老澳门开奖结果

(Originally posted on )

Ramesh, a college graduate from India, borrowed $5,000 from a loan shark to pay a recruiting agent for the opportunity to work in Kuwait as a storekeeper at a wage of $800/month. His aims were simple: to provide a better life for himself and his family. Instead, Ramesh was trafficked to a U.S. military base in Iraq where he was compelled to work as a janitor for $150/month. This paltry sum meant that Ramesh was unable to meet his loan repayments. In a cruel attempt to intimidate him into making his payments, the loan shark sexually assaulted Ramesh鈥檚 sister and seized the family home.

This story, recounted in the just-released, joint 老澳门开奖结果-Yale Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic report, 鈥淰ictims of Complacency鈥�, is but one example of the price that many migrant workers have paid and continue to pay for the opportunity to work on U.S. military bases and other U.S.-run facilities around the world.

These migrant workers, often referred to as 鈥渢hird-country nationals,鈥� or 鈥淭CNs,鈥� have become an indispensable part of the daily lives of our troops in the wars and their aftermath in Iraq and Afghanistan. Like Ramesh, TCNs come mainly from developing countries such as India, the Philippines, Nepal and Uganda, and are contracted to perform low-paid but essential services as cooks, janitors, cleaners and mechanics on U.S. military bases worldwide. In 2011, there were TCNs contracted to work in Iraq and Afghanistan alone. And while the U.S. military has largely been replaced by the State Department in Iraq, , many of whom are TCNs, remain in the country to provide services to the U.S. embassy.

鈥淰ictims of Complacency,鈥� together with hundreds of pages of documents obtained by the 老澳门开奖结果 through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, details the trafficking, forced labor and other abuses that thousands of TCNs have suffered since 2003. The report also provides a concrete set of detailed recommendations to Congress that are aimed at preventing future abuses.

As the report documents, the trafficking and abuse of TCNs in Iraq and Afghanistan is facilitated by the U.S. government contacting and sub-contracting process. The U.S. government, often through the Department of Defense or State, will award prime contractors, U.S.-based corporations such as Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR), logistics contracts to service the U.S. military on bases in Iraq and Afghanistan. These government contractors in turn subcontract to other contractors, most of them located in the Gulf States or the Middle East, that then contract with local recruiting agencies in the workers鈥� countries of origin. Workers like Ramesh, enticed by promises of high paying jobs in the Middle East, take out loans from local loan sharks to pay recruiting agency fees for the promise of high-paying jobs overseas. Some workers get lucky; their recruiting agencies don鈥檛 charge them a fee and are honest about the location and pay of their work. However, many workers are not so fortunate. Like Ramesh they end up paying exorbitant recruitment fees to secure jobs that pay much less than advertised and that are located in different countries than indicated on their contracts (Iraq and Afghanistan instead of Kuwait or the United Arab Emirates), or sometimes . Often, these jobs come with unsafe and living and working conditions. Fearful of losing their jobs and defaulting on their loans, which often mean the loss of their livelihoods back home, these workers continue with their contracts in spite of these conditions. Contractors, who are often aware of the precarious financial situation of many TCNs, take advantage of and will threaten the workers with termination if they make complaints about their poor working conditions and pay.

鈥淰ictims of Complacency鈥� also highlights how the government contracting process opens the door to corruption and waste of U.S. tax-payer鈥檚 dollars by U.S. military contractors. For example, the bipartisan Commission on Wartime Contracting noted in its that contractors bill for TCNs at an average rate of $67,600 to perform food services and other menial tasks. Yet, TCN salaries often range between $150-$500 a month, or $1800-$6000 per year. Since TCNs are often charged for their recruitment and transportation into Iraq and Afghanistan, it is unclear what causes such a large discrepancy between contractor billings and TCN salaries.

Despite and reports on TCN and abuse and contractor malfeasance, in the past ten years a military contractor has been by the government. Nor is there evidence that military contracts are ever terminated due to contractor trafficking violations. However, as the 老澳门开奖结果-Yale report notes, the United States government can address future trafficking, abuse, and corruption in government contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan by taking small, but important steps to improve the oversight of the contracting process and more effectively enforce existing laws and policies, including U.S. anti-trafficking laws. 鈥淰ictims of Complacency鈥� makes a number of concrete recommendations on how greater oversight may be introduced and how U.S. laws may be employed to counter trafficking and abuse of TCNs in the future.

The U.S. government has repeatedly and forcefully stressed its zero-tolerance policy on trafficking; criminal prosecutions and administrative penalties for non-compliant companies should be at the forefront of its enforcement strategy against U.S. contractors that violate U.S. anti-trafficking laws.

As some companies operating in Iraq and Afghanistan have demonstrated, the adoption of stricter hiring and employment standards, aimed at preventing trafficking and abuse of TCNs, are not a pipe dream. 鈥淰ictims of Complacency鈥� highlights that FSI Worldwide, a British contractor, has hired workers from Nepal, India, and Kenya for positions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the UAE. FSI 鈥渢ransfer[s] the cost of recruitment from the TCN to the contracting company, eliminat[es] recruiting agents and us[es] only trusted senior personnel to conduct recruitment, and ask[s] recruits to sign non-payment declarations and to report any attempts by staff to extort money.鈥�

TCNs migrate to find work, to provide for their families, and to save for a better life. The responsibility lies with the U.S. government to ensure that these workers鈥攚ho provide valuable services to our troops and embassies鈥攁re not trafficked, forced into indentured servitude, or otherwise exploited on the taxpayer鈥檚 dime in violation of U.S. and international law.

Learn more about human trafficking: Sign up for breaking news alerts, , and .