A/HRC/32/41
43.
International personnel are generally deployed to conflict or immediate post-conflict
situations in which populations are vulnerable and basic institutions, including law
enforcement, are fragile or non-existent (A/59/710). The presence of peacekeepers, through
an increased demand for sexual services, further exacerbates women’s social and economic
vulnerabilities in a fragile post-conflict society as well as an economy of exploitation,
which can support trafficking networks in the longer term. For instance, the recent cases of
sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeepers in the Central African Republic 34 who prey
on the economic vulnerability of children and women as well as on their need for assistance
and protection could, in some cases, be linked to trafficking for purposes of sexual
exploitation.
F.
International legal framework
44.
The international legal framework around trafficking in conflict and post-conflict
situations is a composite one that draws on multiple branches of law, including
transnational criminal law, international humanitarian law, international criminal law,
refugee law and human rights law. In some cases, common and overlapping rules operate to
ensure that certain protections (e.g., against slavery and forced labour) are applicable in all
situations, including international and non-international armed conflict. In other cases,
particular rules and protections will apply depending on the nature of the situation under
consideration.
45.
Instead of providing a comprehensive analysis, in this part of the report the Special
Rapporteur aims to provide an overview of the legal landscape by addressing the rules that
govern the core violations and issues identified above.
Sources of relevant law
46.
Given the complexities surrounding trafficking in conflict and post-conflict
situations, which can be considered from a number of different perspectives, the range of
sources of relevant law is very wide. In the human rights area, for example, treaties dealing
with slavery and the slave trade, forced labour, child labour, the rights of women, the rights
of children, migrant workers and persons with disabilities, as well as more general treaties
dealing with civil and political rights or economic, social and cultural rights, are applicable
to trafficking in all situations, including situations of armed conflict. Major crime control
treaties, such as the United Nations Convention on Transnational Organized Crime and the
United Nations Convention against Corruption are also relevant to trafficking in all
situations, as are the specialist treaties dealing with the issue of trafficking, most
particularly the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially
Women and Children, supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational
Organized Crime and, at the European level, the Council of Europe Convention on Action
against Trafficking in Human Beings and its Explanatory Report, and the European Union
Directive on preventing and combating trafficking in human beings and protecting its
victims.
47.
Within the specific context of armed conflict, additional legal instruments of
obligation and protection apply. The most relevant of these for the current purposes is the
Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which addresses, inter alia, war crimes
34
12
(New York, 2002); Keith Allred, “Combating human trafficking”, NATO Review (2006); and Rehn
and Johnson Sirleaf, Women, War, Peace.
See A/70/729 and www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=
18548&LangID=E.
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