Human Trafficking and Trauma in the Digital Era: The Ongoing Tragedy of the Trade in Refugees from Eritrea

Eritre­an refugees criss­cross between coun­tries in the Horn of Africa and North Africa in search of a safe place. Along their jour­neys, they are loot­ed, threat­ened, intim­i­dat­ed, vio­lat­ed, and held for ran­som. This book revis­its the human traf­fick­ing cri­sis that first emerged in the Sinai at the end of 2008 and exam­ines the expan­sion of human traf­fick­ing of Eritre­an refugees and oth­er forms of exploita­tion beyond the Sinai. It focus­es on the modus operan­di of these prac­tices and on iden­ti­fy­ing their key facil­i­ta­tors and ben­e­fi­cia­ries. The book locates the ori­gin of these prac­tices with­in Eritrea; it reveals how a delib­er­ate pol­i­cy of impov­er­ish­ment and human rights abus­es has dri­ven the peo­ple out of the coun­try, and how indi­vid­u­als with­in Eritrea, and par­tic­u­lar­ly with­in the rul­ing par­ty, ben­e­fit from the smug­gling and traf­fick­ing of Eritre­an refugees. The use of infor­ma­tion com­mu­ni­ca­tion tech­nolo­gies (ICTs) is iden­ti­fied as key to the new modus operan­di of this crim­i­nal busi­ness and is found to fur­ther facil­i­tate wide­spread col­lec­tive trau­ma amongst Eritre­ans, who wit­ness the abuse of their fam­i­ly mem­bers and fel­low nation­als through dig­i­tal net­works. An entire sec­tion in this book is ded­i­cat­ed to assess­ing the extent and effects of indi­vid­ual and col­lec­tive trau­ma caused by Sinai traf­fick­ing and to exam­in­ing poten­tial approach­es to heal­ing. Oth­er sec­tions dis­cuss the vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties of Eritre­an minors and women, and the con­nec­tions between human traf­fick­ing, ter­ror­ism and organ traf­fick­ing. The last sec­tion of the book rais­es the ques­tion of account­abil­i­ty. It exam­ines and eval­u­ates inter­na­tion­al respons­es to this for­got­ten cri­sis, and dis­cuss­es the need for poli­cies that tack­le the prob­lem where it emerges: in Eritrea.

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