Growing concern over human trafficking has gripped communities across Ethiopia following a major police operation earlier this week that dismantled a sophisticated criminal network operating in the region.<\/p>\n
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In a recent broadcast interview, journalist Abedi Jean de la Croix spoke with correspondent Coletta Wanjohi to unpack the mechanics of the illicit trade and trace the key routes traffickers use to move Ethiopian victims across international borders.<\/p>\n
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Wanjohi explained that victims recruited from Ethiopia are primarily trafficked along three main regional corridors. The Southern Route is among the most heavily travelled, moving individuals through East African transit points like Kenya and Tanzania with the ultimate destination of South Africa, where people are enticed by promises of employment.<\/p>\n
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The Eastern Route takes victims through the Horn of Africa towards Djibouti or Somalia, where they cross the Red Sea or the Gulf of Aden into Yemen before being smuggled into the Gulf states, particularly Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the Northern Route sees smuggling networks transport victims through Sudan and Libya in an attempt to cross the Mediterranean into Europe.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
These syndicates routinely exploit local economic hardship, youth unemployment, and regional instability to lure vulnerable young people with false promises of a better life abroad. Once en route, victims often face severe abuse, extortion, and forced labour. The recent crackdown by Ethiopian law enforcement highlights the growing urgency for stronger cross-border police co-operation to dismantle these human trafficking rings across the continent.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
–ChannelAfrica–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":40563,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-40562","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Growing concern over human trafficking has gripped communities across Ethiopia","published_date":"2026-07-25 08:01:56","news_description":"Growing concern over human trafficking has gripped communities across Ethiopia","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/40562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/40562\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40564,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/40562\/revisions\/40564"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=40562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}