January has been declared National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month. It’s timely that the seriousness of this issue is being recognized, as it is not only a global crisis but a growing problem here at home.

Thankfully, the mainstream media are picking up on the crisis of human trafficking in the U.S., which FRC highlighted in two events last year. In a gripping new report, Fox News states that “with increasing technology and the Internet, human trafficking has become more accessible and more anonymous.” Even the normally business-focused Forbes Magazine is informing its readers about “How To End Sex Trafficking and Human Slavery.”

As Fox reporter Elizabeth Prann notes, “Experts say, across the globe, millions of people are trafficked each year. Hundreds of thousands of the victims are women and girls. But what surprises many — is the rate it is happening in affluent neighborhoods where minors are being turned into sex slaves.”

According to Rob McKenna, Attorney General of Washington State and current president of the National Association of Attorneys General, “Human trafficking is a $32 billion global industry, the fastest growing and second largest criminal activity in the world, tied with arms and after drug dealing … I urge all Americans to educate themselves about all forms of modern slavery and the signs and consequences of human trafficking. Together, we will combat this crime within our borders and join with our partners around the world to end it.”

The problem is grave and the harm it inflicts so painful it is difficult to describe. However, there is good news – the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability lists 31 Evangelical ministries that seek to help girls and women enmeshed in the sex trade, and Catholic Charities has launched a major project to restore the victims of this horrible practice to well-being. You can link to both sites by visiting FRC’s RealCompassion.org web site.

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The State Department annually releases a “report card” evaluating countries’ work and progress on combating the heinous crime of trafficking of human person for either labor or sex slavery. In 2010, the United States was included in the ranking and evaluation for the first time, scoring in the highest tier, although its narrative showed much room for improvement in this area where all can agree that one exploited person is one too many.

On that note, in late November Shared Hope, a non-profit organization dedicated to the eradication of sex trafficking through education and public awareness, released a domestic version of the report, “The Protected Innocence Initiative,” grading individual states on their efforts to combat child sex trafficking.

In their words, “The Protected Innocence Initiative is a comprehensive strategy to promote zero tolerance for child sex trafficking. In partnership with the American Center for Law &Justice, Shared Hope International conducted a comprehensive analysis of each state’s existing laws. The Protected Innocence Legislative Framework solely evaluates a state’s existing laws and does not evaluate enforcement or implementation.

The methodology was vetted by experts in the anti-trafficking field including Ambassador Mark Lagon (U.S. Department of State, Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons 2007-2009) and directors from the following organizations: the National District Attorneys Association; American Bar Association Center on Children and the Law; the Protection Project at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies; ECPAT-USA; Children at Risk, Houston, Texas; and A Future Not a Past, Atlanta, Georgia.”

Criteria used to evaluate states’ grades included criminal provisions addressing traffickers, demand and facilitators, protections for child victims, and criminal justice tools for investigation and prosecution, among others.
According to the report, the worst ranking states in the U.S. include Virginia, Michigan, Maryland, and Colorado, to name just a few. Some of the best states were Missouri, Washington and Texas.

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The unlamented death of “Supreme Leader” Kim Jong-Il, the brutal thug who ran an entire nation like a Stalinist mind-experiment, has ushered his son, Kim Jong-Eun, to the helm of the North Korean regime. Calling it a “government” seems too flattering, as governance implies order, justice, and some kind of representation; none of these are characteristic of North Korea.

According to the anti-persecution ministry, Open Doors,

“Of the reported 200,000 North Koreans in prison camps, Open Doors estimates 50,000 to 70,000 are Christians. Both Open Doors and the U.S. State Department report religious adherents are generally treated worse than other prisoners. Extreme forms of torture and execution, as well as forced abortion and infanticide, have been reported in the camps, according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.”

North Korea likes to downplay its record of abuse, and even minimize the number of Christians living there (claiming fewer than 13,000 total). Yet a survey released yesterday by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life argues that of roughly 24 million people living in North Korea, there are more than 490,000 self-identified Christians in “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea” (that’s Orwell-speak for the dictatorial rule in the North).

From a human standpoint, the outlook in North Korea is not good. According to Christianity Today,

“When Jong-Eun was named Jong-Il’s successor last year, Sam Kim, executive director of the Korean Church Coalition for North Korea Freedom, told CT that Christians in North Korea would likely not see a decrease in persecution. ‘Kim Jong-Eun has not earned the true respect from North Korea’s communist party leaders to effectively govern North Korea. As such, he will be nothing more than a figurehead and his uncle, Chan Sung Taek, will be the person who is really in control,’ Kim said. ‘Unfortunately, Chan Sung Taek is just as ruthless as Kim Jong-Il. As such, Christians can expect to face the same level of persecution’.”

Now is the time for Christians to pray for North Korea: That God would protect and provide for the tens of thousands of believers in the nation’s massive political-prison system; that the new leader, his uncle, and their associates will humble themselves before the Judge of all the earth and transition their country from being a global focal point of oppression into an exemplar of religious and political liberty; and that Christian ministries within North Korea can continue their work and even expand it.

In October, FRC hosted a panel of several distinguished experts in the field of international religious liberty. The event can be viewed here.

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Yesterday here at FRC headquarters, a sobering panel of religious freedom & foreign policy experts looked at the past, current, and potential impact of U.S. foreign policy upon religious freedom around the world.

Watch the panel below, or visit the event page for audio and embed code.

Participants included:

• Elyse Anderson, Foreign Policy Director for Congressman Frank Wolf (R-Va.)
• Ann Buwalda, Executive Director, Jubilee Campaign
• Dr. Thomas Farr, first Director of the State Department’s office of international religious freedom and Director of the Religious Freedom Project at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs and Visiting Associate Professor of Religion and International Affairs at Georgetown’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service
• Emmanuel Ogebe, Nigerian attorney and human rights leader
• Tina Ramirez, Director of International and Government Relations, The Becket Fund

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Last week Margaret Ogola’s life on Earth came to an end, at the very young age of 53.  Here was a woman who understood the gift of time, for she filled the hours allotted to her in radical solidarity with those God entrusted to her care, and in service of advancing the cause of human life and dignity.

Dr. Ogola was a medical doctor, an award-winning novelist, a university professor, a human rights advocate, and a mother of six children.  She ran a hospice for AIDS orphans.  She directed the Institute of Healthcare Management at Strathmore University in Nairobi.  She was an advisor to the Catholic Bishops of Kenya.  She was a powerhouse, yet was described as a person filled with peace.  (For a comprehensive obituary see the Strathmore University web site.)

Margaret Ogola was well known in her country as an award-winning novelist.  Her first novel, The River and the Source, won every African literary award around.  Her subsequent works also received acclaim.

Dr. Ogola was well also known to many Americans active on the world pro-life stage.  Family Research Council’s own Pat Fagan and my husband Austin Ruse knew her from their work with her on the biennial World Congress of Families where I am told she kept huge audiences rapt with her soft voice and powerful message.  In a speech she made at the 4th Women International Conference in Beijing (China) in 1995, she argued that, unless we recognize that each individual is valuable by virtue of simply being conceived human, we cannot begin to talk about human rights.

May God give comfort to her husband and children and may He rest her soul in eternal peace.

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- On Tuesday, September 20, the National Catholic Partnership on Disability will host a webinar, “Threats to Life from Physician-Assisted Suicide”. Registration is free at www.ncpd.org. For more information, contact Peg Kolm: mkolm@adw.org or 301-853-4560.

- In Altum Productions, the talented Allot brother film-making team is hosting a benefit on Friday, October 7, 2011 from 6- 8 pm, in Alexandria, Virginia for an upcoming documentary on prenatal disability diagnosis, “Flashes of Color”. A shocking 90% of babies in the womb who are diagnosed with a serious disability are aborted. Flashes of Color, seeks to highlight the profound contributions of people with disabilities at a time when a “culture of perfection” is fueling a deep and deadly bias against them. For more information contact In Altum Productions.

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In 2005, Chen Guangcheng — a blind masseur and self-taught attorney — began to draw attention to the brutal Chinese “One Child” policy in the city of Linyi. Linyi, with a population of more than 10 million, is located in west-central China. After filing a class action lawsuit against Linyi officials complicit in the forced abortions and sterlizations of thousands of area residents, Chen was arrested by the Chinese authorities. In and out of prison since then, he is now in declining health.

Today, the respected Christian ministry ChinaAid sent out the following:

ChinaAid announced today that it is partnering with Women’s Rights Without Frontiers to spearhead a campaign to free blind activist Chen Guangcheng, whose health is in serious jeopardy because of repeated beatings and malnutrition he suffers in house detention. Women’s Rights Without Frontiers has released a new video demanding freedom for Chen and his family. This video was created by the China Aid Visual Studio.

Pray for Chen and contact Chinese officials to demand his release and that he and his family be provided with food and medical care. Contact the Chinese Embassy in Washington at chinaembpress_us@mfa.gov.cn or call Embassy officials at (202) 495-2266.

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FRC’s friends at the Jubilee Campaign (http://jubileecampaign.wordpress.com/), which works actively against religious persecution and other evils, have sent out an urgent note about the distinguished Chinese human rights attorney Chen Guangcheng. Chen has worked against the Chinese government’s notorious “one child” and forced sterilization policies. To read more and obtain a sample letter calling for the end of the brutalization of Chen and his family, click here http://jubileecampaign.wordpress.com/2011/07/05/execution-by-any-other-name-the-plight-of-chen-guangcheng/ and send your letter to the Chinese Embassy at: chinaembpress_us@mfa.gov.cn

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Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore are trying to raise awareness about child trafficking and prostitution in the United States and have created a technology task force to create solutions to end human trafficking online. Their blunt slogan is, “Real Men Don’t Buy Girls,” and they’re recruiting celebrities to make this pledge and spread the word. Here’s a video from their launch.

Good for them; they could be spending all of their free time (and money) redecorating their homes.

The sleezy yet still influential Village Voice mocked Kutcher saying he wildly inflated the number of girls who are sex trafficked in the United States. That number is notoriously hard to get, but Kutcher and his program are working with NCMEC, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, a source to be trusted. Not only did the Voice play down the problem – suggesting, ludicrously, that the number of actual arrests gives some scope of the problem — but Kutcher is right to point to the Voice as potentially part of the problem. Turn to their back pages and see dozens of ads for prostitutes. (They call people like us who support laws against prostitution “prohibitionists.”)
Good for Kutcher. He slammed the Voice with a tirade of late night Tweets. A sampling:

Hey @villagevoice hows the lawsuit from the 15 year old victim who alleges you helped enslave them going?
Hey @villagevoice speaking of data, maybe you can help me… How much $ did your “escorts” in you classifieds on backpage make last year?
Hey @villagevoice speaking of Data… How many of your girls selling themselves in your classifieds are you doing age verification on?
Hey @villagevoice Find another way to justify that YOUR property facilitates the sale of HUMAN BEINGS
Hey @villagevoice if you want to dispute the online data I’ve collected about the consumption of child porn or the hard facts from NCMEC lmk
Hey @villagevoice REAL MEN DON’T BUY GIRLS and REAL NEWS PUBLICATIONS DON’T SELL THEM

Read more on the Kutcher-Village Voice face-off here.

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According to the respected anti-persecution ministry Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), an Iranian Christian pastor has been sentenced to death in Iran for, to put it simply, being a Christian.

CSW says that “the death sentence handed down in 2010 for the crime of apostasy, to evangelical house pastor Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani, has reportedly been upheld by the third chamber of the Supreme Court in the Shia holy city of Qom. Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani of the Church of Iran denomination was arrested in his home city of Rasht on 13 October 2009 while attempting to register his church. His arrest is believed to have been due to his questioning of the Muslim monopoly on the religious instruction of children in Iran.”

According to the Voice of Martyrs, “With (Pastor Nadarkhani’s) sentence now upheld and confirmed, it is possible that the authorities will ask him to recant his faith and execute him without advance notice if he refuses — a typical pattern of action taken by authorities in such cases.”

This death sentence has been issued despite Iran being a signatory of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, whose Article 18 states:

“Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. This right shall include freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching.”

Sadly, persecution of Christians in Iran is extensive:

“A major spike in the harassment and arrest of Iranian Christians in recent months is revealing just how nervous the Islamic republic is about the prodigious success of house churches, say Iranian Christian leaders. At least 202 Christians in 24 cities faced ‘arbitrary’ arrest between June 2010 and January 2011, according to Elam Ministries. Elam, run by Iranian expatriates, counted 80 arrests over 2008 and 2009 combined.”

You can express your concern for Pastor Nadarkhani and ask for his release by calling the Iranian Interest Section at the Embassy of Pakistan in Washington, DC at (202) 965-4990.  You can also contact the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran at the United Nations: Email – iran@un.int; Phone – (212) 687-2020.

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For all his bravado, in the end Jack Kevorkian was a coward. Dr. Death promoted killing as virtue and convinced far too many people to rally around his evil creed. But, in the end, what he advocated for he ran away from personally. Notwithstanding all of his medical suffering, rather than pull out his suicide machine, the evil doctor instead reserved for himself a natural death. While his followers may still be lost, Kevorkian himself now knows the truth.

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Earlier this month, a coalition of Christian leaders in China drafted and sent a petition to the Chinese government calling for the religious liberty the Chinese Constitution claims to provide. “For the last six decades, the rights to liberty of religious faith granted to our country’s Christians by the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China have not been put into practice,” wrote the 19 brave original signatories of the document.

The petition was generated by the growing crackdown on “unofficial” churches in China. As noted in this blog space in April, the Easter crackdown on the Shouwang Church in Beijing is part of a larger, nationwide campaign in which “unofficial” churches — those that meet independent of government sanction — are being targeted for repression, and their leaders for arrest.

Up to 70 million believers are part of the “unofficial” Christian movement in China. According to China scholar Dr. William Jeynes in a lecture last week at FRC, the Chinese government is pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into the construction of officially-recognized churches and seminaries, but the “unofficial” churches remain targets of the central Communist government. Why? Because, notes Jeynes, the government recognizes that Christianity leads to morality and productivity, but is also grounded in the idea that government’s authority is not final. This makes the Communist leaders in Beijing “nervous,” says Jeynes.

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Lila Rose, President, Live Action and Tony Perkins, President of the Family Research Council talk about Live Action’s undercover videos of Planned Parenthood. To watch the entire webcast, click here.

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How you can protect your children from the dangers of child pornography and sex trafficking. Watch Bob Flores, former Administrator of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJD), and Tony Perkins, President of the Family Research Council to learn more. You can view the rest of the webcast by clicking here.

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In an address to the U.N. General Assembly President Bush said:

“Each year, an estimated 800,000 to 900,000 human beings are bought, sold or forced across the world’s borders. Among them are hundreds of thousands of teenage girls, and others as young as five, who fall victim to the sex trade.  This commerce in human life generates billions of dollars each year — much of which is used to finance organized crime.  There’s a special evil in the abuse and exploitation of the most innocent and vulnerable. The victims of sex trade see little of life before they see the very worst of life, an underground of brutality and lonely fear. Those who create these victims and profit from their suffering must be severely punished. Those who patronize this industry debase themselves and deepen the misery of others.  And governments that tolerate this trade are tolerating a form of slavery.”

This tragic form of slavery is not just a problem “over there,” in third world countries far removed from us.  On the contrary, it is happening right in our own backyard.  Despite laws criminalizing it, sex trafficking is a huge problem in America.

In The National Report on Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking: America’s Prostituted Children, Shared Hope International affirms that at least 100,000 American children a year are victims of sex trafficking, and that number may be much higher.  The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) highlights the fact that sex trafficking of children is largely under-reported in their estimate that 1 in 5 girls are sexually abused or assaulted before they become adults and 1 in 10 boys, however less than 35% of those cases are reported.  Researchers estimate that 10–15 percent of children living on the streets in the United States are trafficked for sexual purposes according to the National Institute of Justice in their report Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children: What Do We Know and What Do We Do About It?.

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How can we stop sex trafficking where it starts? Pat Trueman, CEO of Morality in Media and Founder of PornHarms.com, joins Tony Perkins, President of FRC, to talk about what leads to Sex Trafficking, and how we can take steps to confront the problem at its origin.

You can view the entire webcast by clicking here.

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A special live video webcast hosted by Family Research Council brought together leading experts to shed light on a growing problem that affects every corner of our nation — from neighborhoods, playgrounds, and malls to the local Planned Parenthood clinic. During the webcast, learn what actions you can take to help restore these victims, and stop those who prey on them.

Webcast participants:

• Tony Perkins, President, Family Research Council
• J. Robert (Bob) Flores, former Administrator of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJD)
• Lila Rose, President, Live Action
• Pat Trueman, CEO, Morality in Media and Founder, PornHarms.com
• Samantha Vardeman, Senior Director, Shared Hope International
• Tina Frundt, Founder and Executive Director, Courtney’s House
• Lisa Thompson, Liaison for the Abolition of Sexual Trafficking at The Salvation Army

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On Valentines Day 2011 pro life advocates united across the country to pray for victims of sex trafficking. The vigil was organized as a response to the recent release of videos connecting two very dark industries: abortion and sex trafficking.

From Washington DC to Orange County, CA, people took time from work to ask God to bring hope and healing and light into the lives of the victims of this most heinous crime.

Abortion and sex-trafficking are sinister and they rob people of their inherent dignity. But God is about truth, life, light, beauty, freedom and recognizing the dignity of the human person. He is all powerful and He hears our prayers, especially where groups are united. Lets join together to continue to pray that God will bring light and healing into even these darkest of situations.

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Joan Hinton was not a household name, but her work on the Manhattan project was historic. After earning her Ph.D. in physics in only two years, she was hand-picked to become a researcher on one of America’s most stunning technological achievements – the development and production of an atomic bomb.

Then she had an attack of conscience. In her obituary in today’s New York Times, she is quoted as telling National Public Radio, “I did not want to spend my life figuring out how to kill people … I wanted to figure out how to let people have a better life, not a worse life.”

So, she became a philanthropist who devoted her life to finding the cure to diseases. Well, not quite: Dr. Hinton moved to China and became a devoted Maoist Communist. I’m not making this up.

According to the Times, “For the past 40 years, she worked on a dairy farm and an agricultural station outside Beijing, tending a herd of about 200 cows.”

Did she regret her choice? Not in the least. The Times goes on to quote an interview she gave in 2008 to The Weekend Australian: “It would have been terrific if Mao had lived … Of course I was 100 percent behind everything that happened in the Cultural Revolution — it was a terrific experience.”

Just how “terrific?” Minimally one million people died during the Cultural Revolution due to persecution by the infamous Red Guards. Religious persecution was intense, and the families of “running dogs” (Chinese whose devotion to Communism was deemed insufficient) were brutalized; there are even reports of the cannibalism of young children by some Red Guards.

In total, roughly 30 million Chinese (possibly as many as 70 million) died under Mao’s reign from enforced starvation or outright murder.

Through it all, American born Dr. Hinton remained a devotee of Chairman Mao. In an interview with NBC News in 2004, journalist Catherine Rampell wrote that “Hinton gushes fervent praise for the Cultural Revolution, Mao’s mass mobilization of Chinese youth to criticize party officials, intellectuals and bourgeois values, from 1966 to 1976.” Dr. Hinton even used archaic and ludicrous Maoist language to denounce the “renegades” and “capitalist roaders” – code terms for freedom-lovers who would not fully bend the knee to Beijing’s dictators.

Dr. Hinton now faces the Judge of all the earth, not the beatific images of Mao Zedong with which she festooned her apartment. How sad. How very sad.

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