassador Dyer. The JTIP participates in that Forced Labor
Enforcement Task Force and one of our chief missions is to
fully implement the Uyghur Forced Labor Protection Act--the
UFLPA.
What we have been doing so far, we--as you know, the UFLPA
allows anything that is from the Xinjiang region or made with
goods to be put on a list that will be preventing those
products from coming into the United States.
In addition, each of the members of that Forced Labor
Enforcement Task Force can recommend entities to be added to
that list. Even if it is not something that is clearly based in
that region, that is the area that we have been working most
on.
You may have seen that we recently voted and added two
additional entities to that list. That process is ongoing. In
fact, I was working on that earlier before I came in today.
Senator Ricketts. What challenges do we have? Because
European--goods are still making it into the European
marketplace. What are some of the challenges and what can we do
about it to prevent this?
It is just terrible that goods made by forced labor in the
People's Republic of China are making their way into Europe.
This is just horrible. It is despicable.
Ambassador Dyer. I think there are two challenges, and I
appreciate you asking about them.
Number one is we have to be sure that we are doing our due
diligence because these supply chains are extremely
complicated. They are complex, and the PRC is engaging in
active subterfuge to hide and make it difficult to see clearly
these chains.
It is one of the areas that we actually mentioned in the
Trafficking in Persons Report, this affirmative effort to make
it hard to check to see how the supply chains are working.
This is actually something we brought up, and we want to be
sure that we are doing our due diligence and so that is what is
the most difficult part. We are actively engaging on it now to
be sure that we are correctly and accurately assessing it so
that we can prevent Americans from unwittingly purchasing these
products.
Senator Ricketts. Great. Thank you very much.
Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you. I just have one or two final
questions.
In December of last year, the Treasury Department imposed
sanctions under the Global Magnitsky program targeting
individuals and companies involved in human trafficking abuses.
One set of actions targeted forced labor aboard distant-
water fishing vessels operating out of China. The other
targeted a national of the Philippines for sex trafficking and
the rape of young girls.
Ambassador, given the Global Magnitsky sanctions, and other
targeted sanction programs, are only rarely used for human
trafficking, is this something we can expect to see more
actions like these in the future and can you tell us what role
you see for increasing the use of targeted sanction tools in
the broader U.S. effort to address human trafficking?
Ambassador Dyer. Thank you, Senator.
I believe that using the use of these sanctions is one
important tool. We should not put all of our eggs into that one
basket, but it is absolutely an important tool and the TIP
office is responding to that by actually creating a specialized
individual in our office, a very senior knowledgeable whip-
smart Foreign Service officer who is focused exclusively on
identifying additional targets for Global Magnitsky sanctions.
We were very heartened to see that several of the
successful sanctions did involve forced labor--the ones that
you pointed out--and so we are actually putting additional
effort.
Please know that while we put that in and we are
aggressively seeking additional names to seek Global Magnitsky
sanctions, we are not putting all our eggs. This is something
that we are doing in addition to the TIP Report--our
programming, our bilateral and multilateral diplomacy.
The Chairman. Let me ask you another question. Migrant
laborers are three times more likely to be trafficked than
others are.
How is the State Department addressing the trafficking of
migrant laborers, given they are often difficult to track and
too frightened to share their experiences? Do you know when the
Administration's global labor strategy will finally be
released?
Ambassador Dyer. With regard to your first question
regarding migration, I am grateful to you for bringing it up
and I appreciate your focus on this because we absolutely do
know that migrants are uniquely vulnerable to human
trafficking.
They have many of the characteristics that human
traffickers are seeking. They are afraid to call the police.
They are on the move. They are desperate. They do not
necessarily have a plan.
Our part--the trafficking in persons part--in addressing
the unique vulnerabilities to trafficking of migrants is
several-fold. One is we are tracking the risks not only in the
home countries, but along the migration pathways and then we
are engaging in intense bilateral and multilateral diplomacy
and discussions with those countries so that they are aware of
their own risks and we have actually pulled them out in the
Trafficking in Persons Report. We use that TIP Report in our
discussions with them to show here is where you have areas of
risk.
In addition, we are specifically encouraging these
countries that are along the migration route to do a better job
of screening migrants, referring them to services, and then
making sure that comprehensive services actually are available
for those who do show signs of being trafficked.
We are also using our foreign assistance in a very targeted
way to make sure that we are actually supporting some of the
regional approaches. We recognize that migration is not
something that the United States is going to solve alone.
We have got to have not only a whole-of-government
approach, but a whole of region approach and so we are really
working closely with our allies and countries and partners in
the region.
The last thing that we are doing is making sure that as we
are creating safe legal migration--pardon me, as we are
creating lawful migration pathways, we want to make sure that
those pathways do not have inherent vulnerabilities built into
them.
We want to make sure there is no ability to have extreme
labor recruitment fees so that when they come into the U.S.
they owe so much money that that can be used against them. We
want to make sure that they are not inappropriately tied to a
specific worker and that they can leave if there is an abuse.
Once again, I feel like this is sort of a whole
comprehensive response and we are doing our best to make sure
that we have this really balanced approach.
The Chairman. The global labor strategy you talked about?
Ambassador Dyer. Oh, thank you, sir. I actually checked on
that before I came because I thought you might ask. It has not
been released yet and I do not have a specific timeframe on
when it is coming. I know it is being worked on, and I am happy
to get back with you to let you know their latest update.
The Chairman. I would appreciate knowing that.
Finally, Mr. Walsh, we know that lack of protections for
workers can drive human trafficking. If we hope to end forced
labor, we have to increase our focus not just on prosecutions,
from my perspective, but on support for workers' rights. We
know worker-driven social responsibility programs can prevent
human trafficking.
What are your views on that, and is USAID using resources
and pivoting programs to invest more in expanding labor rights?
Mr. Walsh. Yes. Absolutely. Thank you for the question.
I would say our flagship worker rights program is the
Global Labor Program, which you have been amazing supporters of
for decades now, that works all over the world, especially to
support unions, other forms of collective bargaining
organizations.
We have tried to--a couple years ago when the Global Labor
Program increased by a few million dollars, we tried to use it
to get at some of the most vulnerable populations that we maybe
were not getting at before and who often do not have access to
the traditional tools of organization.
It is kind of two nascent programs. One is in East Africa
and one is in Southeast Asia, and they target migrant workers
who often are in the informal economy--sometimes you could call
it the gig economy--and it gives them tools to report abuses
that may or may not cross the line into trafficking literally,
but are often quite abusive.
It provides services to them, whether it is legal
assistance, the kinds of medical and mental help that I
referenced before, and then in East Africa it is focused
especially on, again, migrant, often informal economy workers,
but who are often women or people with disabilities--so really
the most vulnerable--and trying to provide those same services.
I would also just say that under the Global Labor Program,
there have been a lot of questions about the Uyghurs in
Xinjiang, one of, if not the defining human rights atrocities
of our age, and something that USAID is trying to do is to
focus really on the forced labor part of this problem.
I would kind of echo what Ambassador Dyer said in that the
devilishly complicated part of this is how tangled, marbled
supply chains are and how difficult it can be to find where the
forced labor is.
We are trying to help solve that problem by commissioning
what I would say is some of the most useful action-oriented
research that I have ever come across in my government career
and it aims at--first, we did this for the cotton industry,
which is central in Xinjiang, and then we did it for the
automotive industry--different parts of the automotive
industry--and it is aimed at finding what factories, what
companies, what specific facilities either are demonstrably
employing forced labor or are very suspicious to be.
There are others who have done this work on the outside for
other industries, but it is so important to have a lot of eyes
on this problem identifying specifics and that is both inside
and outside of China because a lot of times the supply line
is--or the use of forced labor--is somewhere else.
With that information in hand, it gives us the ability to
start advocacy and to start going to companies to break
themselves free of this enormous blight on their operations,
sometimes to work with governments to shut down loopholes or
individual areas.
It is kind of a two-part play, find the forced labor and
then go after it, but I think we can make kind of an outsized
contribution with a relatively small amount of money in this
way.
The Chairman. Well, if I was a purchaser of supplies, then
anything I saw from Xinjiang would raise my antenna. It does
not take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you have a
million Uyghurs in a concentration camp, there is a high
probability that you are going to end up with trafficked
products and supplies.
Senator Risch.
Senator Risch. Nothing further, Mr. Chairman, except to say
thank you. You guys are doing Heaven's work. There is no
question about it. We appreciate what you do.
The Chairman. Well, on behalf of the committee we thank you
both for your testimony. Thank you for the very insightful,
Ambassador, aspects you gave and very succinct.
I think you should give the State Department a course on
how to answer questions that are substantive. At the end of the
day, they would very well avail themselves of----
Senator Risch. There is a couple other agencies you can
include.
[Laughter.]
The Chairman. Senator Risch suggested there are other
agencies as well. I will be just happy if you can get the State
Department to do that.
The record for this hearing will remain open until the
close of business on Friday, June 23. Please ensure that
questions for the record are submitted no later than tomorrow.
With the thanks of the committee, this hearing is
adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:39 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
----------
Additional Material Submitted for the Record
Responses of Ambassador Cynthia Dyer to Questions
Submitted by Senator Marco Rubio
Question. Last week, the State Department released its annual
report on trafficking in persons. As you know, along with the detailed
reports on each foreign country's actions to combat trafficking, the
State Department also releases a relatively-short report to highlight
specific cases the Department has discovered in the previous year. It
is absurd and shameful that this report failed to highlight two of the
most alarming instances of modern-day slavery: the Chinese Communist
Party's acts of genocide against the Uyghur population, where
individuals are subjected to forced labor, trafficking, and unjust mass
detentions, as well as Cuba's ``medical brigades,'' which force Cuban
medical professionals to work overseas in terrible conditions so the
regime can profit. For example, on page 43 of your office's 2023
Trafficking in Persons Report, there is an entire page dedicated to an
instance of trafficking involving a Tier 3 country, China, and a Tier 1
country, the United States. The highlighted example intimates the
United States is somehow sponsoring human trafficking, while we
actively investigate and prosecute this heinous crime:
How do you believe this example plays to domestic Chinese media and
propaganda outlets that falsely seek to paint a picture of the United
States as a country where Chinese are at risk?
Answer. We remain deeply concerned about the long-standing and
well-documented state-sponsored human trafficking in both the PRC and
Cuba. In addition to ranking these countries as Tier 3, the report also
found that there was a government policy or pattern of human
trafficking in both countries. The TIP Report further emphasized the
egregious nature of trafficking in these countries by referencing the
concerns about forced labor in Cuba's medical program in 56 country
narratives, concerns about forced labor in China's Belt and Road
Initiative in 13 narratives, and concerns about other PRC affiliated
projects in 14 country narratives. The examples included in the
Introduction to the 2023 TIP Report are meant to be illustrative and
serve as an opportunity to highlight emerging or overlooked issues. The
examples also represent the many--though not all--forms of human
trafficking and the wide variety of places in which they occur. They
are designed to underscore that human trafficking can and does happen
anywhere.
Question. Is the cited example emblematic of most human trafficking
cases involving Chinese being trafficked into the United States?
Answer. The TIP Report is credible in part because of its track
record of highlighting instances of trafficking regardless of where
they occur, including in the United States. This cited example is based
on a documented case in which an adopted Chinese national alleged
forced labor and other exploitation by an American family. (See
Chinese-born woman sues adoptive parents for allegedly locking her in
basement, forced slavery and racist treatment, NBC News, Feb. 3, 2023,
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/chinese-born-woman-sues-
adoptive-parents-alleging-forced-slavery-rcna68876). It reflects one of
the ways in which foreign national children may be subjected to human
trafficking. The example illustrates how children may be vulnerable to
trafficking even within a Tier 1 country.
Question. Can you provide examples of human trafficking in China
involving Uyghurs or other groups?
Answer. State-sponsored forced labor persists under the PRC
Government's ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity against
predominantly Muslim Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, ethnic Kyrgyz, and
members of other ethnic and religious minority groups in the Xinjiang
Uyghur Autonomous Region. The PRC Government reportedly continued to
place these groups, including ethnic Tibetans, in vocational training
and manufacturing jobs as part of an ostensible ``poverty alleviation''
and ``labor dispatch program'' that featured overt coercive elements.
Through numerous witness testimonies, it is well-documented that PRC
authorities and authorized commercial entities subject many individuals
to forced labor in internment camp-adjacent or off-site factories
producing garments, automotive components, footwear, carpets, yarn,
food products, construction materials, holiday decorations, building
materials, solar power equipment, polysilicon and other renewable
energy components, consumer electronics, bedding, hair products,
cleaning supplies, personal protective equipment, face masks,
chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and other goods for domestic and
international distribution.
Question. In responses to my questions during your confirmation
process you stated, ``the United States must continue to take strong
action to promote accountability for the PRC's actions and strengthen
market defenses against the import of goods produced through forced
labor in Xinjiang. If confirmed, I will continue to work with the
international community to alert businesses and other entities to the
reputational, economic, and legal risks of involvement with entities in
or linked to Xinjiang. I will promote coordination efforts within
international business specific to tracing supply chains and
identifying high risk sourcing from companies linked to abuses in the
Xinjiang region to support our shared interest of eradicating forced
labor from global supply chains:''
Now that you have been confirmed, can you describe what you have
done, to date, to alert businesses to the risks of operating in
Xinjiang and identifying companies linked to abuses there?
Answer. The 2023 TIP Report described that the PRC did not take any
steps to change policies in response to mounting public concern over
abuses within Xinjiang and the contamination of international supply
chains with goods produced by PRC state-sponsored forced labor there in
2022. I will continue to raise risks of working in Xinjiang in
appropriate media and business engagements following the report's
release.
I recently met with the Chamber of Commerce's Task Force to
Eradicate Human Trafficking, where I urged Task Force members to invest
in comprehensive due diligence in their own supply chains specifically
related to any connections with entities based in Xinjiang, highlighted
the State Department's efforts to prevent and address forced labor in
our own government contracts, and offered resources and partnership in
these efforts.
The Department of State also partners with Forced Labor Enforcement
Task Force (FLETF) agencies to amplify this unified message; for
example, in March 2023, the State Department's Special Representative
for International Labor Affairs spoke at the Forced Labor Technical
Expo hosted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which offered a
global platform for industry to share best practices on the latest
technologies to advance supply chain transparency, risk mapping, and
the traceability of goods and services. As the State Department
representative to the FLETF, I am also working with FLETF colleagues to
implement the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA), including by
adding new entities to the UFLPA Entity List.
Question. This week, Volkswagen announced that they are planning an
external audit of their facility in Xinjiang. Given that the CCP has
raided the offices of western consulting and auditing firms in China,
is there any way we can trust an audit in Xinjiang conducted by a firm
tolerated by the CCP?
Answer. As documented in the Department's 2023 TIP Report special
interest box ``Deceiving the Watchdogs: How Unscrupulous Manufacturers
Conceal Forced Labor and Other Labor Abuses,'' there is much reporting
from NGOs and academics that audits can be unreliable, with
manufacturers using a variety of tactics to conceal labor and human
rights abuses from auditors.
The 2023 TIP Report explains that the PRC Government and affiliated
commercial entities continued to engage in a concerted campaign to
dispel accusations through vehement denial in public messaging; state-
ordered politically motivated academic research; falsified cotton
production and harvest mechanization data; localized propaganda
campaigns targeting consumers in trade partner countries; the
establishment of false supply chain policy initiatives as alternatives
to preexisting international monitoring and compliance programs; new
sanctions on foreign government officials critical of PRC abuses; and
pressure on international companies.
Therefore, I would find it difficult to expect an objective and
independent audit from a firm located in Xinjiang and allowed to
continue operation by the CCP.
Question. Since passage of my Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act,
what actions has the Department taken to end the use of human
trafficking and slave labor of Uyghurs or other groups in Xinjiang?
Answer. I represent the State Department on the DHS-led Forced
Labor Enforcement Task Force. We are working expeditiously with our
interagency partners to expand the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act
(UFLPA) Entity List, consistent with the law and facts, and prevent
goods made with forced labor from entering U.S. supply chains.
In April 2022, the State Department submitted to Congress a report
outlining the United States' diplomatic strategy to address forced
labor in Xinjiang, as required by the UFLPA. The strategy adopts a
whole-of-government approach to increasing international awareness of
and addressing forced labor as one of the many human rights abuses
being committed amidst the ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity
in Xinjiang, including how the United States will promote
accountability for perpetrators of forced labor and other human rights
abuses. The State Department continues to work closely with Congress,
other federal departments and agencies, NGOs, the private sector, and
our allies and partners to prevent the importation of goods produced
with forced labor.
Alongside these efforts to implement the UFLPA, the Administration
has taken concrete measures to promote accountability for genocide,
crimes against humanity, and other violations and abuses in Xinjiang
and globally. Specifically, it has issued visa restrictions, financial
sanctions under the Global Magnitsky program, export controls, and
import restrictions such as Withhold Release Orders.
Question. In March, Chairman Menendez and I wrote to Secretary
Blinken regarding Cuba's continued international medical ``missions''
across the globe. These international ``missions'' are really a modern-
day human trafficking scheme that exploits approximately 50,000 Cuban
medical professionals who are not compensated for their work. The
regime then profits from this abuse. In our letter, we urged Secretary
Blinken to do more to discourage countries in the region from
supporting the Cuban regime's human trafficking. What steps is the
Administration taking to end the Cuban regime's exploitation and human
trafficking in the region?
Answer. For the fourth year in a row, the Department determined
there is a Cuban Government policy or pattern to profit from labor
export programs with strong indications of forced labor, particularly
its foreign medical missions program. Cuba was again ranked Tier 3 in
the 2023 TIP Report. The Department is urging foreign governments to
investigate the specific conditions government-affiliated Cuban workers
face in their countries to ensure these programs comply with
international human rights obligations and commitments and
internationally recognized labor rights, as well as determine whether
indicators of forced labor--including withholding of wages,
confiscation of travel and identity documents, deception in entering
into contracts, restriction of movement, and threats and intimidation
for leaving the program--are present in the programs. The 2023 TIP
Report noted the risks of forced labor in Cuba's labor export program
and documented their current or previous presence in 56 country
narratives; we also included recommendations to screen government-
affiliated Cuban workers for trafficking indicators if the brigade was
active during the reporting period.
Question. Which countries and organizations continue to utilize
these Cuban medical ``missions''?
Answer. While accurate information is difficult to obtain, by the
end of 2021, as the Cuban Government reported, there were government-
affiliated Cuban workers in 60 countries. According to multiple
sources, including press reports, NGOs, international organizations,
and government officials Cuba's labor export program, including the
medical ``missions,'' operated or currently operates in Algeria,
Andorra, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Bahrain, Barbados,
Belize, Bolivia, Botswana, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cabo Verde, Chad,
Djibouti, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini,
Ethiopia, The Gambia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Guyana,
Haiti, Honduras, Italy, Jamaica, Kenya, Kuwait, Lesotho, Liberia,
Maldives, Mauritania, Mexico, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nicaragua,
Palau, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Qatar, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and
Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa,
Suriname, Tanzania, Timor-Leste, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkiye,
Uganda, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Venezuela, and Zimbabwe; as well
as in some overseas departments or territories, such as Anguilla,
British Virgin Islands, French Guiana, Grenada, Montserrat, Martinique,
and Turks and Caicos.
______
Responses of Mr. Johnny Walsh to Questions
Submitted by Senator Marco Rubio
Question. USAID uses an Agency-Wide Standard Operating Procedure
(SOP) to counter Trafficking in Persons (C-TIP) with many international
organizations, donors, NGOs, contractors and assistance recipients to
ensure USAID itself does not contribute to human trafficking. The SOP
further requires C-TIP training for all employees, a C-TIP clause in
every contract, grant, and cooperative agreement, and requires USAID
employees to report trafficking violations to the USAID Office of
Inspector General (OIG). Last year, USAID announced a program to
increase the capacity of Lebanon's solar industry. In a briefing with
my office, USAID noted that they would purchase solar panels available
on the ``local market'' and explained that these would likely be panels
produced in China. Does USAID have safeguards in place to ensure that
USAID programs overseas do not purchase products or materials made with
the forced labor and trafficking of Uyghurs?
Answer. USAID recently issued two revised Procurement Executive
Bulletins (PEB 19-03 and PEB 16-01) to remind partners that the
Combating Trafficking in Persons provisions in both contracts and
assistance awards prohibit the use of forced labor in the performance
of federal contracts, grants, and cooperative agreements. USAID
provided a list of resources maintained by the U.S. Government to help
partners identify potential sources of forced labor in their supply
chains. These resources include the U.S. Customs and Border Protection
(CBP) Withhold Release Order (WRO) list, the Department of Commerce
Entity List, a Department of Labor list regarding forced and indentured
child labor, as well as the aforementioned UFLPA Entity List. USAID is
engaged in a broader USG approach to address forced labor in supply
chains, including the solar supply chain. This involves improving
traceability and supporting the development of alternative supply
chains among other efforts.
As an observer member of the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force
(FLETF), USAID is also working with the U.S. interagency to support the
Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) enforcement strategy,
including building the UFLPA Entity List.
Question. How does USAID ensure those who work for our implementing
partners who do not speak or read English, are aware of the OIG tip
line?
Answer. USAID has award requirements in place in both contracts and
grants to ensure that implementing partner staff are aware of its
trafficking in persons prohibitions. Specifically, all partners are
required to make their staff aware of the U.S. Government's
prohibitions, and for partners with large awards, they must establish
an awareness program and a process for staff to report violations that
are context-specific and include consideration for the involvement of
non-U.S. citizens.
Although USAID implementing partners must be able to conduct
business in English, when conducting outreach to implementing partners,
USAID Missions take efforts to ensure that the information provided is
in the appropriate language, including through the offering of
translations. During recent outreach efforts by USAID's Responsibility,
Safeguarding, and Compliance (RSC) Division in El Salvador and
Indonesia, the RSC provided information on OIG reporting in both
English and the local languages. The RSC is also exploring additional
translation services to make its safeguarding resources available in
multiple languages.
The USAID OIG conducts their own outreach on their hotline with
implementing partners and USAID defers to the OIG on the specifics of
the rollout of their new hotline format.
Question. Are there USAID C-TIP OIG contact details or processes
for reporting trafficking violations available in any language other
than English?
Answer. Individuals may and USAID-funded organizations must report
Counter-Trafficking in Persons (CTIP) allegations to OIG's virtual
Hotline portal which is accessible on the Fraud Awareness and Reporting
(https://oig.usaid.gov/report-fraud) page of OIG's public-facing
website. The portal can also be accessed directly via this link
(https://oigportal.ains.com/eCasePortal/InvestigationsCaptcha.aspx).
Non-English speakers looking to disclose allegations to the OIG can
select the language of their choice at the top of the Fraud Awareness
and Reporting (https://oig.usaid.gov/report-fraud) page.
Further, USAID OIG is committed to ensuring comprehensive,
independent oversight of USAID's support of Ukraine and its people in
response to Russia's invasion. The OIGs of USAID and the Departments of
State and Defense jointly developed and distributed a Hotline Poster in
English (https://oig.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/2023-01/Hotline
Information for Reporting Ukraine-Related Misconduct--0.pdf) and
Ukrainian (https://oig.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/2023-01/Hotline
Information for Reporting Ukraine-Related Misconduct %28Ukrainain%29--
0.pdf) to encourage timely and transparent reporting of misconduct,
including CTIP, compromising the United States' support to Ukraine and
its people. The posters list how, and what, to confidentially report
and features CTIP prominently.
[all]