"The trafficking of human beings is a crime against humanity and must be stopped." - Pope Francis
The UN crime-fighting office announced that approximately, about 2.4 million people across the globe are victims of human trafficking at any one time, and 80 percent of them are being exploited as sexual slaves. He said that $32 billion is being earned every year by unscrupulous criminals running human trafficking networks, and two out of every three victims are women. According to Fedotov's Vienna-based office, only one out of 100 victims of trafficking is ever rescued. Michelle Bachelet, who heads the new U.N. agency promoting women's rights and gender equality called 'UN Women', said "it's difficult to think of a crime more hideous and shocking than human trafficking. Yet, it is one of the fastest growing and lucrative crimes." Adapted from “U.N.: 2.4 Million Human Trafficking Victims,” Associated Press, 3 April 2012. According to UNICEF, a child victim of trafficking is "any person under 18 who is recruited, transported, transferred, harbored or received for the purpose of exploitation, either within or outside a country". The latest figures estimate that 1.2 million children are trafficked worldwide every year. Child prostitution has the highest supply of trafficked children.