Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar has called on po­lice to in­ves­ti­gate me­dia hous­es that she says may be en­abling hu­man traf­fick­ing.

She said the in­ves­ti­ga­tion should al­so ex­tend to pae­dophile al­le­ga­tions in both the Dr Robert Sab­ga and Ju­dith Jones re­ports.

"I con­demn Hu­man Traf­fick­ing as a vile scourge and evil in our so­ci­ety and all those who en­able it should be pros­e­cut­ed to the fullest ex­tent of the law," Per­sad-Bisses­sar said in a state­ment on Thurs­day.

She added that in this re­gard the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) "wel­comes the in­ves­ti­ga­tion an­nounced by the Com­mis­sion­er of Po­lice and the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice (TTPS) in­to hu­man traf­fick­ing by “se­nior gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials” as iden­ti­fied in the US Gov­ern­ment State De­part­ment’s Traf­fick­ing in Per­sons Re­ports. Hope­ful­ly, the counter-traf­fick­ing unit (CTU) which was formed in 2013 by my UNC gov­ern­ment can con­tribute to this in­ves­ti­ga­tion."

She added, "In­deed, giv­en the fact that the US Re­port on Hu­man Traf­fick­ing in T&T has been pub­licly raised by the UNC since the Ju­ly 2022 re­port, it is puz­zling as to why this im­por­tant in­ves­ti­ga­tion is on­ly now to be start­ed. Ever since 'se­nior gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials' were iden­ti­fied by the US State De­part­ment as be­ing in­volved in hu­man traf­fick­ing, the UNC has sought to get an­swers in the Par­lia­ment as to what was be­ing done about this."

Per­sad-Bisses­sar called on those mak­ing al­le­ga­tions to pro­vide doc­u­ment­ed ev­i­dence to the TTPS to sup­port the al­le­ga­tions they have made.

"Fur­ther, I call on the TTPS to al­so in­ves­ti­gate whether ad­ver­tis­ing in the dai­ly news­pa­pers via ads for es­cort and oth­er per­son­al ser­vices may amount to en­abling hu­man traf­fick­ing. It’s amaz­ing that some me­dia con­tin­ue to pon­tif­i­cate against hu­man traf­fick­ing at the front of their news­pa­pers, whilst in the back in their clas­si­fied ads sec­tion, they may be ac­tive­ly en­abling hu­man traf­fick­ing," she said.

She con­tin­ued: "Fur­ther, I call on the COP and the TTPS to al­so ex­tend these in­ves­ti­ga­tions to in­clude the pae­dophile al­le­ga­tions made in the Sab­ga and Ju­dith Jones re­ports."