Human trafficking is modern slave trade

STEVEN KING’S article (July 5) criticising what he terms the ‘crusade’ against human trafficking is undermined by the simple fact that he does not understand what the term means.

The people he refers to, someone who willingly enters Ireland, legally or illegally, to work in the sex industry are not victims of trafficking. Nor do organisations working on this issue describe them as such.

Human trafficking is defined in international law and in domestic Irish law as the forcible transfer of people, including children, against their will for the purposes of labour or sexual exploitation. Since this appalling trade in human beings thrives in the underground, victims are vulnerable to extreme violence by traffickers, pimps and clients.