U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), the author of the nation’s historic Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 and two subsequent expansions of the law, today warned that the US State Department’s annual report on human trafficking reveals a “creeping complacency that must be nipped in the bud since the thugs who traffic in human beings never grow tired of exploiting women and children for profit, they have to be hunted down and prosecuted.”

Smith said, “The annual Trafficking in Persons Report is a tool created by my law to allow us to quantify and assess what countries are doing when it comes to combating the trafficking of women and children.” He went on, “When the facts show a country is failing to fight human trafficking the law requires us to take action, pressure friend and foe alike to protect it’s women and children and throw the traffickers in jail.”

“What jumps off the pages of this report is that there is a growing tendency—a creeping complacency—to park offending countries in the Watch List rather than identify them as egregious Tier 3 offenders in need of immediate and massive reforms.”

“When used appropriately, the Watch List, can send a clear warning and enable negligent countries to make specific reforms within a reasonable period of time. It is not intended to be an anteroom where countries can hide and never take sufficient action to address human trafficking.”

“There are 32 countries on the Watch List, some for the third or fourth year in a row,” Smith said. “This report indicates a failure to realize the real purpose and benefit of the Watch List.”

Smith specifically cited India as an example of an egregious offending country that has been retained on the Tier 2 Watch List for the fourth consecutive year even thought the report lists numerous areas where there has been a “lack of any significant federal action.”

“Whatever India has said or done to idle itself on the Watch List, its overall record is overwhelmed by a trifecta of abuse,” Smith said.

“The report states that India serves as a source, destination and transit country for victims trafficked for the purpose of forced labor and commercial sexual exploitation,” Smith said. “The report concedes that India’s trafficking problem is estimated in the millions, with 90 percent of India’s sex trafficking being internal—many underage girls forced into legal prostitution.”

“Bottom-line,” Smith said, “The TIP reports says India does not fully comply with the minimum standards for elimination of trafficking. It says there is a lack of any significant federal government action to address bonded labor and that efforts to combat child labor are uneven. And the TIP report points out that India failed to take significant measures to prosecute or punish government official involved in trafficking-related corruption.”

“Yet India remains on the Watch List instead of being on Tier 3,” Smith said.

“After six months of vacancy, we now have new Ambassador at the US Trafficking in Persons Office, Ambassador Mark Lagon. I look forward to working with Ambassador Lagon and am confident that like his predecessor, John Miller, he will use the tools provided in the law to most effectively combat trafficking and provide assistance and protection to the victims.”