The Dutch will press the UN Security Council to expand sanctions against human traffickers as the UN body meets this Wednesday.
In June, the Security Council passed the first-ever sanctions against human traffickers operating in Libya, hitting the financial assets of six men who made fortunes off of buying and selling vulnerable migrants.
Related Campaign: Call on the UN to close Libyan slave markets.
Dutch Foreign Minister Stef Blok says the Netherlands wants to see the sanctions list expanded to other traffickers and other countries.
“The people involved very well realize that they are under scrutiny now, and their business model can’t work the way it used to work …and that they are on our target list,” he said.
Each year, tens of thousands of people pour into Libya — the final transit stop before a short but dangerous sea voyage across the Mediterranean to Europe.
For those involved in the smuggling and trafficking networks, it has been a lucrative business, according to the European Migrant Smuggling Center (EMSC).
In 2015, migrant smuggling networks made at least $5.5 billion trafficking people bound for Europe, according to a 2017 EMSC report. There was a sharp decline in 2016, according to the same report.
Last year, CNN reporters went undercover at a slave market in Libya, capturing footage of Nigerian migrant men being auctioned off for forced labor.
CNN handed over its evidence to the Libyan authorities, who have since launched an investigation into slave markets illegally operating across the country.
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