An Anti-Human Trafficking Program is Launched

Today at the Radisson, public and private sector stakeholders were invited to witness the launch of the Transportation Leaders Empowered through Education, Awareness and Effective Policy Change on Human Trafficking in Belize. TLEAP Belize, as it is otherwise known, is intended to tackle one of the many aspects of the trafficking of persons in the various municipalities. It is being implemented by RET International, through funding from the Central American Region Security Initiative of the U.S. Government. News Five’s Duane Moody reports.

Duane Moody, Reporting

Human trafficking continues to be a transboundary issue that the Government of Belize intends to intercept. Experts say that human trafficking is the exploitation of vulnerabilities and the Anti-Trafficking In Persons Council, under the Ministry of Human Development, wants to address that.

Jaunna Murrillo, Focal Point, ATIPS

Jaunna Murrillo

“Human smuggling is something that is counted as a violation against the country because you enter the country without the proper permission to do so. But those migrants that do get smuggled into a country are at risk and so we do consider that human smuggling can lead to human trafficking and so despite the nature of smuggling, we also want to look at how trafficking can be an issue that could eventually affect them.”

The government is trying to address the issue from multiple fronts, including the transportation sector which is one area being used to facilitate the crime.

Jaunna Murrillo

“We also want to ensure that everybody realises that they can play a part. So it is both private and public. Police can’t be everywhere, immigration can’t be everywhere, social works can’t be everywhere so we want to equip even the public and the persons providing services with the knowledge to say hey, I see something; this is not supposed to be happening, let me inform the police.”

…and that’s where RET International comes in. The organization was established and registered in Belize back in 2015, and has implemented ten projects focused on gender equality and social inclusion, youth empowerment, education and migration and mobility. For the next eighteen months, RET International, through funding from the U.S. Embassy, will be engaging over five hundred stakeholders in the transportation industry to build their capacity to identify signs of human trafficking.

Cherese Ferguson, Country Director, RET International

Cherese Ferguson

“That’s the goal to train about five hundred and forty persons, roughly sixty individuals in the nine municipalities and  from various means of transportation. So bus companies, taxi drivers, taxi associations, water taxi, the airlines as well, Tropic, Maya – wherever we can get into we want to build those partnerships to be able to share that information. We endeavour to inform persons within the industry so that they can be eyes and ears for the government and the country as a whole to help in identifying suspected victims of trafficking and also knowing how to report so that we can deal with the issue. We want to know what people know within this industry. Those in the industry [include] workers stakeholders, operators – what knowledge do they have, what are their attitudes and some of the practices so far as it relates to human trafficking or combating human trafficking and based on that we know what content to include in our training module.”

Transport Minister Rodwell Ferguson says that the initiative has his full support.

Rodwell Ferguson

Rodwell Ferguson, Minister of Transport

“In our region, the main country of opportunity is the U.S., so people would come from El Salvador, Honduras, [and] Guatemala and if they find it easier to pass through Belize, they’ll pass through to reach to the country of opportunity. I am very supportive of it, but I told them this morning that the Ministry of Transportation is still manual. We are hoping to make sure that it is properly digitized that whenever information is requested, then we can forward the information to whoever requests it.”

Even as the initiative is being rolled out, residents are being implored to report information on human trafficking or smuggling to Crime Stoppers Belize or via the P3Tips App.  Duane Moody for News Five.