Human trafficking is an international problem that must be handled domestically. This becomes particularly difficult in a country known for its disregard of human rights and civil liberties. In the U. China was demoted to Tier 3 after nine years of failing to put into place practices to stop human trafficking. Forced Labor Although China officially prohibits forced labor, it is a rampant and widespread practice throughout much of the country, and what makes it worse is that in China, only women and children can be legally recognized as trafficking victims. Domestically an estimated 2.

A uthorities on both sides of the border have failed to stop the trafficking of hundreds of women from Myanmar to China, says a new report released by Human Rights Watch HRW on Thursday. Many of the victims testify to being locked up, raped and forced to bear the children of their captors. Forced to have only one child, Chinese parents often abandoned female babies or had sex-selective abortions in favor of males, leading to a shortfall in the female population of an estimated 30 to 40 million.

Prostitution is illegal in China and is frequently the target of law enforcement crackdowns. The two phenomena of prostitution and trafficking in women, or female trafficking, are nevertheless not equivalent. This article argues that, in the contemporary discourse on prostitution and female trafficking in China, the two issues are often conflated. The two terms are used interchangeably in a way that has affected the conceptualisation of female trafficking as a phenomenon that is largely synonymous with prostitution.