Write Althea and Asclepius, LUDCI.eu Editorial Team
About 46 million people in the world are living as slaves. They are forced to work in factories, mines, and farms, sold for sex, trapped in debt bondage, or born into servitude, according to the 2016 Global Slavery Index by Walk Free Foundation Rights Group.
Most people think of modern-day slavery in terms of girls forced to become sex workers, but this is the only representative of the total activities involved in human trafficking. Sex work accounts for only about 19% of the total forced labour cases. The remaining percentage is scattered through networks of supply chains and in the private sector. Trafficked persons work anywhere within the process of production from raw materials to the finished products.
There have been efforts by several international and local bodies in response to modern slavery but this has barely scratched the surface of the global problem. In the many small-scale success stories reported, many of the victims were never identified. The Trafficking in Persons Report for last year is illustrative of this fact. It accounts for some 86, 000 victims receiving aid in the world. This figure accounts for less than 1% of the total number of trafficked persons. In the same year, the total number of convictions made were less than 7, 000.
Why the Banking Sector Should be Concerned? The reason for human trafficking is to make money. This money is managed through banks. This makes banks unwilling and sometimes ignorant collaborators in the trafficking activities. Many global banks have been charged severally with providing banking facilities to criminals, including child traffickers and drug cartels.
HSBC has been on trial for providing banking services for criminals including drug cartels, dictators, arms dealers, tax offenders, and traffickers. Perhaps the most startling was an investigation that was concluded in 2013, which revealed that HSBC Bank U.S.A had “failed to apply legally required money laundering control to $200 trillion in wire transfers alone, in only a three-year period”.
The bank was fined for $1.9 billion. Now, a report by the ICIJ two years later would further illuminate the nature of this money. The HSBC agreed that they “unwittingly” sheltered money belonging to arms dealers and drug cartels. It is noteworthy that they provided banking facilities for the arms deal that armed child soldiers in a grotesque war in Monrovia in 2003. Its Swiss branches have been called forward severally for providing shelter to unscrupulous individuals, thereby aiding money laundering.
JPMorgan Chase sheltered Jeffrey Epstein’s funds up until 2013. Jeffrey Epstein had been charged multiple times from the 1990s for sex trafficking of children. He pleaded guilty to solicitation of prostitution in 2008. Still, he remained JPMorgan’s client till 2013. The investigation into Epstein suggests that he has been running a sex trafficking ring of minors with his girlfriend for more than 2 decades. Asides from this, speculations remain that Epstein’s company may be a front for money laundry owing to unexplained several billions on dollars in offshore accounts. Deutsche Bank is also known to have worked with Epstein for years.
Several banks were punished by regulators in 2018 for poor anti-money laundering practices. The list includes ING Bank, which was found with funds linked to drug cartels, Rabobank that enabled transfers of hundreds of millions in cash linked to organised crime rings and drug cartels. Wells Fargo’s Wachovia was also fined as was Standard Chartered.
Conclusion:
When we talk of drug cartels and organised crime rings, human trafficking, child labour, and sex trafficking cannot be excluded from their activities. These bestial elements put their fingers into just about the worst of crimes in order to make money.
In their defense, many of these banks claimed unwilling participation in enabling crime syndicates to thrive. This is completely unacceptable as the stakes – the lives of millions of innocent children – are too high. Given the severity of the consequences of their actions and the flimsiness of their excuses, the banking sector comes across as an accessory to child trafficking crimes. This makes them just as guilty as the criminals themselves.
In this vein, federal and internal prosecutors must resort to graver measures of retribution when handling defaulting banks. The fines being slapped on these banks seem to encourage them to continue in their extremely costly “oversight” with anti-money laundry practices. Let us put this in a business perspective. If HSBC was found to have helped launder over 200 trillion in 3 years and they were fined 1.9 billion, it takes little math to figure out that the loss is grossly insignificant. And one could say very well that the business was profitable.
Why not do it again?
At the risk of sounding indicting of governments of several countries, it seems to be that the legal systems also provide a comfortable atmosphere for criminals and their aides to thrive. Why don’t we see actual prosecutions of erring banking officials? Their crimes of “oversight” has cost several lives of men, women, and children directly and indirectly. The least one would expect is that their practicing licenses be seized so that they are permanently excused from this level of “oversight”.
This is a call to all banks to take their anti-money laundering practices seriously considering that the lives of millions of children are on the line. It is also an appeal to governments around the world for stricter punishment for defaulting banks.
