FACEBOOK users have been encouraged to raise awareness and to join the fight against human trafficking by changing their profile pictures to a ‘Blue Heart’ for International Women’s Day.
Dozens of women responded to the weekend plea after Anti-Human Trafficking Cyprus, a user of the social networking website, set its profile status to: Grab a BLUE HEART against human trafficking for your profile picture in time for WOMENS DAY http://www.unodc.org/blueheart/.20.
It also sent out messages to over 800 of its ‘friends’ encouraging them to “donate your profile picture to the Blue Heart campaign against human trafficking this weekend for Women’s Day”.
The message said: “We at the Blue Heart Campaign want to maximise awareness of this terrible crime, and ask you now to change your profile picture to a blue heart and your status to say that you are supporting our cause in time for International Women’s Day on March 8!
“Please invite your friends too, and help us in our struggle against this modern form of slavery.”
The Blue Heart Campaign was launched by United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa last Thursday in Vienna at the Women’s World Awards, in recognition of the fact that women are the primary victims of this crime.
The Blue Heart represents the sadness of those who are trafficked while reminding people of the cold-heartedness of those who buy and sell fellow human beings. It is also reminder of the United Nations’ commitment to fighting this crime.
Costa said: “There is a lot of ignorance about modern slavery. There is also a lot of good will to fight it. The blue heart will raise awareness about a crime that shames us all. It shows solidarity with the victims.”
Costa described human trafficking as “the worst kind of violence against women, made even more repulsive by the fact that people make money from it”.
While poverty made people vulnerable to human trafficking, gender discrimination and sexism were also to blame, said UNODC.
“Whether it’s burkas or bikinis, the humiliation of women as property or sex objects is an affront to human dignity. It creates a market for women and girls who are traded like commodities,” he said.
Costa called on people all over the world to join the Blue Heart Campaign against human trafficking “in order to end enslavement, and achieve women’s equality”.
n UNODC’s Global Report on Trafficking in Persons offers the first global assessment of the scope of human trafficking and what is being done to fight it.
Materials and more information on the Blue Heart campaign can be found at www.unodc.org/blueheart
