Here William Finnegan talks about the transnational networks of human trafficking and the efforts to help their victims.

American Award-winning journalist David Batstone, and author of "Not for Sale: the return of the Global Slave Trade".

Batstone who is also professor of Ethics at the University of San Francisco and the founder and president of Right Reality, an international social venture firm, was keen to encourage Australians to take up the cudgels in this most recent round of a very ancient trade, the ‘Traffic in Souls.’ It’s not just prostitution…

A combined group of 180 Catholic religious orders are lobbying the Australian government to change the way victims of people-trafficking are treated by the law in Australia. The campaign's being led by the umbrella group, Australian Catholic Religious Against Trafficking in Humans, which works to eliminate human trafficking in Australia and the Asia-Pacific region. The group's taking its case directly to parliament, urging not just changes to the law, but also greater effort from elected leaders on the issue.

ABC Radio National: Encounter
23 September 2007

Each year, women and girls are brought into Australia, kept in confinement and forced into prostitution - just part of the massively lucrative global phenomenon of human trafficking. Church groups in Australia and their international networks are on the front line addressing this issue - through rescue, rehabilitation and support for the victims; advocacy for legislative reform; and tackling the desperate poverty in source countries where women and girls are lured or sold for 'export'.

Listen to the podcast of the Encounter program on ABC Radio National that featured ACRATH members: