Kashi* was only 5-years-old when she was taken from her family and trafficked into domestic servitude for a wealthy family. Confused and alone, she spent the next 10 years in a never-ending cycle of housework, abuse, and loneliness—desperate for a childhood like other girls her age.
She said: "I was such a small girl, and sometimes I would get very homesick and cry. I wondered when I would go home. But when I cried, they would lock me in a dark room, sometimes for an entire day with no food or water.
"I was not allowed to leave or speak to anyone outside of the family. No friends. No school. No birthdays. No life."
Kashi faced frequent physical, verbal, and sexual abuse throughout her childhood, leaving her feeling worthless and traumatised.
At 15, Kashi learned the family's other dark secret: they were connected to an illicit sex trafficking ring, and this would be her fate. Kashi was sold to a brothel, dressed up and sold to 15 to 20 men a day in a room that locked from the outside. She was beaten brutally if she ever resisted and soon gave up hope of escape. She says, "I worked there because I was scared to lose my life. I wanted to live."
But, after a few months there, IJM teams and local authorities found Kashi and conducted a rescue operation at the massive brothel, bringing her to safety.
While she struggled to trust authorities at first, Kashi shares, "Somewhere there was a little hope inside me, a faith that I was safe. I am out of the bad place...I had never thought I would get out of that place if it had not been for the IJM sisters (social workers) who supported me."
Following her rescue, Kashi moved into a loving aftercare home and began the long process of restoration. She participated in crucial trauma-focused therapy, built a strong relationship with her IJM caseworkers, and even got to go to school for the first time in her life.
Kashi also bravely agreed to share her story in a legal trial against four members of the family who enslaved and exploited her. She shares, "I only wanted one thing: that what I had to go through—whatever had happened to me—whatever I had lost and the challenges I have faced, would not happen to any other child."
Today—while she still navigates the ongoing effects of trauma—Kashi's moving from strength to strength. She works as a tailor and has joined other survivors in speaking out, frequently raising her voice in the media and at events on the reality of sex trafficking, why it must stop and what survivors need.
Kashi says, "My dream is to be somebody—that I have my identity so that when people hear about me or hear my name, they recognise me not for what has happened to me in the past, but with what I will become in my future."
As a father of a teenage daughter, I find it unthinkable that she had to experience such violation and was alone for so many years. I am also deeply inspired by her power, courage and determined resolve to share her story far and wide, to make sure that no other child has to live through the same things as she has.
I think her story is an invitation to us all – will we have the same courage to stand up for justice, and to see an end to modern slavery?
It is more urgent than ever before that we ask ourselves this question. As every country and every person feels the fall-out from the Covid-19 crisis, it has become clear that the most vulnerable people are being affected more than anyone else.
Today's UN Day for the Abolition of Slavery comes at a time when the World Bank has just warned that up to 150 million additional people could be pushed into extreme poverty by 2021. Traffickers are already starting to take advantage of people who have lost livelihoods by tricking, trapping and coercing people with false job offers and loans. Online recruitment, grooming and exploitation have been widely used by traffickers during the pandemic too.
There are also indications that some trafficking networks have adapted, moving online during the lockdowns. Children, as young as just a few months old, are being sexually exploited online for "customers" who pay to view from all around the world, including the UK.
I think there is a clear call for each of us to consider what we can do about these brutal injustices. Not all of us are able to physically work with police to identify and free trafficked children like Kashi. But, at IJM we have seen the incredible impact that the global Church can have through prayer, generosity and action. From individuals in the UK, like Laura who recently cycled the length of the Pyrenees mountain range on a bike in her own living room to raise money and awareness of modern slavery, to Church leaders in Ghana from different denominations who just last week gathered to form a coalition against child trafficking.
Perhaps today, on this UN International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, we each have a chance to think about where in our own lives we can take a stand against modern slavery. Maybe for some of us that looks like committing to prayer for freedom. Maybe for some of us it means choosing carefully which companies we buy from, prioritising those that are actively working to have supply chains free from slavery. And maybe for some of us it looks like giving our time or money to this work.
This year IJM's Christmas appeal will be going towards our work to stop sex trafficking of women and children – just like Kashi. Like Kashi, we want to make sure that no child has to endure what she did. Will you join us?
David Westlake is the CEO of IJM UK, which works worldwide to end slavery.
