NAPTIP boss calls for crippling of human traffickers finances

The Director-General of the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP), Dame Julie Okah-Donli has called on destination countries of human traffickers to cripple the latter’s finances if the fight against human trafficking is to be won.

The NAPTIP boss stated this yesterday when the new Ambassador and Head of the European Union Delegation to Nigeria, Mr. Ketil Karslsen paid her a working visit.

Donli said , “We must cripple traffickers economically by tracing and freezing their accounts for the benefit of victims of human trafficking. We must take their money and render them impotent’’, she said.

She also stressed the need for destination countries to work closely with the Nigerian Embassies in the areas of victims’ identification; language barriers and assistance to victims.

She urged the European Union and her members to consciously deal with issues of pornographic sites, massage parlours and farms scattered all over Europe and where victims of human trafficking from Nigeria and Africa are daily exploited.

‘The NAPTIP boss also spoke of the need for equal attention to be focused on the trafficking and exploitation of boys and men by traffickers.

She said ‘’ the boys and men are even more brutalized and nobody is doing anything about it. These are the people who when they survive and are deported back home, they become potential armed robbers, hired assassins and engage in other crimes. We need to empower them and help them rather than focus only on the plights of the girls and children’’.

In his remarks, the European Union Ambassador to Nigeria said that the current increase in human trafficking and irregular migration is an issue of shared common responsibility that must be addressed by all stakeholders in order to arrive at reasonable results.