FROM BONDAGE TO FREEDOM
14
“All acts and attempted acts involved in the recruitment,
transportation within or across borders, purchase, sale, transfer,
receipt or harbouring of a person involving the use of deception,
coercion (including the use or threat of force or the abuse of
authority) or debt bondage for the purpose of placing or holding
such person, whether for pay or not, in involuntary servitude
(domestic, sexual or reproductive), in forced or bonded labour, or
in slavery-like conditions, in a community other than the one in
which such person lived at the time of the original deception,
coercion or debt bondage”. 32
The HRS definition focuses on clearly identifiable elements of the
crime, in order to distinguish cases of trafficking from other acts, such as
undocumented migration. These elements are:
i)
acts or attempted acts;
ii)
recruitment;
iii)
transportation, which can be via legal or illegal channels of
migration;
iv)
purchase, sale, transfer, receipt or harbouring of a person;
v)
deception, i.e. being tricked into vulnerable situations;
vi)
coercion (including the use or threat or force or the abuse of
authority;
vii)
debt bondage;
viii) servitude (domestic, sexual or reproductive), in forced or
bonded labour, or in slavery like conditions.
ix)
Transportation to community other than the one in which such
person lived at the time of the original deception, coercion or
debt bondage33.
The above definition clearly brings out various stages involved in
trafficking and at the same times differentiates trafficking from migration.
A comparison of this definition with the definition given in the UN
Protocol on Trafficking brings to fore the fact that all these elements
32
Ibid.
33
Supra note 26, pp.35-37.