Guyana has maintained its Tier 1 ranking in the latest US State Department Trafficking in Persons’ Report and the government is being lauded for demonstrating “serious and sustained efforts” during the reporting period with some 216 trafficking victims identified from a total of 288 potential victims.
“These efforts included identifying more victims and referring them to services, increasing investigations and prosecutions, drafting and funding a National Action Plan (NAP) for 2021-2025 with input from survivors, training diplomats, and conducting a campaign to inform migrants of the Spanish-language hotline,” was how the report described the efforts by the government. However, the 2022 report pointed out that although the government met the minimum standards, it did not convict any traffickers for the first time in four years. And it did not formally approve Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) to identify victims, provide sufficient security for trafficking victims at shelters, provide enough Spanish-language interpreters, identify any victims among the vulnerable Haitian population, or adequately oversee recruitment agencies.
Guyana is one of two Caribbean countries, the other being The Bahamas, ranked at Tier 1 while Barbados, Jamaica, St Vincent and Suriname are ranked at Tier 2 and Antigua & Barbuda, Haiti, St Lucia and Trinidad & Tobago are on the Tier 2 Watch List. In addition to the 216 victims identified by the government, another 15 were identified by Non-Govern-mental Organisations (NGOs). According to the Report, of the identified victims, 193 were women and 14 were girls, all of whom were exploited in sex trafficking; the Report also stated that five women, 10 men, six girls, and three boys were exploited in labour trafficking. The breakdown by nationality of the sex trafficking victims were – 22 Guyanese, 166 Venezuelans, five Jamaicans, two Cubans, and one Indian; the remaining victims were from unspecified countries. And the labour trafficking victims included six Guyanese, 10 Venezuelans, three Cubans, two Brazilians, two Jamaicans, and one Indian national.
This Report implies that there was a small increase in trafficking in person especially when compared with the identification of 199 victims by the government and an additional five victims by NGOs in 2020 (127 sex trafficking victims and 77 labour trafficking victims). The Ministry of Human Services and Social Security’s (MHSSS’s) Counter-Trafficking in Persons (C-TIP) Unit was able to identify the victims in cooperation with the police and thereafter provided each with social welfare and assistance. The Report noted that the government’s C-TIP Unit had five staff members, and that the government did report that this number was insufficient to effectively undertake its work. In August 2021, the government publicly stated it planned to expand the C-TIP Unit but had not done so by the end of the reporting period.
Exploit
According to the Report, over the last five years in Guyana, human traffickers were able to exploit domestic and foreign victims in Guyana, and traffickers exploited victims from Guyana abroad. It said that the government reported 78 percent of traffickers in 2020 were men, predominantly Guyanese; 14 percent of traffickers were from Venezuela, while less than 3 percent were Dominican and Haitian. NGOs reported traffickers are often middle-aged men who own or operate nightclubs while some traffickers are family members of the victims. Women and children from Guyana, Brazil, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Suriname, and Venezuela become sex trafficking victims in mining communities in the interior and urban areas, the report said.
An NGO reported in 2021 that an increasing number of young, Indi-genous girls are being taken from Bolivar State in Venezuela to Guyana, where traffickers exploit them in commercial sex. NGOs also reported trafficking networks operated by illegal armed groups known as “sindicatos” in Delta Amacuro State in Venezuela. These NGOs reported these groups lead members of the Indigenous Warao community into Guyana to work long shifts in illegal mines with no medical care despite experiencing curable common health issues. “(Warrau) women are recruited to work as cooks in the mines but are often forced into commercial sex or exploited by illegal armed groups. While both sex trafficking and labour trafficking occur in remote interior mining communities, limited government presence in the country’s interior renders the full extent of trafficking there unknown,” the report noted.
Recommendations
The Report contains a number of recommendations for the government, including increasing prosecutions and convictions in sex and labour trafficking cases and pursuing them under the Combating Trafficking in Persons Act of 2005, including for cases involving child victims. Enhancement of security for victims is another recommendation to the government, especially those residing in government shelters, and their relatives and proactively screening vulnerable populations, including Haitian migrants and Cuban medical workers. Recommendations for trafficking indicators includes a referral of victims for services, and ensuring potential victims are not deported without screening. Under prosecutions, the government reported initiating investigations in 38 cases involving 57 suspects, 46 for sex trafficking and 11 for labour trafficking, compared with 31 new cases (23 for sex trafficking and eight for labour trafficking) in 2020.
The government continued one sex trafficking investigation from the previous reporting period, and it also reported that it initiated prosecutions against three suspected traffickers, one for sex trafficking and two for labour trafficking, compared with one new prosecution for sex trafficking in 2020 and three prosecutions in 2019. The report revealed that the authorities ceased prosecution of one alleged sex trafficker following the suspect’s death but continued prosecutions against two defendants, one for sex trafficking and one for labour trafficking. The courts dismissed the labour trafficking case in December 2021 for insufficient evidence. There was no conviction of any traffickers, compared with the conviction of one trafficker for each of the past three years.
The government did not report on any new investigations, prosecutions, or convictions of government employees complicit in trafficking offences. Interestingly, the Report stated that victims lacked trust in the country’s law enforcement agencies, prosecutors, and the judicial system; the Report also cited the State’s inability to guarantee the safety of victims and their relatives; language barriers; and delays in investigations as notable challenges in prosecuting trafficking. “The judicial process remained slow, with trafficking and other major criminal trials taking an average of two years and up to three years to complete due to shortages of trained court personnel, postponements at the request of the defense or prosecution, allegations of bribery, poor case tracking, and delays in preparing cases for trial,” the report said.
Tier 1, though recognized as the highest TIP ranking, does not mean that a country has no human trafficking problem or that it has done enough to address the crime. “Rather, a Tier 1 ranking indicates that a government has made efforts to address the problem that meet the TVPA’s minimum standards. To maintain a Tier 1 ranking, governments need to demonstrate appreciable progress each year in combating trafficking. Tier 1 represents a responsibility rather than a reprieve,” the trafficking Report said.
