Fatal Promises

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Fa.tal: adj- Causing ruin or destruction;disastrous / Prom.ise(s): noun- something that effects an express assurance; indication of what may be expected. Every year, an estimated 800,000 persons are trafficked across international borders and forced into sexual or labour servitude. Estimates are that as many as 32 million people yearly are held in slave-like conditions for sexual or labour exploitation, 2.4 million of these individuals as a result of being trafficked. They are promised good jobs or pay, but end up forced into prostitution or working in servitude for no pay. They are emotionally and physically brutalized, starved, forced to work extremely long hours, stripped of their passports and locked away, and eventually discarded or worse, murdered. Eight years after the United Nations established the Palermo Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, "Fatal Promises" offers a comprehensive look at the realities on the ground versus the rhetoric of today's political efforts in combating human trafficking. While focusing on Ukraine as a country of origin and western European countries and the U.S. as countries of destination, "Fatal Promises" illuminates the magnitude of this global epidemic.