Police rescue man trafficked into forced labour in UK first

In November last year police rescued a 22-year-old man trafficked into the United Kingdom from the Czech Republic. Lured by false promises of a good job, the man was forced into agricultural work in Cambridgeshire. His papers were taken away from him on arrival, and he had no access to the bank account used for his wages.

He was forced to work long hours for a year and denied adequate food. When he tried to escape from the house where he was kept in Peterborough, he was caught and forcibly returned.

This is the first forced labour case to be detected by police in the UK. The man was rescued by police as part of Pentameter 2, a national initiative targeting trafficking for sexual exploitation, after they received a call from a member of the public.

The investigation continues.

UK pays compensation for victims of trafficking

In December, four women who were trafficked from eastern Europe and forced into prostitution in the UK, were awarded more than £140,000 as compensation for the trauma they experienced. Using international trafficking networks, one of the women, now aged 18, was brought into the country five years ago and another was trafficked at the age of 16 in 2003. The women were subjected to forced prostitution, multiple rapes and beatings. They were also refused any payment and threats were made to their lives if they tried to escape. Two of the women did however escape, at the start of last year.

This is a precedent setting case in which the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority has officially recognised that trafficked women and children are entitled to compensation as victims of violent crimes, which includes false imprisonment and forced prostitution.

Two arrested in Mauritania on slavery related charges

Two Mauritanians were arrested in October for allegedly forcing two children to work without pay in a town about 600 miles from the capital. Slavery became a criminal offence in Mauritania last August even though the practice has been banned since 1981. Now slave holders face up to 10 years in prison and fines.

Mohamed Ould Nobi aged 51 and his mother Marieme Mint Kneiba, aged 85, are being held on charges of infringing children's rights and denying them their right to education, as opposed to slave holding. They are the first suspects to be arrested on charges such as this in Mauritania although it is not clear when they will stand trial.

The country's newly elected President Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi has made eradicating slavery a priority.

Fruit picked by enslaved farm workers in Florida

In December, the Independent newspaper reported the story of three Florida fruit-pickers held captive and exploited by their employer for over a year. When they were found, they carried scars of beatings to their head and body, knife wounds, bruising and cuts. They had been forced into debt, physically beaten and locked up at night to prevent them from escaping.

A week after they escaped, the police discovered that a forced labour operation was supplying fruit pickers to local growers in Florida. The suppliers were a well known family in the area, who detectives later found out, were keeping another 11 men against their will at a house in Florida.

The majority of people affected by exploitation on farms are migrant workers from Mexico, Guatemala and Haiti, compelled by economic need to look for work abroad and then become trapped in forced labour situations. Pickers are paid 45 cents (22p) for every 32-pound bucket of tomatoes collected and a worker has to pick nearly two and a half tons of tomatoes in order to reach minimum wage.

In the first five months of the year, most of America's fresh tomatoes are grown in Florida. They then make their way to the shelves of American supermarkets and the tables of some of the country's most popular restaurants and fast-food outlets.

As Antonio, a former exploited fruit-picker in Florida says: "People don't realise that someone's suffering. We're the ones that pick the food but they don't see our sweat and exploitation".

Click here for our Action on forced labour and exploitation in US agriculture.

820 Indigenous Brazilians freed by Government officials

A group of 820 indigenous Brazilians were freed from slavery by government officials in November 2007 while working at an Agrisul sugar refinery in the rural southern state of Mato Grosso do Sul. According to a statement from the Ministry of Labor, the group was found to be working in "extremely degrading labor conditions", including being forced to sleep amongst rubbish.

The Brazilian Court has shown a commitment to tackling slavery as reflected in the 2003 National Action Plan for the Eradication of Slavery. While the Government has not met its goal of eliminating slave labour by 2006, some 25,000 workers have been freed from slavery-like conditions in Brazil since 1995. It is estimated that thousands of Brazilians remain victims of slave labour.