DHAKA: The US Department of State said that Bangladesh does not “fully meet” the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking, but is making “significant efforts” to do so on Friday.

They made the remark over ‘modern-day slavery’ in Bangladesh as it ranked the country as ‘tier-2’ in its just released ‘Trafficking in Persons’ report.

It is said that the report is the US government’s principal diplomatic tool to engage foreign governments on elimination of human trafficking.

The report enjoys the Congress’ mandate and it looks at what the governments are doing to combat human trafficking (modern day slavery) through the lens of what the US describes as the 3P paradigm — “prevention, protection, and prosecution”.

It ranks countries in its four-tier ranking system.

Bangladesh has been ranked as tier-2 country meaning it has failed to meet the minimum standards of combating human trafficking, but is striving to do so.

It also means that the country shows that “it is doing a decent job, but could definitely improve”.

“And those minimum standards are set out in our trafficking law of 2000, but they really track the international standards and best practices that we see around the world,” according to the report.

It said Bangladesh authorities investigated and prosecuted more cases under the 2012 Prevention and Suppression of Human Trafficking Act (PSHTA), but managed to convict only a small number of traffickers.

“Bangladesh lacked a formal referral mechanism and authorities did not adequately train police and other public officials on identifying and assisting victims,” the report observed.

However, while there are three more tier following the awareness ratio and Tier 1 is the highest ranking there that the US puts itself in with many other western countries, but according to the report it does not mean that a country has no human trafficking problem.

To see the report details, click:

BDST: 1525 HRS, JUN 21, 2014