Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua on the list of countries with the most human trafficking

According to a list compiled by the United States, these are the countries with the highest incidence of human trafficking: Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, as they do not meet the minimum standards for elimination and do not make significant efforts to do so.

This is according to the 2024 Trafficking in Persons Report (TIP Report) published on Monday by the US State Department, which divides countries according to their level of human trafficking and places those mentioned in the most serious level, which was already there a year earlier.

In Nicaragua, for example, the government of Daniel Ortega “continued to downplay the seriousness of the problem” and failed to identify any trafficking victims for the second consecutive year, nor prosecute or convict any traffickers.

Venezuela is asked to investigate and prosecute traffickers and their accomplices involved in child sex trafficking, the recruitment or use of children by NSAG or other illegal armed groups, trafficking of men and LGBTI people.

And Cuba is asked to ensure that “government-sponsored labor export programs meet international labor standards, specifically that participants receive fair wages that are paid in full into bank accounts that workers can control.

The report highlights that there are broad commonalities in trafficking trends faced by countries across the Western Hemisphere (North, Central and South America and the Caribbean). In this case, they are often linked to irregular immigration.

“Unprecedented irregular migration in the region affects all countries in the Western Hemisphere. Migrants and asylum seekers are particularly vulnerable to sex trafficking and forced labor, including by large and small organized criminal groups,” she notes.