Investigate and prosecute trafficking crimes, including official complicity, and seek adequate penalties for convicted traffickers, which should involve significant prison terms. * Train officials to use the SOPs for victim identification and NRM for referral to care to proactively identify and refer trafficking victims to services, including among vulnerable populations such as children, refugees and IDPs, Cuban government-affiliated healthcare professionals, and People’s Republic of China (PRC) nationals employed at worksites affiliated with the PRC’s Belt and Road Initiative. * Formally operationalize, staff, and regularly convene the NCCTIP to coordinate government efforts and include civil society in its activities. * Increase efforts to train judicial and law enforcement officials on the anti-trafficking law, including case investigation and the distinctions between human trafficking and migrant smuggling. * Adopt and implement the draft 2023-2025 anti-trafficking NAP and dedicate resources to its implementation. * Increase efforts to raise awareness on all forms of human trafficking, particularly among vulnerable populations. * Establish a specialized anti-trafficking unit in the Judicial Police to ensure officers effectively investigate suspected trafficking crimes. * Include anti-trafficking training for all new magistrates and prosecutors attending the Ministry of Justice’s training college in N’Djamena. * Create a mechanism to proactively screen for trafficking indicators in the labor recruitment process, consistently enforce strong regulations and oversight of labor recruitment companies, and hold fraudulent labor recruiters criminally accountable. * Develop national-level data collection on trafficking crimes.

The government slightly increased law enforcement efforts. Law 006/PR/2018 on Combating Trafficking in Persons criminalized sex trafficking and labor trafficking. Article seven of Law 006/PR/2018 prescribed penalties of four to 30 years’ imprisonment and a fine of 250,000 to 5 million Central African francs (CFA) ($420 to $8,430); these penalties were sufficiently stringent and, with regard to sex trafficking, commensurate with penalties prescribed for other grave crimes, such as rape.

The government did not systematically collect data on law enforcement efforts, including on cases of human trafficking. The government did not report initiating any investigations, compared with initiating 12 investigations during the previous reporting period. The government reported prosecuting two suspected traffickers, the same number as the previous reporting period. The government reported convicting two traffickers, the first trafficking-related convictions in three years. The court sentenced the two traffickers to seven years’ imprisonment and a fine under the government’s 2018 anti-trafficking law. Observers reported judges, prosecutors, police, and gendarmerie lacked resources to effectively investigate and prosecute crimes, including trafficking. NGOs noted magistrates were underfunded and often did not have access to the internet and electricity.

Corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained significant concerns, hindering law enforcement efforts. Although the government did not report any investigations, prosecutions, or convictions of government employees complicit in human trafficking crimes, an international organization reported the government investigated and prosecuted three government officials allegedly involved in trafficking crimes; two officials were reportedly convicted and each were issued sentences of five years’ imprisonment, the prosecution of the third official remained on-going. Observers reported some local government officials and security forces may cover up allegations of trafficking crimes, intimidate prosecutors, or not pursue cases to protect suspected traffickers; further reports indicated complicit officials intimidated victims from pursuing criminal cases. Observers reported customs and law enforcement officials allegedly accepted bribes from traffickers. Reports indicated officials subjected prisoners to forced labor on private projects outside of prisons. The government did not report any cooperation with foreign counterparts on law enforcement activities. The government, in partnership with international organizations, trained judicial and law enforcement officials on trafficking in persons, child exploitation, and human rights frameworks.

The government maintained inadequate protection efforts. Authorities did not report identifying or referring to care any trafficking victims for the third consecutive year. An international organization reported identifying and providing services to 359 trafficking victims, including six sex trafficking victims and 353 victims of forced labor, which included one child and 39 foreign nationals. NGOs and international organizations also repatriated four foreign national sex trafficking victims and 39 foreign national forced labor victims. The government had SOPs for victim identification and an NRM to refer victims to care; however, authorities did not consistently implement the SOPs to proactively screen vulnerable populations for trafficking indicators. Observers reported a lack of resources and weak interagency coordination impeded victim identification and referral to care. The government did not report any dedicated funding for trafficking victim protection services.

The Ministry of Women, Family, and National Solidarity, in partnership with an international organization and local NGOs, operated nine transit centers used as temporary shelters throughout the country. These transit centers offered temporary housing, food, and education to vulnerable populations, including potential trafficking victims. However, observers reported the transit centers lacked necessary resources and training to effectively operate and assist trafficking victims. Officials did not report providing services to any trafficking victims during the reporting period. Services continued to be limited to urban areas and were largely inaccessible to much of Chad’s rural population. Due to a lack of government-provided victim services, international organizations provided most protection services to trafficking victims, including health care, counselling, and reintegration assistance without government support.

The government had negligible victim-witness assistance available to support victims’ participation in investigations and prosecutions. The law allowed victims to obtain restitution, but the government did not report awarding restitution during the reporting period. Victims could file civil suits against their traffickers; however, no victims reportedly did so. The government did not have a formal policy to offer temporary or permanent residency for foreign trafficking victims and did not report identifying any foreign victims. Due to limited use of the SOPs for victim identification, authorities may have arrested and detained some unidentified trafficking victims.

The government increased efforts to prevent trafficking. The government’s 2018 anti-trafficking law established the NCCTIP to coordinate inter-ministerial anti-trafficking efforts. However, the government has not yet fully operationalized the NCCTIP, hindering overall efforts to combat trafficking. The Multisectoral Technical Committee (MTC), launched in July 2021, was intended to guide the government’s anti-trafficking activities in the interim; however, the government did not report if the MTC met during the reporting period. The government drafted a 2023-2025 anti-trafficking NAP, but it remained pending by the end of the reporting period. In collaboration with an international organization, the MTC conducted an awareness-raising activity for World Day against Trafficking in Persons. An international organization also reported it worked with the government to conduct trafficking assessments and awareness-raising activities. Observers reported high illiteracy rates among the population hindered the government’s ability to increase awareness of human trafficking. An international organization reported it worked with the government to collect information on displaced and migrant populations, including information on trafficking indicators.

The government had laws and regulations on labor recruitment; however, the government did not conduct inspections of recruitment agencies or screen labor migrants for trafficking indicators in the labor recruitment process. Lack of government funding and awareness of applicable laws impeded child labor enforcement efforts. The government previously established an inter-ministerial committee to draft legislation to protect migrant workers; however, legislation developed in the previous reporting period remained pending. The government did not make efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts. The government in collaboration with an international organization issued birth certificates from health and civil registration centers and provided registration and birth certificates to IDPs. The government reported efforts to prevent the recruitment and use of children in the military through a vetting process, which included official attestation by parents that individuals without birth certificates were at least 18 years old. The government reported providing anti-trafficking training to its troops prior to their deployment as peacekeepers. The government did not provide anti-trafficking training for its diplomatic personnel. Although not explicitly reported as human trafficking, there were two open cases of alleged sexual exploitation with trafficking indicators by Chadian peacekeepers deployed to the UN peacekeeping mission in Mali in 2017 and 2022; of these, the government reported accountability measures in one case and continued investigating the other case.

As reported over the past five years, human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Chad, and traffickers exploit Chadian victims abroad. Poverty remains a driving factor of human trafficking. Observers report children from low-income families are most at risk of forced labor. Families frequently entrust their children to relatives or intermediaries to receive education, apprenticeship, goods, or money; some relatives or intermediaries subsequently force or coerce children to work in domestic service or cattle herding. Individuals associated with small- and medium-scale enterprises force children to beg in urban areas and exploit them as agricultural laborers on farms; in northern gold mines and charcoal production; and as domestic workers across the country. Observers reported child labor trafficking in Chad is most serious in the mining sector, due to the distance of the mines from major cities, limited government presence, and the harsh climates of northern Chad. In the Lake Chad region, community members exploit some children in catching, smoking, and selling fish. Elders of some traditional Quranic schools known as mouhadjirin coerce children from small rural villages into begging, street vending, or other forms of labor trafficking throughout the country. Child marriage remains prevalent nationwide, especially in the northern areas; some girls are sold or forced into marriages and exploited in forced labor, including in domestic servitude and agriculture. Trafficking networks continue to target vulnerable populations using new routes from southern to northern Chad.

Climate change and forced displacement by government-affiliated herders may increase vulnerabilities to trafficking for some southern agricultural communities. Cattle herders force some children to work along traditional routes for grazing cattle and, at times, cross ill-defined international borders into Cameroon, the Central African Republic (CAR), Sudan, Niger, and Nigeria. Traffickers in rural areas sell children in markets for use in cattle or camel herding. In some cases, military or local government officials exploit with impunity child herders in forced labor. Additionally, experts allege officials force prisoners to work on private enterprises separate from their legal sentences. Criminal elements exploit some rural Chadian girls who travel to larger towns in search of work in child sex trafficking or domestic servitude. Observers report traffickers may use online platforms such as WhatsApp and social media to lure, recruit, and exploit potential trafficking victims. According to observers, Chadian mercenaries – often operating in Libya – facilitated human trafficking. In northern Chad, migrants are recruited by migrant smugglers to work in gold mines; workers are then exploited in indentured labor.

Chad hosts more than 1.2 million refugees, internally displaced persons, returned refugees, and asylum-seekers as of March 2024, which includes an influx of 554,000 Sudanese refugees since the conflict in Sudan began in April 2023. More than 100,500 Chadian returnees from CAR and the Lake Chad Basin region may be vulnerable to trafficking based on their economic instability and lack of access to support systems. While many individuals migrating irregularly into Libya for economic reasons initially used the services of smugglers, traffickers exploit some of these undocumented migrants in sex or labor trafficking. Community-based armed groups tasked with defending people and property in rural areas likely recruit and use children in armed conflict. Experts report victims of trafficking are vulnerable to recruitment by terrorist and armed groups. Sources report non-state armed groups, including Boko Haram, forcibly conscripted children to serve in combat and support roles. PRC nationals employed in Chad at worksites affiliated with the PRC’s Belt and Road Initiative may have been vulnerable to labor trafficking. Cuban government-affiliated medical professionals working in Chad may have been forced to work by the Cuban government.