David on Formosa

A report from the US State Department has ranked Taiwan equal with China for its failure to address human trafficking. The Taipei Times carried an article about it yesterday. The articles states:

In an annual report on global trafficking in persons, the department rated Taiwan as one of the world’s worst performers in the global sex trade, on a par with China and other countries like Russia, Cambodia, Equatorial Guinea and Libya.

The report says that a “significant share” of the foreign workers, mainly from Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines, who are lured to the country for low-skilled jobs, end up in forced labor or slavery by labor agencies and employers.

The recruitment of foreign brides, mainly from Vietnam, has also become a “major conduit for the trafficking of girls and women into the Taiwanese sex trade” with children also being forced into the sex trade, the report adds.

As Taiwan imports hundreds of thousands of migrant labourers from Southeast Asia every year this provides ideal cover for people trafficking operations. Indeed the importation of foreign labour is in itself often a system of terrible abuse and exploitation.

Another article published in the Taipei Times last Sunday detailed the difficulties and abuses that some foreign workers in Taiwan face.

The alarming thing is that the government punishes foreign workers if they violate the conditions of their employment, but doesn’t take action against the employees. The Taipei Times yesterday reported,

The report notes that the Council of Labor Affairs last month boosted fines for businesses caught hiring illegal labor to US$23,000.

However, none of the cases referred to law enforcement officials by the CLA were investigated or prosecuted. In addition, no company has been held criminally responsible for any trafficking-related violation.

The report also takes Taiwan to task for its lack of protection for women and children victimized by the sex trade. Care for victims is uneven and Taiwanese authorities “continue to punish victims of trafficking for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of their being trafficked,” the report said.

The authorities fail to offer the victims alternatives to deportation to countries “in which they face hardship and retribution.” Such victims include women from China, as well as Southeast Asia.

The report also criticized the treatment of contract workers forced into slavery, citing several shortcomings at the labor council.

After the riots by Thai workers in Kaohsiung in August last year the government should really have taken some effective action to improve the conditions of foreign labourers. However, it seems nothing has really changed.

Please note: I blogged about the protest by Thai workers last year here, here and here.