CYIL 2012

JANA ONDROVIČOVÁ

CYIL 3 ȍ2012Ȏ

3.4 Inherited debt Workers may also inherit intergenerational debt in more traditional systems of bonded labour. This kind of debt is tied with family itself. It means that a person can fall victim to debt bondage just by being born into a family suffering from hereditary enslavement. The family is unable to repay the illegal debt and it is passed down from

generation to generation. 3.5 Forced marriages

This form of slavery is related especially with women and young girls who are forced to enter into a marriage mainly because of economical or cultural reasons. 12 They have to marry a person whom they do not know and very often they have never seen before and who is older than the woman. The women who are forced to get married can also fall into other forms of slavery. They can be subject to domestic servitude as well or can be held as sexual slaves. 4. Modern slavery in documents of international law The international community has reacted to the modern forms of slavery since this issue has appeared. From the beginning of the 20 th century numbers of international documents have been adopted. They denounce modern slavery and make it illegal. These documents have been implemented with varying degrees of success in suppressing slavery. Many of these agreements lacked adequate institutions and procedures to ensure that they were enforced. According to these documents slavery and slave-related practices as they are described by this article are regarded firstly as a common international crime when 12 One very rare form of slavery can be found in southern India, where it is still alive in spite of a lot of legal effort to prohibit this kind of practice. Although the practice was formally prohibited the practice still survives there in significant numbers. It is the practice of ritual sexual slavery or forced religious ‚marriage‘. The custom of “marrying” girls to a deity, thereby depriving them of the right to ordinary marriage and assigning them to sexual exploitation by the deity‘s priests or devotees, existed in many ancient cultures. These girls or women are dedicated and initiated without their consent, by family members and village elders, and usually have no knowledge of what becoming a Jogin, Matha or Devadasi will involve. They are not ‘free’, in the sense that they become the servant of the deity and the common property of her devotees, and accordingly have no decision-making say over the nature and content of their lives or their means of livelihood. They are subject to gross exploitation, in the form of sexual servitude or non-consensual sex with one or many partners, often on demand. They are prohibited under the practice from marrying and leading a normal family life, nor can they enjoy the normal social standing of a wife and mother even if they do have a “husband” or partner. They are denied protection from exploitation, discrimination, verbal abuse, and insulting behaviour whereby other rights may also be withheld (such as access to health care, education and proper remuneration). They are especially vulnerable to recruitment into commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking. Their children are similarly vulnerable because of their birth status. They are unable to escape or renounce the cultural status of Jogini, Mathamma or Devadasi . The status follows them through life. They are subject to discrimination from all parts of society. see:http://www.antislavery.org/english/resources/reports/download_antislavery_publications/ritual_ slavery_reports.aspx ( opened 6. 4. 2012 ).

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