Sponsoring slavery

Every minute, one person is sold over an international border. Human trafficking is now the fastest growing international crime; it is second in size only to the drug trade and ahead of arms trafficking, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Due to its nature as a hidden crime, there are no precise figures on human trafficking, but profits are estimated to be $32 billion annually — $4 billion from forced economic exploitation and $28 billion from forced sexual exploitation. In terms of trafficked people, some 20.9 million people are victims of forced labor, of which 9.1 million, or 44 percent, are moved either within or outside of their country and therefore likely to be trafficked, according to 2012 data from the International Labor Organization (ILO).  More from this author: China moves for Saudi oil Dirty dealings in Qatar's World Cup bid Shocking though such numbers may