ROME – For months, humanitarian aid workers and Europe’s leaders have been wringing their hands about how to stop the human traffickers who are responsible for the deluge of migrants and refugees making the dangerous crossing from Libyan ports to European shores.  There has been talk of everything from destroying smugglers ships to infiltrating the traffickers’ networks, but apparently a more basic plan was also in the works.

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In a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, cited allegations from whistleblowers, and a report from the State Department’s own Office of Inspector General this month that said the department is not in a position to completely hold its own employees accountable for human trafficking violations, or to ensure policies are understood and followed.

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Authorities in May said they discovered 139 suspected graves in abandoned jungle camps in northern Perlis state, a remote area bordering Thailand that trafficking syndicates used as a transit point.

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This spring, investigators discovered mass graves of human trafficking victims in Malaysia. How did the US State Department respond? By upgrading its assessment of Malaysia’s human rights efforts. According to Reuters, trafficking experts in the department had given the country a poor rating, but political appointees overruled them.

There’s only one reason why the State Department would change Malaysia’s status: to ease the country’s inclusion in the Trans Pacific Partnership, or TPP — a massive 12-country trade and investment pact currently being negotiated by the Obama administration.

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KUALA LUMPUR: Mass graves believed to contain bodies of hundreds of migrants from Myanmar and Bangladesh have been found in Malaysia, media reported said on Sunday.

Police discovered 30 large graves containing the remains of hundreds of people in two places in the northern state of Perlis, which borders Thailand, the Utusan Malaysia newspaper reported.

Hien was 10 when he arrived in Britain. He did not know where he was or where he had been. He knew only that he was here to work. Since he emerged from the back of a lorry after crossing from Calais seven years ago, his experience has been one of exploitation and misery. He has been a domestic slave, been trafficked into cannabis factories, been abused and beaten and was eventually prosecuted and sent to prison. It has been a life of terror, isolation and pain.

Hien’s story is not unique. He is one of an estimated 3,000 Vietnamese children in forced labour in the UK, used for financial gain by criminal gangs running cannabis factories, nail bars, garment factories, brothels and private homes. Charged up to £25,000 for their passage to the UK, these children collectively owe their traffickers almost £75m.

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Malaysia detained more than a thousand Bangladeshi and Rohingya refugees, including dozens of children, police said, a day after authorities rescued hundreds stranded off the coast of Indonesia’s western tip.

There has been a huge increase in refugees from impoverished Bangladesh and Myanmar drifting on boats to Malaysia and Indonesia in recent days after Thailand, usually the initial destination in the region’s people smuggling network, announced a crackdown on the trafficking.

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