“Toshiba, colored, at a special price”
Trafficking in women on ebay?
There one rubs oneself already surprised the eyes. So promising sounds the offer: "natsuki olaz, soft skin, dermatolog. Tested."And for mrs. Olaz, the seller eoloi on the swiss ebay offshoot charges just 3.000 swiss francs. Oh yes, the item to be auctioned is of course as good as new. But it still goes cheaper. At "toshiba, colored, at a special price" the starting price is only 1780 francs. "Colored" apparently does not go so well in switzerland.
But if you want to make an offer right now with shaky fingers, you should rather read the item description first. There it becomes clear what it is really about: "on the european black market a woman costs less than we spend annually for our outer appearance. Women are blackmailed and made dependent with false promises, threats and fictitious debts. The booming sex industry is responsible for the trafficking of around 500 women a year in europe alone.000 to the victim. Hundreds of them end up in switzerland."And of course also with us in germany.
Responsible for this provocative action is amnesty international switzerland, which published about 250 such offers on ebay last monday. "We have nothing against ebay – the online trading platform par excellence is simply best suited to illustrate to the public how women are traded in a matter-of-fact way," says campaign manager stella jegher. However, ebay was not informed about this action in advance and has meanwhile removed almost all of these alleged offers.
As one can read in the swiss-lupe-blog, allegedly four years ago vietnamese women were actually offered for sale via ebay. This was reported in march 2004: "since the beginning of march, three young vietnamese women with photos have been offered on the online marketplace for a minimum bid of about 4,400 euros," the international society for human rights said in frankfurt on friday. The auction of the women is said to be scheduled for ten days. Then they should be sent by ship to taiwan, where the respective ‘buyer’ could pick them up." however, the report is silent on whether the trafficking also occurred.
The extent of trafficking in women in europe is shown by the figures published by "frauennews"" has published. According to this, about 500.000 women and girls trafficked for sexual exploitation in EU countries. In europe alone, the trafficking gangs make a profit of 7 billion dollars from it. And "trafficking in women is as lucrative as drug trafficking, but much less risky: while drug trafficking carries up to ten years in prison, trafficking in women carries a maximum sentence of two years."
