Turning the pages back...

March 11, 1998

Seven years ago, President Bill Clinton announced a series of measures to curb the abuse of women worldwide and especially the international trafficking of women, a problem that has plagued Ukraine and some of the other states of that region.

Addressing a special White House ceremony on March 11, 1998, marking International Women's Day (March 8), the president outlined his plan of action, which included an expansion of U.S. efforts on behalf of women at home and overseas, and the convening of an international conference to develop new strategies to combat the international trafficking of women.

Adding their voices on behalf of women's rights at the ceremony were: First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, Attorney General Janet Reno, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and Advisor to the Prime Minister of Thailand Saisuree Chutikul.

Secretary Albright, who had just returned from an international trip that began in Kyiv, said the government of Ukraine asked, and the United States agreed, to collaborate on a joint strategy to combat trafficking of women and girls to and from Ukraine. "Our goal is to make this a model of international cooperation and to mobilize people everywhere to respond to this pernicious trafficking in human beings - with a stoplight visible around the equator and from pole to pole," she added.

President Clinton said he had instructed Secretary Albright and U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator Brian Atwood to expand U.S. international efforts to combat violence against women and earmarked $10 million to strengthen partnerships in this endeavor with governments and private organizations. In combating the "inhumane practice of trafficking of women," the president said he also had asked Attorney General Reno "to make sure that our own laws are adequate to the task we face here at home; that trafficking is prevented, victims are protected, traffickers are punished."

President Clinton said the United States also would use its consular and law enforcement presence overseas to help combat trafficking worldwide, by assisting victims, helping improve legislation, training judges and law enforcement officials, and by establishing public education campaigns abroad.

Source: "Clinton pledges to fight international trafficking of women," by Yaro Bihun, The Ukrainian Weekly, March 15, 1998, Vol. LXVI, No. 11.

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, March 6, 2005, No. 10, Vol. LXXIII

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