UN: 50 million people worldwide are in 'new slavery'
The United Nations, while declaring that 50 million people are enslaved in various parts of the world due to working conditions or forced marriage, warned about a significant increase in the number of "new slaves" in recent years.
In a report released on Monday, September 11, the organization said that the number of "new slaves" increased by about 10 million people between 2016 and 2021 alone.
The report, which was prepared based on research by the organization's migration and labor departments in collaboration with an anti-slavery charity, also stated that at the end of 2021, about 28 million people were living in forced labor camps and about 22 million were living in forced marriages.
Based on these statistics, it can be said that approximately one in every 150 people in the world's population is a victim of new forms of slavery.
Guy Ryder, head of the International Labor Organization, described the lack of progress in the fight against modern slavery as "shocking" in a statement, adding: "Nothing can justify the continuation of this form of human rights abuse."
According to the findings of this study, during the COVID-19 crisis, conditions considered to be forced labor have expanded due to the deterioration of working conditions and increased debt of workers. Climate change, war, and military conflicts have also been mentioned as other factors affecting the intensification of poverty and the migration of vulnerable people to insecure places where they are not supported.
The study warns that being trapped in forced labor often lasts for years, and women who are forced into marriage are forced to spend their entire lives in this state of slavery.
Statistics show that at least one in five people forced into forced labor are children, and more than half of them (about three million) are exploited in commercial and sexual exploitation. Meanwhile, the risk of forced labor for migrant workers is three times higher than for adult, non-migrant workers.
"The results of this study further emphasize the importance of safety, regularity and order in migration," Antonio Vitorino, head of the International Organization for Migration, said in a statement.
The phenomenon known as "new slavery" exists in almost every country in the world, with more than half of forced labor cases and a quarter of forced marriage cases occurring in countries with relatively high or high incomes.
The recent UN study also shows that since 2016, when the previous study was conducted, the number of girls and women forced into marriage has increased by about 6.6 million and the number of people forced into forced labor has increased by 2.7 million.
The statistics in this study show that about 14 percent of these people are forced into forced labor by governments, prominent examples of which include forced labor of prisoners in the United States and several other countries.
This study also refers to credible documents about the widespread prevalence of forced labor in extremely difficult conditions in North Korea, and the situation of the Uyghur minority and other Muslims in China is mentioned as one of the most important cases of forced labor imposed by a government.
Former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet previously said in a report released on September 29 that more information was needed to make a judgment in this regard, "but it appears that conditions in labor camps in Xinjiang province [in China] are discriminatory and that residents of these camps are subjected to various forms of harassment or repression."
Source: Radio Farda
