TIMEの流れを絶やすな -1-

一時期雑誌TIMEを読もうという流れが盛り上がりを見せてしまいましたが、また下火になってしまいましたね。熱意だけではTIMWをすぐに読めるようにならないかもしれませんが、せっかくの流れをなくしてしまうのは惜しいですね。

「好きな記事、興味のある記事から読もう」というのは正論ですが、せっかくTIMEに挑戦するのですから特集記事から取り組むというのもありだと思います。その号で力を入れて取材した記事ですし、現在世界で何が起きているのか理解でき、興味の幅を広げてくれるものです。そして、英語学習レベルの人に欠けてしまいがちな1000語を超える長めの記事に慣れるという次のステップにつながる力をつけることができます。

もう次号がでてしまいますが、今週の長めの記事はフランスの極右政党ルペン、中国のテニス選手　李娜、ナイジェリアの少女誘拐、米国の死刑執行、911博物館の開館あたりでしょうか。

今回は、その中でナイジェリアの少女誘拐を取り上げたModern Slave Tradeを見てみます。タイトル通り世界の現状を知ることができ大変勉強になります。記事の長さも2500語程度で、特集記事にしては短めです。

WORLD HUMAN TRAFFICKING
The Modern Slave Trade
Belinda Luscombe @youseless May 15, 2014

奴隷というと自分には関係ないことと思ってしまいがちですが、むしろどの国も無関係ではないのが現状のようです。日本のドラマ「おしん」だってHuman Traffickingかもしれませんね。。。

The Modern Slave Trade
On the spectrum of abhorrent business practices, buying and selling humans, especially children, remains the gold standard. Yet modern abolitionists say it happens all the time. “This Nigerian eruption is a chilling and unusual form of trafficking,” says Carol Smolenski, executive director of ECPAT-USA, an organization that fights child trafficking. “But I can tell you definitively that the sexual exploitation of children takes place in every country.” Many nations are simply in denial about it. “I’ve learned, after 22 years of working on this issue, the first conversation in any new country starts with, ‘But we don’t have that here.’”

It may not look like the slave trade of old–no country legally protects the institution of slavery anymore, and the shackles are economic or psychological rather than physical–but the trade in humans is a thriving 21st century business. Finding people to enslave is not that complicated. The most fertile ground shares three main attributes: a heavy mantle of poverty, a cluster of especially vulnerable people and only trace amounts of the rule of law. Much of the world fits that description.

個人的に驚きだったのは女性を性労働に従事させる場合の利益率の高さです。意志に反して無理矢理連れてくるので当たり前かもしれませんが、うまみがあれば根絶は難しくなってしまうでしょう。

“The sex-trafficking industry is hugely profitable,” says Grono. “The annual profit margin on each woman is about 70%. Highly successful companies such as Google have a profit margin of around 22%.” Because it’s so lucrative, traffickers have found myriad ways to conscript new women. Sometimes victims are kidnapped, and sometimes they’re simply hoodwinked by false offers of a better life through training, education or a low-level but legal job in a wealthy, faraway land. Some girls are wooed by boyfriends who turn out to be captors. What they thought was a ticket to paradise takes them instead to hell on earth.

記事の後半ではようやくナイジェリアの現状を伝えてくれています。今回の事件は突発的なことではないことが分かります。

Being female and Nigerian is, in fact, one of the less lucky human conditions. According to the UNODC, Nigeria is one of the top countries of origin for human trafficking. There’s a particularly active corridor between that part of West Africa and Italy. Some estimates suggest that 60% of the prostitutes in Italian brothels hail from Nigeria.

Indeed, the Chibok girls’ case is not even the most extreme example of Nigerian child trafficking. In May 2013, 17 pregnant girls ages 14 to 17 were rescued from a so-called baby farm, an orphanage in Imo, in the southeast, where they had all been impregnated, reportedly by the same man. The infants they bore were being sold off for adoption, forced labor or worse. This is not the only baby farm Nigerian police have uncovered. UNICEF estimates that at least 10 children are sold daily across the country.

また、強制的な結婚をすることが慣習になっているそうです。

By most definitions, forcing a child to marry is another form of sex trafficking. But activists who work with communities where child marriage is customary say parents sometimes believe they are doing the best thing for their daughters. “As girls get old they might get harassed as they go to school, so parents will marry them to protect them from that,” says Janoch. “Not getting married at all has really dire consequences.”

この後はナイジェリアの経済、貧富の格差、そして、米国でのHuman Traffickingの取り組みなどに触れてくれていますが、最後のパラグラフIt’s no accident that the best solution for the challenges faced by the Nigerian girls–and nearly all those who are sexually trafficked–is education,とあります。

It’s no accident that the best solution for the challenges faced by the Nigerian girls–and nearly all those who are sexually trafficked–is education, the very thing Boko Haram wishes to “rescue” them from. Many women who get coerced into prostitution all over the world do not see themselves as victims. Their brothel becomes their home, their pimp family. Without a viable alternative future, a lot of those rescued from sex work return to it. This is especially true in countries where poverty is endemic and women are not valued. But it’s not untrue even in the wealthiest nations. “I’m telling you sincerely this is not just a Nigerian problem anymore,” says Sister Rosemary. “This is happening everywhere.”

そういった意味でも、学校で起こった今回の事件は問題の本質を示したものであり、だからこそ、これだけの注目を集めているのかもしれません。