KOCHI: Every eight minutes a child goes missing in the world, there should be an end to it, said Rani Hong, a survivor of child trafficking, at a press conference held at Ernakulam Press Club on Monday. Rani is here in Kochi to create and spread awareness on child trafficking. “Around 40 million children are sold for profit by traffickers around the world. People must act against child traffickers, there should be a system to track the missing children in the state,” said Rani, who is the UN special advisor on the ‘Global Initiative to Fight Human Trafficking’.
Rani Hong was abducted at the age of seven when she was living with her parents and siblings in Kochi. She was made a slave and was severely beaten and abused by human traffickers. “I nearly faced death and they told me that my parents were dead. I was put up for illegal internal adoption and was trafficked to TN and then to Canada,” Rani said. After 21 years, when she met her mother she realised that she was a victim of human trafficking. “My fight against human trafficking started from then,” she said.
‘Tronie Foundation’ was started in 2006, to fight against human trafficking, child labour, slavery and for the rehabilitating the victims. “There should be a system and a database to track the missing children in the state. If the ministry or our government has such a database, it should be shared with other jurisdictions. An application can be developed to track the missing children with the help of the available database and we are ready to cooperate with the government in tackling human trafficking in the country,” said Rani.