Melysa Sperber, Director of the Alliance to End Slavery and Trafficking (ATEST), issued the following statement in response to the reported arrest of Kah Walla, President of the Cameroon People's Party (CPP). Ms. Walla was apparently arrested in Younde, Cameroon earlier today after...
Category: Resources
Shandra Woworuntu: My Life as a Sex-Trafficking Victim
By Shandra Woworuntu Published on March 30, 2016 by BBC Magazine Shandra Woworuntu arrived in the US hoping to start a new career in the hotel industry. Instead, she found she had been trafficked into a world of prostitution and sexual slavery, forced drug-taking and violence....
U.S. Cracks Down on Products Made by Slave Labor, but Hurdles Remain
Alliance to End Slavery and Trafficking Director Melysa Sperber is featured on the latest PBS Newshour Shortwave podcast. She speaks closing of a loophole in the Tariff Act of 1930 that allowed goods made by forced or child labor to enter the United States. By P.J. Tobia Published...
Letter to the White House on 2016 Administration Priorities
March 8, 2016 President Barack Obama The White House Washington, DC 20502 Dear Mr. President: At the most recent meeting of the President’s Interagency Task Force to Monitor and Combat Trafficking (“PITF”) in early January, we were pleased to see the progress...
One Step Closer to Stopping the Import of Goods made with Forced Labour
By David Abramowitz, Humanity United Published on February 28, 2016 in the Thomson Reuters Foundation News Blog The International Labor Organization estimates that nearly 21 million people around the world are subject to forced labour. That astounding number begs the question:...
ATEST Applauds Elimination of 85-Year-Old Loophole that has Allowed Products Made with Forced or Child Labor into the United States
For Release: February 16, 2016 The Senate voted last week to close a loophole in the Tariff Act of 1930, a law that prohibits goods made by forced, child or prison labor from entering the United States unless the United States doesn’t produce enough of those goods to meet consumer...
Address the Root Causes of the Migrant Crisis
In this letter to the editor of The Washington Post, Director of the Alliance to End Slavery and Trafficking Melysa Sperber urges U.S. policymakers to address the violence, corruption, poverty and climate of impunity at the heart of the migrant crisis. It is tragic that...
Human Trafficking Survivor: ‘We Need Jobs, Not Pity’
By Evelyn Chumbow Published on February 2, 2016 in CNN Freedom Project Evelyn Chumbow is an anti-trafficking survivor activist and member of the U.S. Advisory Council on Human Trafficking. She recently received a Bachelor of Science degree in Homeland Security from University of...
Great Step, but Only First, for Trafficking Survivor Empowerment
By Bukola Oriola Published on January 29, 2016 in The Hill Blog During National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, it’s not enough to just talk about how to prevent modern slavery from happening. We must also focus on how to help victims and survivors of this...
Know Signs of Labor Trafficking
By Harold D'Souza Published on January 27, 2016 in Cincinnati Harold D’Souza is a Cincinnati resident and anti-trafficking advocate. It is hard to believe that the person serving you dinner, pumping gas or selling you a carton of milk in the local convenience store might be...