Powerful networks of traffickers operate out of Tenancingo, Mexico where boys are groomed to become pimps from a young age, according to the head of an anti-human trafficking organisation. Picture: Martinelli David.
IT’S known as the sex trafficking capital of the world.
And it’s there, in Tenancingo, Mexico, where young boys are trained to become pimps and girls are forced to sell sex, according to the head of an anti-human trafficking organisation.
In a commentary for CNN, Polaris chief executive Bradley Myles said the small town at the dark heart of Mexico’s sex-slave trade was home to “some of the most heartbreaking and shocking cases” of exploitation.
Mr Myles said the organisation had operated a national human trafficking hotline for the U.S. since 2007 and in that time had “learned about more than 21,000 cases of sex and labour trafficking” with many of them linked to Tenancingo.
“Tenancingo is a town with a foundation built on exploitation,” Mr Myles said.
“Powerful networks of traffickers operate out of the region, where boys are groomed to become pimps from a young age.”
Mr Myles said women and girls were forced to sell sex on the streets, in residential brothels, online, and in cantinas across the United States and Mexico.
“They and their families are threatened through violence, deception, and intimidation,” he said.
“These women and girls are trapped in modern slavery, enslaved by criminal networks that have perfected human trafficking and exploitation into a sophisticated science over decades.
“The depth and breadth of the modern slavery that is intricately woven throughout our global society is both shocking and daunting.”
Powerful networks of traffickers operate out of Tenancingo, Mexico where boys are groomed to become pimps from a young age, according to the head of an anti-human trafficking organisation. Picture: Getty ImagesSource:Getty Images
The International Labor Organisation estimates that 4.5 million people are victims of sex trafficking around the world in an industry that generates tens of billions of dollars in criminal profits each year, according to Mr Myles.
He said with the increase of victims of the sex trade came an increase of survivors who were reaching out for help and services.
“We are witnessing more attention being paid to human trafficking by the public than ever before,” he said.
“This level of momentum from concerned citizens can truly have an impact in dismantling the human trafficking networks that are present in our communities.”
Polaris has partnered with Consejo Ciudadano to strengthen the Mexico-U.S. cross-border safety net for survivors of human trafficking.
Mr Myles said “combating violence against women, promoting gender equity alongside safe migration, and access to economic opportunity are all important elements of fighting the root causes of human trafficking in Mexico”.
“Not only that, but we must increase services for victims, which means governments must take a more active role in funding these services,” he said.
“And if we want to shut down this network once and for all, we must address the core source of revenue by convincing men to stop purchasing commercial sex from trafficking victims.”
Human trafficking survivor Karla Jacinto, now 23, made headlines last year when she revealed publicly she was raped more than 43,200 times after being lured from her home in Mexico as a 12-year-old by a trafficker who forced her into prostitution.
Human trafficking survivor Karla Jacinto, now 23, made headlines last year when she revealed publicly she was raped more than 43,200 times after being lured from her home in Mexico as a 12-year-old by a trafficker who forced her into prostitution.Source:Supplied
Ms Jacinto spoke with Pope Francis at a conference on modern slavery in July 2015 and has shared her story in the US Congress.
She said she had “no other identity” beyond that of a sex object and urged the Congress to do more to stop the criminal enterprise, The Washington Times reported.
“I was forced to serve every kind of fetish imaginable to more than 40,000 clients,” Ms Jacinto told the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Africa, global health, global human rights and international organisations.
She said many of her clients “were foreigners visiting my city looking to have sexual interactions with minors like me”.
Sex trafficking is believed to account for 80 per cent of the world’s 20 million to 30 million “modern-day slaves”, Utah Attorney General Sean Reyes told US politicians after Ms Jacinto’s address in May last year. Two million of those are estimated to be children.
There were between 20 million and 36 million slaves around the world in 2015, including 5.5 million children.
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