There are an estimated 610,000 people living in conditions of modern slavery in Thailand (GSI 2018). The country is a source, destination and transit country for men, women and children subjected to forced labour and sex trafficking. Thailand’s commercial sex indusrty remains vast, increasing vulnerabilities for sex trafficking. Children are victims of sex trafficking in brothels, massage parlours, bars, karaoke lounges, hotels and private residences. People are trafficked from other Southeast Asian countries, Sri Lanka, Russia, Uzbekistan and some African countries. It is also a transit country for people from China, North Korea, Bangladesh, India and Burma. Ram ran away from an abusive home and was forced to live on the streets. One day while stealing food from a local market, Ram was kidnapped by a street gang. Ram was forced to steal from tourists during the day and at night was sold for sex to older men. Ram’s exploitation finally came to an end when his trafficker was arrested.

There are an estimated 403,000 people living in modern slavery in the United States (GSI 2018). Sex trafficking exists throughout the country. Traffickers use violence, threats, lies, debt bondage and other forms of coercion to compel adults and children to engage in commercial sex acts against their will. The situations that sex trafficking victims face vary, many victims become romantically involved with someone who then forces them into prostitution. Others are lured with false promises of a job, and some are forced to sell sex by members of their own families. Victims of sex trafficking include both foreign nationals and US citizens, with women making up the majority of those trafficked for the purposes of commercial sexual exploitation. In 2015, the most reported venues/industries for sex trafficking included commercial-front brothels, hotel/motel-based trafficking, online advertisements with unknown locations, residential brothels, and street-based sex trafficking. At 14 years old Samantha ran away from home and became involved with a local gang. She tells of how she was controlled by these people and forced to provide sexual services. The gang controlled when she ate, when she slept and if she showered. Samantha was finally able to escape by jumping out of a car while with a customer.

Trafficked into sex slavery in 1988 at the age of 14, from her hometown of Chicago, Tina Frundt is one of many survivors who become activists after liberation. Calling herself “a voice among the many who have been unheard,” she explained in an interview that “once people are aware of this issue, they can write letters to Congress, find out what areas have a trafficking problem, and take notice when they’re coming home from a club or are out late.” As a Street Outreach Coordinator for the Trafficking Intervention Program at Polaris Project, an organization that provides services to trafficking victims, she told Congress in 2005 that “sex trafficking of U.S. citizens is a reality in every city in the United States, including right here in our nation’s Capitol. Tina added: “if we are judging the efforts of other countries to combat trafficking, we certainly must aggressively fight the trafficking of our own citizens.” Tina decided to tell her story because, as she noted in an interview, “testimony sheds light on a problem that has been going on for so long in the US. Yes, it’s going on in other countries as well, but we also need to focus on what’s been going on here in the US for years.” She knows, as she explained to Congress, that “when we see a woman on the street here in the US, we think, ‘why is she doing it? This must be her choice. She can walk away any time she wants. She can leave.’ There is less sympathy for the domestic victims.” But like foreign national victims, Tina noted, domestic victims are also moved away from their homes. “They can’t go back because they don’t know where they are or they are ashamed to tell their families of what has happened to them… How can you ask help from the police when they have done nothing but arrest you, not recognizing you are a victim of sex trafficking?”