Pakistan's rank remains unchanged in US State Department's annual TIP report

• Pakistan retains position in Tier 2 for third consecutive time.
• Govt demonstrated "overall greater effort" than before, report says.
• 4.5 million workers stuck with "forced labour" across country.
  

WASHINGTON: Pakistan retained its position in the second tier in the United States State Department's annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report released Monday.

This is the third consecutive time Pakistan has been ranked in the second tier by the report since 2022.

The department's report is divided into three tiers.

Tier 1 implies that a country is complicit in the US Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) and is making efforts to combat trafficking.

Meanwhile, Tier 2 features countries that aren't fully in compliance with the TVPA but are making "significant efforts" towards it.

Countries on the Tier 3 list may be subjected to US sanctions or restrictions on assistance, such as non-humanitarian related support, if authorised by the US president.

Pakistan shares the rank with its neighbour India on the list as the report has found both countries to "not meet the minimum standards for ending human trafficking".

However, the report highlighted that the governments of both countries are working diligently to meet these standards, hence their rank in the list.

Additionally, the report noted that Pakistan's government has demonstrated "an overall greater effort than the previous report" with increased prosecutions and punishments for human traffickers.

Furthermore, the report said that human traffickers "exploit domestic, foreign nationals in Pakistan and India".

It highlighted "forced labour" as both countries' "biggest human trafficking problem" with 4.5 million workers being stuck with it across Pakistan.

Human traffickers employ forced labour in kilns, agriculture, coal, carpet industries, the report said.