Newsroom

April 5, 2007

SMU Human Rights Education Program
presents symposium on human trafficking

SMU's Human Rights Education Program will present a symposium on human trafficking Tuesday, April 10, with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nicholas Kristof as the featured speaker.


Nicholas Kristof

Human trafficking is one of the fastest-growing crimes in the world. Poverty and lack of economic opportunity make women and children potential victims of traffickers associated with international criminal organizations.

"Trafficking is a widespread and multi-faceted problem, and it deprives people of their most basic rights," said Dr. Rick Halperin, director of the SMU Human Rights Education Program. "I am certain that this symposium will focus much-needed attention to this very serious problem, and that people will want to get involved in the struggle to end this human rights violation."

While victims are particularly vulnerable to trafficking for the sex trade, human trafficking is not limited to sexual exploitation. It also includes persons who are trafficked into 'forced' marriages or into bonded labor markets, such as sweat shops, agricultural plantations, or domestic service.

Due to the highly clandestine nature of the crime of human trafficking, the great majority of human trafficking cases go unreported and culprits remain at large.

The symposium will include information on the seriousness of the problem in Dallas and elsewhere, as well as efforts to stop this crime.

The symposium is from 1 - 7 p.m. in SMU's Hughes-Trigg Student Center Theater. It is free and open to the public.

Kristof is an author and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who specializes in East Asia. Currently, he is a columnist for The New York Times. Kristof and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn, also a Times journalist, are authors of China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power and Thunder from the East: Portrait of a Rising Asia.

Human Trafficking Symposium
April 10, 2007
Hughes-Trigg Student Center Theater

1 - 3 p.m. Trafficking: Dallas and Modern Slavery

  • Dr. Rick Halperin (moderator), Director of the SMU Human Rights program, Chair of the Board of Amnesty International, USA, President, Texas Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty
  • Given Kachepa, Zambian singer and survivor of human trafficking
  • Sandy Shepherd, Given's American mother.
  • Bill Bernstein, M.S., LPC, Program Director, Services for Victims of Trafficking Program at Mosaic Family Services

3:15 - 4:45 p.m. What Can We Do? Supporting Victims of Trafficking in Our Community

  • Dr. Rick Halperin (moderator)
  • Sarah Saldana, J.D., Assistant U.S. Attorney, Northern District of Texas
  • Manuel Barbona, Ph.D., Executive and Clinical Director, Center for Survivors of Torture
  • Callie Miner, JD, Senior Attorney, Multicultural Legal Services Program, Mosaic Family Services

4:45 - 5:15 p.m. Reception

5:30 - 7 p.m. Keynote Address

  • Nicholas Kristof – Inaugural Address for the SMU Human Rights Education Program.

 

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