IOM and the Social Welfare Bureau of China's Special Administrative
Region (SAR) of Macao will host a one-day training workshop for 35
police and customs officers on human trafficking and victim
identification on Monday 28 February 2011.

The Macao government-funded training follows an earlier
three-day IOM counter-trafficking workshop held in the SAR in
November 2009 and will be facilitated by a counter-trafficking
expert from China Women's University in Beijing and specialists
from IOM's office in Hong Kong.

Macao, which is home to a thriving casino and gaming industry,
is one of Asia's leading tourist destinations and according to the
US State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in
Persons, has been a destination for the trafficking of women 
from mainland China, Mongolia, Russia, the Philippines, Thailand,
Vietnam, Burma and Central Asia for commercial sex work.

The Office's 2010 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report classifies
the SAR as "Tier 2", indicating that the government is making
significant efforts to stamp out human trafficking, but has not yet
achieved "Tier 1" status and eliminated the problem.

In 2007, Macao established a "Human Trafficking Deterrent
Measures Concern Committee" and in 2008 adopted legislation to
combat human trafficking.  This criminalized traffickers and
provided a legal basis for law enforcement officers to deal with
the issue.

In 2009 China signed the UN Convention against Transnational
Organized Crime and its Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish
Trafficking in Person, Especially Women and Children, signaling its
commitment to step up efforts to stamp out human trafficking 
and improve victim protection nationwide.

For more information please contact:

Gloria Ko

IOM Hong Kong

Tel: +852.23322441

E-mail: "mailto:gko@iom.int">gko@iom.int