Protection
The government made efforts during the reporting period to improve protective services provided to trafficking victims. Kenyan officials removed 14 children from situations of trafficking in Nandi and placed them in a children's home. The government referred two additional trafficking victims to IOM for assistance during the reporting period, and ensured the well-being of a number of other victims. City Council Social Services Departments in Nairobi, Mombasa, and Kisumu operated shelters to rehabilitate street children vulnerable to forced labour and commercial sexual exploitation; the government provided services to children exploited in the commercial sex industry at these facilities. In partnership with an NGO, the Ministry of Home Affairs provided and refurbished a building to house a toll-free hotline that enables children and adults to report cases of child trafficking, labour, and abuse. Staff members were hired and trained to serve as counselors and refer callers to government and NGO service providers. In June 2007, the Department of Home Affairs’ Children's Services Unit hired an additional 180 Chief Children's Officers; during the reporting period, several children's officers posted throughout the country were involved in trafficking investigations and provided counselling and follow-up to child trafficking victims. Fifteen newly appointed Kenyan ambassadors received a first-ever briefing on human trafficking at Kenya's Foreign Service Institute; preparations are underway for a comprehensive briefing from the Ministries of Labor and Home Affairs and IOM for mid-grade and junior officers on their responsibilities in assisting Kenyan victims abroad. The government encourages victims’ assistance in the investigation and prosecution of trafficking crimes, and ensures that they are not inappropriately incarcerated or otherwise penalised for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked. The government does not, however, provide legal alternatives to the removal of victims to countries where they would face hardship or retribution.
Read more about this topic: Human Trafficking In Kenya
Famous quotes containing the word protection:
“The best protection parents can have against the nightmare of a daycare arrangement where someone might hurt their child is to choose a place that encourages parents to drop in at any time and that facilitates communication among parents using the program. If parents are free to drop in and if they exercise this right, it is not likely that adults in that place are behaving in ways that harm children.”
—Gwen Morgan (20th century)
“A man with convictions finds an answer for everything. Convictions are the best form of protection against the living truth.”
—Max Frisch (1911–1991)
“Ah! how much a mother learns from her child! The constant protection of a helpless being forces us to so strict an alliance with virtue, that a woman never shows to full advantage except as a mother. Then alone can her character expand in the fulfillment of all life’s duties and the enjoyment of all its pleasures.”
—Honoré De Balzac (1799–1850)