On a Sunday morning in March 2023, people fishing off the coast of Ankazomborona in northwestern Madagascar discovered two corpses floating in the sea. Soon, alarmed villagers were combing the coast in pirogues for signs of mariners in distress. Rescuers eventually recovered 34 bodies, including three children. The dead were determined to have been passengers on a small boat that ran aground on its way to the French island of Mayotte, about 250 miles from Madagascar. Twenty-three survivors were also rescued but fled, fearful of being arrested for evading immigration laws.
The Damayan Migrant Workers Association Baklas project is an organized effort to rescue Filipina women from labor trafficking and involuntary servitude. The Damayan group consists of about 800 Filipina women. They experienced labor trafficking upon immigrating to the U.S. and they wanted to help themselves and other women like them. The organization was founded in 2002 and has grown since then. The Presbyterian Committee on the Self-Development of People awarded Damayan $85,000 for three years in 2002. In 2003, Damayan (a Filipino word that means “helping each other”) became a grassroots nonprofit organization.
Government leaders from several countries around the world are receiving mail from Presbyterian churches containing prints or paper cut-outs of red hands. It’s part of the Red Hand Campaign — an initiative to encourage countries to stop the practice of turning children into armed soldiers.
Members of the PC(USA)’s Human Trafficking Roundtable (HTR) led Wednesday’s worship service raising awareness around human trafficking, sex trafficking and forced labor.
Last autumn I traveled with mission co-workers and partners in Thailand to visit Hill Tribe persons working to gain such citizenship rights as healthcare and education. The experience showed me just one of the many ways the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is working to address human trafficking. Presbyterians in their own communities have established shelters, resource facilities and computer applications as well.