A/HRC/38/45 in creating multidisciplinary and transnational teams despite implemented efforts on training and capacity-building at the regional, bilateral or national levels. 24 28. Similarly, serious concerns have arisen in relation to the increasing number of trafficking cases of Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh and neighbouring countries. 25 For such refugees, the clandestine nature of their journey, the often unscrupulous and corrupt conduct of their facilitators and collaborators and the extent to which some States will go to prevent their departure, transit or arrival, all operate to create or exacerbate opportunities for traffickers, who prey on their precarious situation. For instance, Rohingya from Myanmar typically embark on maritime and overland journeys, often via Thailand, to reach Malaysia irregularly. Initially smuggled across borders, some are subsequently trafficked to work on fishing boats or palm oil plantations for labour exploitation. 26 29. The Special Rapporteur also received allegations in relation to a pattern of arrests and detentions of Bangladeshi and Rohingya women and girls for the sole purpose of them being undocumented in the area of West Bengal in India, at the border with Bangladesh. In that regard, appropriate investigations and early identification had to be undertaken to determine whether they had entered the territory of India by means of coercion, abduction, fraud, deception, abuse of power or a position of vulnerability, for the purpose of exploitation. B. Identification in transit countries 30. The recent migration situation into Europe has primarily involved an influx of Syrians, Iraqis and Afghans, many of whom moved through the Balkans (often referred to as “the Balkan route”) in their attempt to reach Europe. Along the way, and at various stages of their journeys and flights, many of those migrants and refugees are exposed to different risks, vulnerabilities and exploitation, including, in some cases, human trafficking.27 31. In Central America, migrants attempting to reach the United States of America, have been forced to rely upon increasingly dangerous routes, often ending up in the hands of smugglers and traffickers. Smuggled migrants are vulnerable to trafficking, including mistreatment, sexual exploitation, threats, intimidations and restriction of their freedom of movement. Most overland migration involves migrants from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras transiting through Mexico to the United States. 28 IOM Mexico noted that trafficking victims are often identified at the moment they are freed from exploitation, either through the payment of ransom sums, when they manage to escape by their own means or, in exceptional circumstances, when traffickers free or abandon them. 32. Similarly, the journey of sub-Saharan African women and unaccompanied children is particularly hazardous. Thousands of such women and children have disappeared, presumably abducted for purposes of trafficking-related exploitation. Somali and Sudanese refugees and asylum seekers fleeing conflict, including numerous unaccompanied children, have been kidnapped or lured from refugee camps or while travelling, sold and subsequently held captive in Libya or in the Sinai desert for the purpose of exploitation through extortion.29 33. The main challenges common to all transit countries relate to a recurrent confusion between trafficking and smuggling, and an inadequate legal framework and standard 24 25 26 27 28 29 Ibid. See A/HRC/32/18, para. 11. See A/HRC/29/38/Add.1, para. 19; and A/HRC/32/41, para. 24. FAFO, Vulnerability and exploitation along the Balkan route: Identifying victims of human trafficking in Serbia (Oslo, 2017), available at www.fafo.no/images/pub/2017/20620.pdf. Also Healy and Forin, “Trafficking along migration routes”. See UNODC, “Smuggling of Migrants from the Northern Triangle to the United States”, available at www.unodc.org/documents/toc/Reports/TOCTASouthAmerica/English/ TOCTA_CACaribb_migrantsmuggling_to_US.pdf. See A/HRC/32/41 para. 21. 9