Collusion from authorities, lack of official data and indifference of society are the main factors that hinder journalistic investigation of human trafficking and exploitation, according to three Latin American journalists who have covered these crimes in depth.
María Fernanda Fitzgerald, from Colombia; María Antonieta Flores Astorga, from Mexico; and Jazmín Bazán, from Argentina, spoke with LatAm Journalism Review (LJR) about how, despite the obstacles, they have managed to shed light on these problems with investigations that provide different perspectives on a reality that is silenced in the region.
The average rate of human trafficking victims in South America is almost 1 per 100,000 inhabitants, according to data from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). However, this figure reflects only documented cases. The organization claims that crime is underreported in the region and suggests that the actual number of victims could be significantly higher.
Collaborating with social organizations, using a gender-based approach and treating victims with empathy are some of the best practices that have helped Fitzgerald, Flores Astorga and Bazán document these crimes.
Crimes such as human trafficking and exploitation are not being sufficiently investigated by Latin American media, according to the three journalists, who shared what, in their opinion, are some of the reasons behind this lack of coverage.
Fitzgerald, content and investigations editor of the digital feminist outlet Volcánicas, from Colombia, said these crimes do not generate the same morbid fascination or level of interest in audiences as other crimes, such as drug trafficking.
⚠️ “No, de eso no se habla. De eso no le podemos contar porque a la que habla le va mal”. Son 5, todas colombianas y todas sobrevivieron a haber sido captadas en redes de trata con fines de explotación sexual en México pero prefieren guardar silencio: el temor es mayor pic.twitter.com/C3zvFdl9fK
— Volcánicas Periodismo Feminista (@VolcanicasRev) April 30, 2024
“It's very frustrating, because people are not very interested. It's such a heavy topic that most people prefer not to know,” Fitzgerald told LJR. “I also feel that it does not arouse the same kind of morbidity as, for example, the life of a drug trafficker and so on, and it leads to less interest.”
In April of this year, the journalist published the feature article “This is how trafficking for sexual exploitation between Mexico and Colombia works,” in which she delved into the operation of recruitment networks and modalities of trafficking of Colombian women who are taken to Mexico. The article also revealed how human trafficking has become one of the new forms of financing for criminal groups that seek to diversify their activities beyond drug trafficking.
Some activities related to human trafficking or exploitation may be culturally normalized, which also makes them difficult to address, said Bazán, Argentine journalist and author of the report “Criadazgo: child exploitation trapped between the walls of silence,” published in the Paraguayan digital media outlet El Surti. The article talks about how criadazgo – as the fostering of low-income children and adolescents by families in exchange for food, housing and education is known in some South American countries – can become a way of covering up harassment, abuse and domestic labor exploitation.
Bazán said that one of the challenges in her article was to explain why criadazgo is an illicit activity, despite the fact that it is usually considered in Paraguay as a custom that has its origins in Spanish colonization and has been culturally and socially reinforced throughout the country’s history.
“The description of the phenomenon itself, which some try to attribute to Paraguayan culture, leaving aside issues such as poverty, history, lack of education, power hierarchies, was particularly challenging,” Bazán told LJR.
Flores Astorga, a traditional media journalist who has written three books on child abuse and trafficking, said that these crimes carry a burden of shame that leads society to prefer to ignore them.
Flores Astorga's first two books, “Carriolas vacías: tráfico de niños en México” (Empty Strollers: Child Trafficking in Mexico) from 2012 and “Niños a la carta” (Children a la Carte) from 2017, came from investigations of child trafficking in the state of Jalisco, considered one of the most conservative in the country. The journalist said that in conservative societies like that it is more difficult for the media to agree to address these types of issues in depth.
“I lived in Guadalajara and I see that people don't want to hear about those gruesome topics,” Flores Astorga told LJR. “However, [the crime of child trafficking] is more common than we think. The elephant is in the middle of the room and we don't want to see it.”
Despite this invisibility, the journalists found in their investigations that human trafficking and exploitation happen in full view of society. This is because, as Fitzgerald said, people often have an idea about human trafficking that is not necessarily real.
“When we talk about trafficking, what we imagine is a lot of women chained up in a cave. And trafficking is something so everyday that we see it all the time and we often don't notice it. Many times even the victims do not know that they are being trafficked,” the journalist said.
Two of journalist María Antonieta Flores Astorga's books are derived from investigations into child trafficking in the state of Jalisco, Mexico. (Photo: Screenshot)
Other journalists, Fitzgerald added, choose not to address the topic out of fear for their safety, since in most cases, there are powerful criminal groups behind the crimes of human trafficking and exploitation.
“There are many journalists who do not approach the subject out of fear, which is very justified,” Fitzgerald said. “It's something you learn to deal with, but of course it's not something everyone wants to get into, nor should they.”
Fitzgerald said she has faced threats to her safety when investigating trafficking networks in Colombia. She has had to put her investigations on hold several times because of it.
“I learned a little to lower my profile at times, I let the topic rest for a little while, I focus on other types of things and then when I see that the tide goes down a little, I come back and take it up again,” she said. “It may not be the most efficient strategy, but given the conditions we have here, with corrupt authorities, many times being the ones who participate in these trafficking networks, going to the police is not an option.”
On many occasions, authorities are part of or linked to human trafficking or exploitation networks, which also makes it difficult to investigate these crimes, Fitzgerald and Flores Astorga agreed.
“In countries like Colombia and Mexico there is a lot of complicity on the part of the authorities – such as Immigration, the Army and the Police – participating as people who carry out the crime,” Fitzgerald said. “They are the leaders of the groups that end up recruiting women or people involved in trafficking.”
Flores Astorga said that her first two books detail how officials from children's shelters or family protection institutes supposedly have a direct participation in the removal of minors and therefore the victims' complaints do not come to fruition.
“Another challenge is the simulation and cynicism of the authorities [themselves] who are well aware of what’s going on, but they pretend not to because they are colluding,” the Mexican journalist said. “It is sad to see that work is done to denounce a very important issue and that nothing happens.”
The collusion of authorities complicates access to official information and officials in investigations, added Flores Astorga, whose most recent book, “La bestia que devora a los niños” (The beast that devours children) published in 2023, addresses how businessmen, members of the Catholic Church and authorities are alleged accomplices in all types of sexual crimes against minors.
“They don't give you the interviews, they don't give you the information, you become undesirable, so it is more difficult to access official data,” she said.
Fitzgerald said that the significant underreporting of this crime in government institutions was the most complex obstacle she encountered when investigating human trafficking.
“You would think that because it is a very delicate issue, [governments] would surely have very comprehensive records and the reality is that they do not. The majority of leaders, both at the local level and at a more general level, are completely unaware of how these dynamics work, they do not know what trafficking is, they do not understand it,” she said. “This makes it a highly invisible and unknown crime, because it is very difficult to find records.”
Given this official under-reporting, the work of social organizations is important for journalists who investigate human trafficking, Fitzgerald said.
“Organizations are trying hard to keep some records on the issue. Obviously, their figures are not as technical as those of a ministry or a local authority could be,” she said. “It is with much, much dedication to the subject that these organizations, more or less, end up keeping very comprehensive records that allow us as journalists to at least try to make this situation a little visible.”
El criadazgo es una forma de esclavitud infantil que persiste en Paraguay. Niñas y niños de escasos recursos son explotados a cambio de promesas de alimento y educación.
Una práctica que se mantiene en la penumbra sin que el Estado intervenga de manera efectiva.
Abrimos pic.twitter.com/tCpAHaBtVO
— El Surtidor (@elsurti) February 5, 2024
Bazán also turned to social organizations to remedy the lack of public data on criadazgo in Paraguay. Thanks to the support of Global Infancia and other organizations defending children and adolescents, she was able to obtain the data to show, among other findings, that criadazgo functions as a window to trafficking and sexual exploitation in that country.
“The lack of updated official statistics was one of the biggest obstacles to understanding the extent of this problem,” Bazán said. “I think the merit of the article lies in having compiled the work carried out by survivors, activists, members of NGOs and researchers over decades.”
Although giving a voice to the victims of human trafficking and exploitation is important in a journalistic investigation, if the approach is not correct, they can be re-victimized, Fitzgerald said.
The journalist said that when she approaches victims of human trafficking to obtain their testimonies, she tries to do so with victim protection organizations to guarantee the safety of these sources.
“The victim can talk to me and tell me everything, but if I am not completely clear and in context about what is happening, I can end up causing something even worse to happen to them,” Fitzgerald said. “You have to do it with great care. This does not usually happen in the media, journalists being very concerned about the safety of the victims. That ends up leading to a lot of re-victimization.”
Bazán added that it is also important for journalists to obtain sufficient documentation before interviewing victims. Victim advocacy organizations are of great help in giving journalists sufficient context of the problem.
“It is essential to arm yourself with information. That is, research the topic beforehand. These [anti-trafficking organizations] provide an essential theoretical and sensitive framework to address this issue,” Bazán said. “It seems to me that journalists should approach survivors with prior research, humility and a willingness to listen.”
Bazán said that it must be taken into account that not all people who have gone through situations of trafficking or exploitation have a uniform opinion regarding their experiences, so journalists must be careful to avoid generalizations.
“I also believe that it is essential to talk from sensitivity: to understand how far the interviewees want to go and be aware of their limits,” she said. “Sensationalism is the enemy of this type of coverage.”
Flores Astorga said that gaining the trust of the victims or people around them is essential to obtaining testimonies. To this end, when she approaches mothers of abducted children in her investigations into child trafficking, she seeks to show empathy and convince them that her voice will be helpful in making the crime visible and preventing more families from being affected.
“They have to trust you, because if not, they won't tell you anything. I always tell them that [their testimony matters] so that it does not happen to others and so this does not remain in the dark, so that other mothers know about it,” Flores Astorga said.
A feature by the newspaper El País Colombia in April of this year about the sexual exploitation of girls in Medellín led to complaints on social networks for referring to the problem as “child prostitution.” Following the controversy, journalist Jules Ownby, author of the article, clarified on his X account that the headline had been modified to better reflect the content. However, for Fitzgerald, this article is a clear example of how journalistic work can really re-victimize by not using the correct terms to address the topic.
Colombian journalist María Fernanda Fitzgerald has done several reports on human trafficking for media outlets such as the feminist digital magazine Volcánicas. (Photo: Courtesy of María Fernanda Fitzgerald)
“[The feature] is very violent. It doesn't know that they are talking about children, that children cannot be prostituted, and that there is a use of terms that should be known," she said. “The word ‘prostitution’ implies consent from the girl or boy who is being subjected to this. That is something that we should eliminate and talk directly about sexual exploitation of children and adolescents.”
To avoid re-victimizing, it is important that journalists be trained in a gender-based approach, Fitzgerald said. This will also avoid appealing to morbidity and sensationalism.
“Not only the journalist, but the newsrooms, and in fact also the journalism schools at the university level, should be interested in teaching the guidelines for coverage, not only of this, but of other types of topics that involve gender, non-revictimization, basic human rights,” she said.
