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Editor's note: CNN's Freedom Project highlights the horrors of modern-day slavery, amplifying the voices of the victims, highlighting success stories and helping expose the web of criminal enterprises trading in human life.

By Katia Hetter, Special to CNN updated 10:24 AM EST, Thu March 1, 2012
(CNN) -- Kimberly Ritter could not believe what she was seeing.

Girls wearing almost nothing at all, suggesting all sorts of sexual acts, listed on page after page of Backpage.com's escorts section. When she looked closer at the photos, she noticed something eerie.

She could recognize the rooms.

Ritter is a meeting planner at Nix Conference and Meeting Management of St. Louis. She and her co-workers work with 500 hotels around the world and visit about 50 properties annually. She can identify many hotel chains used in escort ads by their comforters, bathroom sinks, air conditioning units and door locks. Sometimes, she can also identify a specific property.

Meet Kimberly Ritter, sex trafficking sleuth.

A child protection code of conduct

Ritter has become a force in the international anti-trafficking movement, where she uses her expertise to identify the mainstream middle-end and high-end hotels used by traffickers.

She negotiates with hotels to fight trafficking at their properties, while also trying to convince hotel general managers that it's good business to fight trafficking through signing the Tourism Child-Protection Code of Conduct, a voluntary set of principles that businesses can adopt to fight trafficking. Her firm has created a version of the code for meeting planners and was the first signatory a few weeks ago.

Ritter hopes to recruit other planners to sign on to the code.

Once Ritter and her co-workers realized they could have an impact, "we thought this should be something all meeting planners could do," she said.

Although anti-trafficking organizations can't be sure how many people are forced into commercial sex work, the United Nations Global Initiative to Fight Human Trafficking estimates that human trafficking is a $32 billion business worldwide, with $15.5 billion coming from industrialized countries. (That includes forced sexual and nonsexual commercial labor of adults and children.)

An estimated 100,000 to 300,000 children are at risk of commercial sex exploitation in the United States, according to End Child Prostitution and Trafficking (ECPAT), which created the tourism code. The National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline (            888-373-7888      ) has recorded 46,000 phone calls over the past four years requesting information, reporting tips about trafficking and connecting about 3,600 victims of sex trafficking to social services. (The hotline takes calls about sex or labor trafficking.)

Trafficking isn't simply sex for sale

Sex trafficking isn't prostitution, which is engaging in sex with someone for payment. The crime of sex trafficking has three parties: one person holding the victim, while using "force, fraud or coercion" to make the victim engage in sex acts for payment, and the third party paying for the sex, said Brad Myles, executive director of the Polaris Project, which operates the hotline with funding from the U.S. government. If the victim is a child, no force, fraud or coercion is required for the sex to be a crime.

Escort ads posted online don't obviously state that sex with children is being sold, Ritter said, but customers who want children know to look for words like "fresh," "candy" and "new to the game." The underage victims are often runaways and victims of sexual abuse who are vulnerable to pimps promising modeling jobs, money, food and drugs.

After a pimp and customer make a deal, usually online or over the phone, hotels are an obvious place where the sex can take place. "There's privacy, a neutral place for a customer to come to, certain amount of anonymity and you don't have to stay long term," said Noelle Collins, an assistant U.S. attorney and human trafficking coordinator for the Eastern District of Missouri, who prosecutes these cases. "This can happen anywhere, but hotels are logical places where it could be found."

Sex trafficking wasn't on Ritter's mind when she met with the U.S. Federation of the Sisters of St. Joseph to book the federation's 2011 conference. That year, the nuns decided to take a stand on the issue. "We've always done some type of social action [at our conference]," said Sister Patty Johnson, executive director of the federation, which encompasses the 16 congregations of Sisters of St. Joseph in the United States. "We like to leave the city [we visit] a tiny bit better than when we came."

The nuns told Nix they wanted their hotel to sign the tourism code of conduct developed by ECPAT, a worldwide network of organizations and individuals that fights commercial sex exploitation of children. Hilton Worldwide, Wyndham Worldwide, Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group (which includes the Radisson brand) and Delta Air Lines are all signatories to the code. After Ritter's initial online research turned up hotels she recognized, she agreed to raise the issue with their potential venues.

Hotels can train to fight trafficking

Many hotel executives have security measures designed to fight trafficking but express concern about being publicly identified with the issue. An exception is Millennium Hotel St. Louis general manager Dominic Smart. After learning about the problem, Smart got his parent company's permission to become a pilot program. Often, hotel executives don't want customers to think their hotels have a prostitution or sex trafficking problem. (The code requires annual reporting.) Smart, who said he hasn't had a case yet, didn't worry about it.


"We felt it was our responsibility to get involved and fight human trafficking," said Smart, whose hotel signed onto ECPAT, went through training for managers and line staff, and hosted the nuns' conference.

Training of hotel staff is key, said Michelle Guelbart, project coordinator for ECPAT-USA. Hotel managers may never spot the signs of sex trafficking, but housekeeping and room service employees often know something isn't right. They're just not sure what. "Hotel rooms are used as venues for exploitation," Guelbart said. "A pimp might hold up one or two girls in a room and might run traffic out of a room. They'll post ads on a website and send a girl to the room next door."

Red flags to watch for: Someone besides the guest rents a room, checks in without luggage and leaves the hotel. The child left in the room may seem confused about his or her own name; may appear helpless, ashamed, nervous or disoriented; may show signs of abuse such as bruising in various stages of healing; or may have tattoos that reflect money or ownership.

The child usually doesn't have any spending money or identification; cannot make eye contact; and wears clothes printed with slogans such as "Daddy's Girl" or inappropriate clothes for the weather. Sometimes, the child will come on to various men during the check-in process.

"We've trained them on the red flags, what to look for," Smart said. "If they see them, they report it to their manager and we would take over from there. The manager can assess and go to the police if need be."


Guests can report signs of trafficking

Hotel guests can also keep their eyes open for those red flags, said social worker Theresa Flores, an Ohio-based survivor of underage sex trafficking and an anti-trafficking activist. Guests who see the red flags can simply call the national hotline to report their suspicions, without ever leaving their names. Flores often travels to cities with big sports events and political conventions to educate hotel and motel owners, donating thousands of bars of soap listing the hotline for victims and witnesses to trafficking.

Most of the country's state attorneys general and many anti-trafficking activists blame Backpage.com and other websites for not doing enough to fight sex trafficking. Backpage's lawyer says the company takes many steps to fight the problem.

"Any adult ads that are posted are monitored in real time, 24/7," wrote Steve Suskin, legal counsel for Village Voice Media, which owns Backpage, in an e-mailed statement to CNN.com. "All nudity is banned, even for adult ads, and anyone who attempts to post an ad that's suggestive of an underage or exploited minor is immediately reported to NCMEC [the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children], which is designated by the FBI to alert local law enforcement to rescue any child at risk in a hotel or other location."

Unlike other websites, Backpage doesn't allow Web posters to post anonymously, Suskin wrote.

"Backpage charges $1.00 to post in personals, because it holds users accountable and provides credit card information to police so they can identify, locate, arrest and prosecute those who use common carriers to prey on children," he wrote. "We continue to invest millions of dollars in human, technological, and other resources to detect and report suspected child predators and to help law enforcement apprehend and prosecute them."

With so much of the sex trafficking business migrating to the Internet, the crime still has to take place somewhere. "Hotels can really be part of the solution," said Myles, the Polaris Project executive director. "These are crimes, these are ways that women are being mistreated, and these are forms of violence against women. A lot of hotels don't want to be associated with it."

By David Ariosto, CNN (1/31/12)

The Hershey company, one of the United States' leading chocolate producers, says it's pledged $10 million over the next five years to educate West African cocoa farmers on improving their trade and combating child labor.

The region is home to about 70% percent of the world's cocoa but has also been the source of recent scrutiny over its alleged use of child labor.

Hershey's announcement Monday heartened activists, who say the company is finally focusing efforts on improving the root cause of the issue.

"It's a start," said Judy Gearhart, executive director of the International Labor Rights Forum. "We see this as a welcome first step toward accountability."

The company said in a press release that chocolate consumers will later this year be able to purchase a new version of Hershey's Bliss brand, which will be 100% made from Rainforest Alliance-certified farms mostly in Ivory Coast and Ghana.

Gearhart's organization, which had planned to run a Super Bowl advertisement denouncing Hershey for its alleged use of child labor, has since decided to pull the commercial because of Monday's announcement.

"We feel (Hershey's) joining with Rainforest Alliance sends the right message, but its just the start," said Gearhart.

Rainforest Alliance, a New York-based conservation group with whom Hershey has partnered, says it employs monitors in West Africa to conduct random audits of cocoa farms to ensure they are pursuing sustainable practices without the use of child labor.

Following such audits, the organization issues certificates to farmers or group certificates to collections of small farmers, using "several dozen auditors" for tens of thousands of farms across the region, according to Alex Morgan, a Rainforest Alliance senior manager.

Currently, between 1% and 2% of Hershey products are certified, said Andy McCormick, the company's vice president of public affairs.

"Hershey is extending our commitment with new programs to drive long-term change in cocoa villages where families will benefit from our investments in education, health and economic opportunities," said J.P. Bilbrey, Hershey President and CEO in a statement.

The move follows a recent CNN documentary entitled "Chocolate's Child Slaves," that explored a human trafficking network and farmers using child labor in Ivory Coast.

-CNN's David McKenzie contributed to this report.

By Moni Basu, CNN February 11, 2012 -- Updated 1451 GMT (2251 HKT)

(CNN) -- In a New Delhi hospital, a two-year-old girl is fighting for her life after a teenager brought her there three weeks ago, unconscious with severe head injuries and bruises, fractured arms and human bite marks covering her tiny body.

All of India began following her ordeal through newspapers and television. Doctors operated on the toddler, opened up her airways and placed her on a ventilator. They named her Falak, which means sky.

Her condition remains critical, said Dr. Sumit Sinha of the India Institute of Medical Sciences. No one knows whether she will survive or if she does, whether she will live with permanent brain damage.

But that's just the tip of the story. With each day, it becomes more sordid.

Once police began investigating Baby Falak's back story, they unearthed a suspected ring of human trafficking. The details sparked new outrage among authorities and the public alike, who say the case raises a host of questions about child abandonment, exploitation and the poor treatment of girls and women in the world's second most populous nation.

"This has turned out to be one of the biggest sex rackets involving minors and child prostitution and sale of women for marriage," said Raaj Mangal Prasad, head of India's Child Welfare Committee. "This shows this is a classic case where the magnitude of trafficking has come to light."

Indians came to know of Baby Falak after a distraught teenage girl, only 14, brought the baby to the hospital, claiming to be her mother.

On the night of January 17, the baby just kept crying and crying, the teenager told the Child Welfare Committee in New Delhi. Angered by the tantrum, the girl slapped the baby three or four times -- and bit her.

A while later, she said, the baby slipped on a wet bathroom floor and fell on her face. The girl tied a bandage around the baby's head but the wound began to swell. The next day, when the baby did not wake up, the girl took her to the hospital.

The doctors said Baby Falak was bruised the color of eggplant and beets. She was in a coma. They did not believe the girl's story. Nor that she was Falak's biological mother.

"My personal opinion would be that it doesn't look like a simple case of falling down," said Dr. Deepak Agarwal, a neurosurgeon at the hospital.

She was referred to a juvenile center for counseling and police launched an investigation.

South Delhi deputy Police Commissioner Chhaya Sharma formed five teams to fan out across India to track down Falak's real family.

What police learned in the subsequent weeks was shocking.

The teenage girl ran away from home last June to escape abuse from her alcoholic father. The father failed to pay rent, his landlady told CNN's sister network CNN-IBN. A neighbor described him beating his daughter so hard that her red welts were readily visible.

"I have seen with my own eyes how her father used to beat her up with a stick," Vikram told CNN-IBN.

But her escape led the teenager to more trouble.

She told authorities two people, Sandeep and Arti, forced her into a life of prostitution; that Sandeep allegedly raped her first for three days before he found her customers, according CNN-IBN. Months later, the girl met a man named Rajkumar and the two began living together in a New Delhi slum. Police suspect he, too, was sexually abusing the girl.

The girl told authorities that Rajkumar brought Baby Falak home in November. It's unclear whether the baby was abused then but on that January night, Falak almost died.

"Once victim hurting another victim because there is no sense of hope, sense of survival they can see for themselves," psychiatrist Achal Bhagat told CNN-IBN.

In the western state of Rajasthan, police eventually tracked down Munni, 22, the woman believed to be Falak's biological mother. She had been abandoned by her first husband and sold off in marriage when she was 16 to a young man from a Rajasthani village, Sharma said. She was valued at $6,000, according to The Times of India.

Munni left her three children behind.

"The family life was very disturbed," Sharma said. "She was convinced that she would not be able to raise Falak on her own."

While Munni's youngest fought for her life in the hospital, police found her other daughter in the state of Bihar, many miles from Delhi and Rajasthan. Her son's whereabouts are still not known.

Police scored a breakthrough in the case Friday when they were able to nab Rajkumar, the man they believe is central to the possible trafficking ring. He was caught absconding at the New Delhi train station, Sharma said at a news conference.

In all, police have arrested 10 people so far who are believed to have profited greatly from their crimes.

They are still probing. No one knows how many babies were abandoned, how many women were married off for a price or how many girls were forced to sell their bodies.

The case prompted India's home ministry to review police reports and consider action and reignited national debate on a serious problem in India.

A 2011 TrustLaw danger poll ranked India as the fourth most dangerous place on earth for women, behind Afghanistan, Democratic Republic of Congo and neighboring Pakistan.

The survey said 100 million women and girls are involved in prostitution and 50 million are "missing" in the last century because of female feticide and infanticide. Almost 45% of girls are married off before they reach adulthood.

Prasad of the Child Welfare Committee called the problem "huge." He said India needs more comprehensive laws on the books and stronger enforcement.

This sort of thing happens all too often, Prasad said, and sadly, flies under the radar of a majority of India's 1.2 billion people.

But now, a hapless child fighting very publicly for her life has thrust an ugly side of Indian society into the national spotlight.

Wednesday, January 11, is National Human Trafficking Awareness Day. President Obama has again proclaimed the month of January as National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, urging all Americans to become educated about human trafficking so that we can put an end to this modern day slavery.  Below is a copy of the proclamation.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
A PROCLAMATION

Nearly a century and a half ago, President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation -- a document that reaffirmed the noble goals of equality and freedom for all that lie at the heart of what it means to live in America.  In the years since, we have tirelessly pursued the realization and protection of these essential principles.  Yet, despite our successes, thousands of individuals living in the United States and still more abroad suffer in silence under the intolerable yoke of modern slavery.  During National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, we stand with all those who are held in compelled service; we recognize the people, organizations, and government entities that are working to combat human trafficking; and we recommit to bringing an end to this inexcusable human rights abuse.

Human trafficking endangers the lives of millions of people around the world, and it is a crime that knows no borders.  Trafficking networks operate both domestically and transnationally, and although abuses disproportionally affect women and girls, the victims of this ongoing global tragedy are men, women, and children of all ages.  Around the world, we are monitoring the progress of governments in combating trafficking while supporting programs aimed at its eradication.  From forced labor and debt bondage to forced commercial sexual exploitation and involuntary domestic servitude, human trafficking leaves no country untouched.  With this knowledge, we rededicate ourselves to forging robust international partnerships that strengthen global anti-trafficking efforts, and to confronting traffickers here at home.

My Administration continues to implement our comprehensive strategy to combat human trafficking in America.  By coordinating our response across Federal agencies, we are working to protect victims of human trafficking with effective services and support, prosecute traffickers through consistent enforcement, and prevent human rights abuses by furthering public awareness and addressing the root causes of modern slavery.  The steadfast defense of human rights is an essential part of our national identity, and as long as individuals suffer the violence of slavery and human trafficking, we must continue the fight.

With the start of each year, we commemorate the anniversaries of the Emancipation Proclamation, which became effective on January 1, 1863, and the 13th Amendment to abolish slavery, which was signed by President Abraham Lincoln and submitted to the States for ratification on February 1, 1865. 

These documents stand as testaments to the gains we have made in pursuit of freedom and justice for all, and they remind us of the work that remains to be done.  This month, I urge all Americans to educate themselves about all forms of modern slavery and the signs and consequences of human trafficking.  Together, and in cooperation with our partners around the world, we can work to end this terrible injustice and protect the rights to life and liberty entrusted to us by our forebears and owed to our children.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim January 2012 as National Slavery and Human Trafficking Prevention Month, culminating in the annual celebration of National Freedom Day on February 1.  I call upon the people of the United States to recognize the vital role we can play in ending modern slavery and to observe this month with appropriate programs and activities.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
thirtieth day of December, in the year of our Lord two thousand eleven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-sixth.

BARACK OBAMA

From CNN's Freedom Project blog publi12/14/11
(CNN) - Google Inc. announced Wednesday that it's providing $11.5 million in grants to 10 organizations working to end modern-day slavery and human trafficking.

Gary Haugen, president and CEO of International Justice Mission, one of the grant recipients, called the move a "game-changing investment." IJM is a Washington-based human rights agency that works to rescue victims of slavery and sexual exploitation in about a dozen countries.

"This is the largest corporate step up to the challenge that is beginning to apply direct resources to the fight against slavery," Haugen said.

According to estimates by grant recipients, Google's support will free an estimated 12,000 people from slavery and prevent millions more from being victimized. Numbers vary widely, but policymakers, activists and scholars estimate the number of modern-day slaves at somewhere between 10 million and 30 million people worldwide.

Google's director of charitable giving, Jacquelline Fuller, said the company chose to spotlight the issue of slavery because the topic of freedom - "the most basic of human rights," as she puts it - resonated with company employees around the world.

"Many people are surprised to learn there are more people trapped in slavery today than any time in history," Fuller said. "The good news is that there are solutions. Google is supporting organizations that have a proven track record and a plan to make a difference at scale."

Google made the announcement through a link posted on its web page. The gift is part of a total of $40 million the Internet giant is giving in charitable donations during the holiday season.

The grant will be shared by newly formed coalitions of international anti-trafficking organizations. The bulk of the donation, $8 million, will go to two coalitions led by IJM in India, with about half going toward direct intervention and government-led rescue operations, and half toward advocacy and awareness projects. In addition, $1.8 million will go to the U.S. Anti-Trafficking Initiative - a partnership between Polaris Project, which operates the National Human Trafficking Resource Center hotline, Slavery Footprint, an interactive Web site and mobile app that estimates how much of a user's lifestyle relies on forced labor, and IJM.

IJM says most of its funding comes from private donations. In 2010, it notes, less than 1% of its funding came from big business or corporate foundations.

"It gives us a sense of what's possible," said IJM's Haugen. "We can actually change the whole balance of resources between those who are the criminals, hurting human beings and those who are on the side of those who need freedom today."

CNN has also joined the fight against modern-day slavery and collaborates regularly with many advocacy groups, including the recipients of these Google grants. Since launching the CNN Freedom Project in March, CNN has broadcast more than 200 stories and a half-dozen documentaries on the issue of human trafficking and modern-day slavery. Nearly 2,000 people have come out of slavery, either directly or indirectly, as a result of those stories.

From CNN's Freedom Project
Post by: CNN's Leif Coorlim

Editor's note: "Common Dreams", which aired on CNN at the weekend, can now be viewed online in its entirety. Find out more about how you can help the Haitian children at CommonDreamsHaiti.com A Grammy Award-winning musician and actor is using his star power to help rescue children being exploited in Haiti, a nation founded by freed slaves.

In a Freedom Project documentary, Common shines a light on the plight of the Restaveks, the estimated 300,000 children working as domestic servants in Haiti.

The United Nations says the deeply rooted practice is a form of modern-day slavery.

Common said, "I just felt like I was entering another place, another world I had never experienced, and I really had to prepare my mind to be in it."

In Haiti, he met children who are forced to work long hours and denied an education. He also met a team dedicated to securing their freedom.

"Often you speak to them, their heads are down, they don't make eye contact. Most of all, they feel very inferior and that carries them into adulthood," Common said.

"We have a nation where the children who become adults have very little skills. They are illiterate, and they are not integrated into Haitian culture."

The practice of Restavek - from a French word meaning "to stay with" - began with the noble intentions of educating children from rural villages. But over the years, the practice has become twisted. The result is that many children are now exploited rather than helped.

As poverty and misrule held back Haiti over the decades, the chances to go to school became fewer. The Restavek system remained, with children being forced to work instead of receiving an education.

Even when an earthquake almost two years ago devastated large parts of the capital, Port-au-Prince, the Restavek system remained.

In view of the still-destroyed presidential palace is a tent city with trash piled up in the streets, where children can be seen working. Many of them are Restaveks in forced labor, not kids helping mom or dad.

Among them is a 12-year-old girl whose back is scarred from months, possibly years, of carrying water for 30 minutes over rough ground to the canvas-walled home where she lives.

The Restavek Freedom Foundation tries to get the children into school to help make their lives a little easier and their futures brighter.

Haitian-born New Yorker Fabiola Desmont goes searching out Restavek homes, trying to convince the adults that the children should be in school, not working.

At one home, a man was persuaded to let his Restavek child go to school. The child's eyes lit up. But not everyone is able to see the system is wrong.

Common said, "The children are removed from their parents and sent to live with other families where the adults treat them like slaves. They do not get to go to school or enjoy themselves.

"They can encounter mental, physical and emotional abuse with these families. It's a tough situation for me to see them (in), but imagine what it is like to be the kid - it's much tougher for them.

"Restavek Freedom tries to reason with the adults looking after these children, and tries to get them into a better environment.

"We were going (into homes) to say 'it's a child's right to learn.' It will help Haitian society, but some of them could not see that.

"We talked to little kids about what they wanted to do. Some said they wanted to do something great; others dreamed of going to school. Everyone should be allowed to fulfill their dream."


Post by: CNN's Leif Coorlim

By Jessica Dabrowski | jessica.dabrowski@fox8.com Staff Writer 5:09 p.m. EST, December 2, 2011

CLEVELAND— A man who pleaded guilty to three counts related to attempted sex trafficking of children was sentenced Friday.

Otto Linzenbach, 63, of Leipzig, Germany, will spend 15 years in prison.

"The details laid out in this case reveal a secret world that targets our society's most precious assets -- our children," Steven M. Dettelbach, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, said. "We will work cooperatively and vigilantly to protect our most vulnerable."

Undercover Homeland Security Investigations agents created a phony website to cater to individuals seeking to have sex with children.

The agents told the child predators that for about $1,600 they would meet them in Cleveland, then take them to Canada or Michigan to rape a child or children.

The predators were told to pick their victims through photos on the fake website.

No real children were involved.

Linzenbach flew to Cleveland from Germany with the intent to rape children.

"This operation shows the length to which those who seek to have sex with children are willing to go -- even if it means flying across the globe," said Brian Moskowitz, Special Agent in Charge, United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations (HSI).

"It also underscores the fact that lengthy federal prison terms await those who engage in this depraved behavior. HSI will continue to use our unique authorities to confront this threat wherever it exists," Moskowitz added.

Linzenbach was arrested on April 1 after an undercover agent picked him up at the Sheraton Airport Hotel in Cleveland.

Court records show he paid $1,600 in cash before being arrested.

On Aug. 9, Linzenbach pleaded guilty to attempted sex trafficking in children, attempted exploitation of children and travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual conduct.

(Fox 8 News Reporter Emily Valdez Contributed to this report.)

By Fred Pleitgen and Mohamed Fadel Fahmy, CNN November 3, 2011 -- Updated 1622 GMT (0022 HKT)

El Arish, Egypt (CNN) -- Bedouin smugglers involved in people trafficking are also believed to be stealing organs from refugees who are unable to pay their demands for large amounts of cash to take them into Israel.

The New Generation Foundation for Human Rights and the EveryOne Group, from Italy, have presented evidence that the bodies of African refugees have been found in the Sinai desert with organs missing.

The Sawarka Bedouin tribe, one of the largest in the Sinai, was named by one Bedouin source as being involved in organ thefts.

A Sawarka leader said he was aware that people trafficking was going on in Sinai and that in some cases refugees were held in bonded labor and tortured. But he added only rogue elements of his tribe were involved.

According to rights groups, refugees -- from places like Ethiopia, Eritrea or Sudan -- are enslaved and tortured and the women raped if they cannot come up with the large sums of money the Bedouin try to extort from them and their families to smuggle them into Israel.

Among Bedouin leaders in the Sinai, no one was willing to speak openly about the organ theft. Tribal leaders said they knew nothing about it or had only heard rumors.

But Hamdy Al-Azazy, head of New Generation Foundation, has photos showing corpses with distinctive scars in the abdominal area. All the photos were taken in a morgue in the Egyptian port town of El Arish after the bodies were brought there.

Al-Azazy says the organs are taken from refugees while they are still alive. "The organs are not useful if they're dead. They drug them first and remove their organs, then leave them to die and dump them in a deep dry well along with hundreds of bodies."

He says he was once taken to the area where the bodies are dumped after the organ removal process. He says he believes corrupt Egyptian doctors are working with the Bedouins, coming to Sinai with mobile hospital units to perform the operations to remove especially corneas, livers and kidneys.

"Mobile clinics using advanced technology come from a private hospital in Cairo to an area in the deserts of Mid-Sinai and conduct physicals on the Africans before they choose those suitable, then they conduct the operation," Al-Azazy said.

CNN showed some of the photos of the dead to Dr. Fakhry Saleh, the former head of Cairo's forensic department and an expert on the illegal organ trade.

"There are two kinds of scars. One is from a postmortem autopsy and one from surgery," Saleh said, pointing to a scar that he says came from an operation that must have been performed shortly before the person died.

According to Saleh, the operation was conducted no more than 48 hours before death, indicated by the freshness of the scars.

Furthermore, all the scars are in the area of the liver and kidney. "They are good stitches in the area of the liver and the kidney," Saleh said while examining the photos on a laptop.


While Saleh says he has never heard of organ theft involving African refugees, he says it seems highly probable that the scars on the bodies come from organ removal.

"They could open you up, take it out and just let you die. The mafia does not care whether you live or die. When they cut you open, it would be very painful, so they would give you anesthesia," Saleh later said.

Saleh has done extensive research on the illegal organ business in Egypt, which preys on poor people. The World Health Organization in a recent report called Egypt a regional hub for the trade.

An investigation headed by Saleh found illegal organ trafficking to be one of the most profitable criminal activities.

"Organ trade is the second most profitable trade behind only weapons trade," he said. "It brings in more money than drug dealing and prostitution."

One Bedouin tribal chief did put CNN in touch with a Bedouin who used to be involved in people smuggling and who was close to the organ theft scheme. The source spoke on condition of anonymity but offered insights into the scheme.

"The doctors deal directly with the Sawarka family, and they buy the organs starting from $20,000," the source said in a phone interview.

He offered further details of the logistics required to keep the organs fresh for the transplant into their new owners' bodies: "The doctors come with some sort of mobile fridge where the organs can be stored for six to eight hours and resold in Cairo or elsewhere."

The source claimed doctors from Cairo are involved in the organ theft, a claim that has proved impossible to verify.

"It's like spare parts for cars," the Bedouin, who later agreed to meet one member of the CNN crew in person, said sarcastically toward the end of the interview.

A second Bedouin, who also refused to be identified, later gave a similar account.

The police general in charge of security in Northern Sinai tells CNN that his forces are aware that organ trafficking and theft are going on in their area of operations but that the authorities have not identified who is behind the schemes.