[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 5]
[House]
[Page 6255]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      MODERN DAY SLAVERY IN LIBYA

  (Mr. POE of Texas asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute.)
  Mr. POE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, after the United States toppled the 
Government of Libya, the nation became a failed state, one that is a 
brothel of slavery. Fleeing persecution from terrorists and vast 
famine, west Africans hand their life savings over to drivers who will 
take them to Niger, then off to Europe. But these refugees are labor 
trafficked as slaves to Libya instead. They are bound to the slave 
block and sold at the auction of slavery.
  The slave drivers force them to work inside private prisons for 
little or no food. Meanwhile, the slave masters demand ransoms from the 
families. If the families don't pay the ransom, the refugees are sold 
again to larger prisons and the demand doubles. If the ransom is never 
paid, the slaves are eventually murdered.
  Mr. Speaker, human slavery still exists in north Africa, and it is a 
scourge on humanity. But the United States should be very careful about 
taking out a regime like it did in Libya without understanding the 
long-term consequences like what happened in Libya.
  And that is just the way it is.

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