UN Women's note on sex work, sexual exploitation, and trafficking

Source
UN Women
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Year
2013

In this resource, UN Women respond to the anti-decriminalisation campaign by Equality Now. UN Women reaffirm that sex work is work, and that sex workers need the rights that come with full decriminalisation. They highlight and condemn attempts to conflate sex work with sexual exploitation and trafficking. They note that conflating these very different concepts leads to human rights abuses towards both sex workers and trafficked people.

They particularly highlight:

  • The issues of sex work, sexual exploitation and trafficking are complex issues which have significant legal, social and health consequences. Due to such complexity, it is important that we do not conflate these three issues which deserve to be considered in their own right. We cannot consider sex work the same way we consider trafficking or sexual exploitation which are human rights abuses and crimes.
  • The conflation of consensual sex work and sex trafficking leads to inappropriate responses that fail to assist sex workers and victims of trafficking in realizing their rights. Furthermore, failing to distinguish between these groups infringes on sex workers’ right to health and self- determination and can impede efforts to prevent and prosecute trafficking.
  • Sex workers are right holders like all other women and men and should be recognized as such.

You can download this two page PDF document above. This resource is in English.

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