No less than two-thirds of trafficked victims are women and girls while one-third of the victims of human trafficking are children, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, UNODC, said on Wednesday.

UNODC Executive Director, Yury Fedotov, disclosed this on Wednesday at the launch of the 2016 UNODC Global Report on Trafficking in Persons.

According to a new report from the UNODC, the vast majority of all human trafficking victims – some 71 per cent – are women, girls and children.

“Trafficking for sexual exploitation and for forced labour remain the most prominently detected forms.

“But victims are also being trafficked to be used as beggars, for forced or sham marriages, benefit fraud, or production of pornography,” Mr. Fedotov said.

According to him, the 2016 UNODC Global Report disaggregates data on the basis of gender and found that women and girls are usually trafficked for marriage and sexual slavery.

“Men and boys, however, are trafficked into exploitative labour, including work in the mining sector, as porters, soldiers, and slaves.

“Worldwide, 28 per cent of trafficking victims are children, but children account for 62 per cent in Sub-Saharan Africa and 64 per cent in Central America and the Caribbean.

“Sixty nine countries detected trafficking victims from Sub-Saharan Africa between 2012 and 2014.”

Fedotov emphasised the link between armed groups and human trafficking.

He noted how armed groups often engaged in trafficking in their territories of operation, coercing women and girls into marriages or sexual slavery.

According to him, armed groups also pressed men and boys to act as forced labour or combatants.