—From Lebanon’s second periodic report to the Committee of the convention on the rights of the child [12]

Islamic law, or Shari‘a, like international human rights laws, regards any kind of sexual exploitation as among the gravest of transgressions. It is the responsibility of Muslims all over the world to implement the Qur’anic traditions of self-help, solidarity and protection of the vulnerable through measures such as legislative and social responses to sex trafficking. The method of Shari‘a implementation needs to be re-examined so that unfair practices, such as sham marriages, do not take place under the guise of Islam.

Although some international and regional anti-trafficking conferences have taken place in Muslim countries, local Muslim communities, including the ones in the Delhi slums, remain lethargic. Dr. Sunitha Krishnan, founder of Prajwala, believes that religious groups can play a tremendous role in raising community consciousness. Imams and other religious leaders can use their ability to shape social values, attitudes and norms to address the misogyny and exploitation of children that underlie sex trafficking and related problems. Local Muslim communities can develop measures to stop and punish the traffickers, the qazis solemnizing the sham marriages and the customers involved in the trade.

Whether it is because of ignorance or embarrassment, Muslims generally refuse to acknowledge the existence of sex trafficking in the Muslim world. Trafficking may be one of the biggest threats to the safety of Muslim women in the Muslim world, yet it receives scant attention from the Muslim leadership. Instead of focusing on the protection of Muslim women, Islamic discourse on women in the Muslim world is largely relegated to issues of gender segregation, dress codes and marriage regulations.

The Muslim world is known for its fervent reactions to injustices levied against it — the Danish cartoon incident being one recent example. However, Muslim communities are less impassioned when the injustices in question are levied by Muslims against Muslims. The lack of political or social will to respond to, or even acknowledge, the daily rape and exploitation of tens of thousands of Muslim women and girls is a catastrophic failure of the global Muslim community.

The Future

For every girl rescued, there are thousands who continue to suffer in the brothels. In December 2004, the Second Arab-African Forum Against the Sexual Exploitation and Abuse of Children took place in Rabat, Morocco, while earlier in the year, Indonesia hosted the first Regional Conference on Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes. As a result, Cameroon, Gambia, Guinea, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Yemen, Oman, Syria, Albania, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Burkina Faso and Nigeria have either made national assessments or developed national plans to fight human trafficking.

To facilitate a local Muslim response to sex trafficking, USAID recently granted funds to a local NGO in Bangladesh, which began the Community Mobilization Program Involving Imams in Anti-Trafficking (COMPIAT). About 2,400 imams are being trained to help spread the word about trafficking in their communities and conduct community level workshops.[13]

Huma Kazmi felt uneasy about the woman who was posing as her aunt and notified authorities at the hospital. The woman fled and Huma was safe. Unfortunately for many in the aftermath of the tsunami and quake, the story does not have a similar ending. STOP and other NGOs, governments and religious groups place sex trafficking within the broader context of development, poverty reduction and gender equality and are compelled to address the root causes of stigma and other forms of accepted oppression. A multi-faceted approach can be used not only to combat sex trafficking, but also to restore children’s and women’s rights. The potential to create systemic change for the role of women in developing countries is considerable. These anti-trafficking approaches can be used to strengthen women’s economic security and rights, build women’s leadership roles, promote children’s rights and help eliminate violence against children and women.
As the girls at the STOP house sing …

    I have wings,
    I can fly,
    Unshackle my chains and
    Watch me soar…