The phenomenon “has become more visible in recent years, but not much progress has been made in the area of more direct attention to victims,” Carmela Jibaja, a Catholic nun with the Ramá Network against Trafficking in Persons, told IPS.

This Central American civil society organization forms part of the Talita Kum International Network against Trafficking in Persons, based in Rome, which brings together 58 anti-trafficking organizations around the world.

Jibaja pointed out that “the biggest trafficking problem is at the borders, because El Salvador is a country that expels migrants,” as well as in tourism areas. The most recognized form of trafficking in the region is sexual exploitation, whose victims are women.

Carlos Morán, Interpol security officer and a member of the Honduran police Cybercrime Unit, agrees: “We know that El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala are countries with a heavy flow of undocumented migrants, which puts them at risk of becoming victims of trafficking.” It was during the Regional Seminar on Investigation Techniques and Protection of Victims of Trafficking in Persons, hosted Nov. 4-8 by San Salvador, that brought together officials from the office of the public prosecutor, police officers, legal experts and other key actors and experts from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. These countries make up the so-called Northern Central American Triangle. The objective was to strengthen capacities and good practices in the investigation of trafficking, especially when the crime is transnational. The participants in the meeting declined to talk about figures on the extent of trafficking in the region, due to the lack of reliable data.

In the countries of the Northern Triangle, there are government efforts to develop victim care programs, but they are insufficient and civil society organizations have had to take up the challenge.

Mirna Argueta is executive director of the Association for the Self-Determination of Salvadoran Women (AS Mujeres), and coordinator in El Salvador of the Latin American Observatory on Trafficking in Persons, which brings together 15 countries. She told IPS that “the problem is serious, because we are facing networks with great economic and political influence, and victims are not being protected.”

There are very few programs to help with their reinsertion in society. Her organization has been working since 1996 with victims of trafficking, offering psychological and medical support. It is an important ally of the Attorney-General’s Office in victim protection work. AS Mujeres helps the police and prosecutors when victims have to be moved from one place to another, in a secretive way, especially when judicial cases against organized crime networks are underway.

It has also offered shelter to women victims of trafficking, but now the prosecutor’s office does.

AS Mujeres’ victim care program includes psychological support, medical assistance which incorporates non-traditional techniques such as biomagnetism as well as massage and aromatherapy. “Experience has shown us that with the combination of these three techniques, recovery is more effective, and care is more integral,” said Argueta. Since the program started in 1996, it has served some 600 trafficking victims.

AS Mujeres also promotes a self-care network. “When the victim has gone through different stages, we integrate her with other women and they can share their experiences, making it less painful, and helping them with their reinsertion in society,” Argueta added. Many victims feel they are “damaged,” or worthless, and they turn to prostitution.

Victims can spend from six months to two and a half years in the program, depending on the complexity of each case. For example, there are women with acute problems of depression, suicidal thoughts and persecutory delusions.

According to figures from the United Nations office in Honduras, released in July this year, 80% of the victims of human trafficking in Central America are women and girls. In El Salvador, 90% of cases involve sexual exploitation. However, other types of trafficking have been detected, such as labor exploitation, forced panhandling and others. So far this year, the prosecution has reported 800 victims, cases that are still open.

In Guatemala, in 2018, the Public Prosecutor’s Office detected 478 possible victims, 4% more than the previous year. There were 276 reported cases, also an increase of 4%. Children and adolescents continue to be vulnerable to trafficking, as 132 children and adolescents were detected as possible victims of human trafficking, 28 percent of the total, 111 of whom were rescued.

They were victims of illegal adoptions, labor exploitation, forced marriage, forced panhandling, sexual exploitation and forced labor or services. However, the most invisible form of trafficking, according to the prosecutor’s office, is the recruitment of minors into organized crime. A relatively new phenomenon that is responsible for the crime wave in the three Northern Triangle countries.

The gangs have mutated into organized crime groups, with tentacles in the illicit drug trade, extortion rackets, “sicariato” or murder for hire and now human trafficking.

In El Salvador, it is common to hear stories in neighborhoods and towns controlled by gangs about young girls who gang leaders “ask for”, to be used as sex toys by the leaders and other members of the gang, and the families hand them over because they know that they could be killed if they don’t.

The gangs go farther, forcing their victims to provide sexual services for profit, another aspect of trafficking. In 2018 there were 46 confirmed victims, 43 police investigations and 38 judicial proceedings. The trials led to four convictions and two acquittals. The rest are still winding their way through court, according to the Council’s Work Report 2018.

The attention to victims included programs to help them launch small enterprises, as well as measures of integral reparations for families of children and adolescents in the shelters.

El Salvador is part of the Regional Coalition against Trafficking in Persons and Smuggling of Migrants, along with Belize, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama and the Dominican Republic. Honduras has also provided support for economic reinsertion, offering seed capital to set up small jewelry businesses, among others, said Interpol’s Morán.

At least 337 people from Honduras have been rescued since 2018, including 13 in Belize and Guatemala, according to a report by the Inter-Institutional Commission Against Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking in Persons in Honduras.

See here the article Central America – Fertile Ground for Human Trafficking