27th Parliamentary-Intelligence Security Forum – Human Trafficking and its Role in Sponsoring Terrorism
Ms. Tanya Gould spoke as a survivor of human trafficking, emphasizing that trafficking operates as a structured and organized system, much like terrorism. She highlighted how both rely on violence, coercion, intimidation, and exploitation, and argued that trafficking should be viewed not as isolated incidents but as part of broader criminal and extremist networks.
She explained that terrorist organizations use trafficking to recruit fighters, enslave women and children, generate revenue, move operatives across borders, and hide within refugee flows. Drawing from her lived experience, she described trafficking as a business with defined roles such as recruitment, transportation, document fraud, and safe houses, sustained by corruption, weak governance, poverty, and instability.
Gould stressed that trafficking is transnational, historically entrenched, and economically driven, exploiting migration routes, conflict zones, and marginalized communities. Victims are often cycled through repeated exploitation and moved across regions to avoid detection, making the crime systematic and difficult to dismantle.
She concluded that the intersection of terrorism and human trafficking poses a direct threat to global security. Addressing it requires coordinated international efforts to disrupt criminal networks, strengthen governance, close legal loopholes, and confront both the ideological motives of extremist groups and the financial systems that enable exploitation. Speaking personally, she underscored the lasting psychological control traffickers exert over victims, reinforcing the urgency of treating human trafficking not only as a human rights issue but as a central security challenge.
