A group of 47 child victims of trafficking have been returned by
IOM and the Pan American Development Foundation (PADF) to their
homes in the impoverished district of Grand Anse in south-west
Haiti, where IOM will provide follow-on care and assistance.

Aged between two and seven years of age, the children had been
taken from their home town of Jeremie to Haiti's capital,
Port-au-Prince where they were kept at a rogue centre awaiting
international adoption for a period ranging from six months to two
years.

The children, who all come from major trafficking source
communities, were ‘given away' by their parents in return for
promises made by traffickers working for the centre to assist them
financially to set up small businesses, and to meet the needs of
children who'd been taken away and those remaining behind.

After learning that they had been misled by the traffickers and
of the inhumane conditions in which their children were being kept
at the centre, parents approached a local NGO, Initiative
Départementale contre la Traite et le Traffic des Enfants
(IDETTE) to denounce the owner of the centre and to ask for the
return of their children. With the help of other NGOs, the parents
filed a complaint against the owner of the centre in 2006 and
campaigned for the return of their children.

The Haitian government through the Institute for Social
Well-Being and Research (IBERS) and the Brigade of the Protection
of Minors, the PADF, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF),
the Collectif contre la Traite et le Trafic de Personnes, local
NGOs and IOM all collaborated to enable the rescue and return of
these children.

According to IBERS, whose functions include the approval of
adoptions, there are many other bogus centres involved in the
trafficking of children for international adoptions. However, a
lack of resources means the government agency is currently unable
to investigate all centres and to close down all those involved in
child trafficking.

A UNICEF/Terre des Hommes study in 2005 revealed that the number
of crèches involved in inter-country adoptions had seen a
spectacular increase in recent years with fees reaching USD 10,000,
mostly to pay lawyers processing the adoptions.

In addition to sheltering the children post-rescue and in
helping to return them back home, IOM will provide them with
medical and psychological assistance. The educational fees of
school-aged children will also be paid for one year while parents
will be given micro-grants and training to set up small businesses
to ease financial worries during the initial period of return.

One of the most impoverished regions of Haiti, many villages and
communities in Grande Anse are difficult to access and have no
schools or hospitals. Many families here have between six to eight
children with parents often unable to meet basic needs such as
food, education and healthcare.

Since 2005, IOM has assisted with the return and reintegration
of 121 child victims of trafficking in Haiti with funding from the
US State Department's Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration
(PRM). In addition to providing medical and psycho-social care, IOM
also carries out family tracing, evaluation and reunification,
educational/vocational support in addition to giving
micro-enterprise grants to parents/caretakers to prevent
re-trafficking. Where family reunification is not possible,
children are placed in shelters.

For more information, please contact:

Geslet Bordes

IOM Port au Prince

Tel: +509 244 1218; 490 0505

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