Increase efforts to investigate and prosecute alleged traffickers, including officials allegedly complicit in trafficking, and seek adequate penalties for convicted traffickers, which should involve significant prison terms. * Proactively identify trafficking victims, including by screening for trafficking indicators, especially among vulnerable populations, including child laborers, women and girls exploited in commercial sex, unaccompanied children, Cuban government-affiliated workers, Indigenous populations, refugees, and migrants, and refer victims to care. * Formally establish the inter-ministerial anti-trafficking task force, designate an agency to lead the government’s anti-trafficking efforts, and allocate sufficient resources. * Finalize and implement a comprehensive anti-trafficking NAP and dedicate resources to its implementation. * Accede to the 2000 TIP Protocol. * Take steps to eliminate recruitment or placement fees charged to workers by foreign labor recruiters and ensure any recruitment fees are paid by employers. * Strengthen the capacity of the Labor Inspectorate to identify and refer victims of forced labor to appropriate services. * Further expand anti-trafficking efforts to identify victims and prosecute traffickers beyond Pointe-Noire and Brazzaville. * Ensure victims are not inappropriately penalized solely for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked. * Implement and consistently enforce strong regulations and oversight of labor recruitment companies, including training labor inspectors to identify and report trafficking crimes and holding fraudulent labor recruiters criminally accountable. * Ensure the safe, humane, and, to the extent possible, voluntary repatriation of foreign victims, including through collaboration with relevant organizations and source country embassies, and provide foreign victims with legal alternatives to their removal to countries where they may face retribution or hardship. * Given significant concerns about forced labor indicators in Cuban international work programs, screen Cuban overseas workers, including medical professionals and refer them to appropriate services.

The government made negligible anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts. The 2019 Combating Trafficking in Persons Law criminalized sex trafficking and labor trafficking. The related provisions in Congolese criminal law prescribed penalties of five to 10 years’ imprisonment, which are sufficiently stringent and, with respect to sex trafficking, commensurate with the penalties prescribed for other grave crimes, such as kidnapping.

The government did not report any trafficking investigations, prosecutions, or convictions for the second consecutive year. Observers reported law enforcement officials did not investigate potential cases with trafficking indicators because of alleged conflation of human trafficking with other crimes. The government did not report any investigations, prosecutions, or convictions of government officials complicit in human trafficking crimes; however, corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained significant concerns, inhibiting law enforcement action. Authorities continued an investigation into a 2020 allegation of judicial corruption in a trafficking case but did not provide any updates on the case. The court system remained dysfunctional, and many criminal cases continued to languish due to significant backlogs in the high court due to irregular court sessions, lack of centralized record keeping, and limited legal statistics.

The government continued to provide anti-trafficking training to new police officers at the police academy. Anti-trafficking training remained institutionalized as part of a yearly training initiative for law enforcement officers. The government did not report collaborating with foreign governments on any anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts.

The government made mixed protection efforts. For the first time in three years, officials reported identifying five trafficking victims – one sex trafficking victim, one forced labor victim, and three victims of unspecified forms of trafficking. NGOs identified 10 additional trafficking victims. The government referred five victims to services in coordination with an NGO. The government had capacity to provide comprehensive care services, in collaboration with international organizations and NGOs, for trafficking victims, including temporary shelter, medical and psycho-social care, basic necessities, and education.

The government’s implementing regulations for the anti-trafficking law provided formal written procedures for victim identification. The government also had a formal process to refer victims to government or NGO services for care. Observers reported the government did not consistently implement its procedures to proactively screen vulnerable populations for trafficking indicators. The government had capacity to offer financial and legal assistance to trafficking victims, including by providing lawyers and referrals to services, but did not report doing so. A government-run center in Brazzaville could provide victims with basic necessities, education, and psycho-social counseling; authorities did not report how many victims received services. The government reported having a dedicated budget to assist victims of crime, including trafficking victims. The government continued to largely rely on NGOs and international organizations to assist with the identification, referral, and provision of services for trafficking victims without adequate funding or in-kind support. The government could offer some victim-witness assistance to victims participating in investigations and prosecutions, including police accompaniment during trials, and had some procedures to protect victims’ confidentiality.

Due to inconsistent use of formal identification procedures and lack of screening by law enforcement, authorities may have detained some unidentified trafficking victims. The government, in cooperation with an international organization, repatriated two foreign trafficking victims. Authorities provided consular and legal assistance to these victims, including providing travel documents and facilitating their return and reintegration into their home communities. The government provided the same availability of services to national and foreign victims and could provide temporary residency status to foreign trafficking victims during judicial proceedings; however, Congolese law did not provide legal alternatives to the removal of trafficking victims to countries where they would face retribution or hardship. Authorities provided foreign adult trafficking victims a choice between repatriation to their country of origin or reintegration into the local community. Congolese law allowed victims to request restitution in trafficking cases.

The government maintained minimal efforts to prevent trafficking. The government had a federal inter-ministerial committee to coordinate anti-trafficking efforts; however, it did not convene and the committee continued to remain without a formal agency designated to lead its efforts. A ministerial decree to formalize the inter-ministerial committee remained pending for the second consecutive year, hindering the overall effectiveness of the country’s anti-trafficking response. Additionally, officials reported bureaucratic processes further impeded the committee’s progress. The government’s 2022-2023 NAP remained pending formal approval from the Prime Minister’s Office by the end of the reporting period. The Ministry of Justice had a 2022-2025 Action Plan for Indigenous People that included labor issues, and the Ministry of Social Affairs had a 2021-2023 Plan for Trafficking in Persons. The government also had a 2022-2026 action plan on child protection, which included child trafficking. Observers noted a lack of interagency coordination, in part due to overlapping mandates and limited funding, hindered overall anti-trafficking efforts. Officials held four public awareness campaigns on the risks of human trafficking. The government continued to operate a hotline for victims of crime, including trafficking; however, officials did not report whether it received any calls related to human trafficking. Observers reported the hotline was largely ineffective and had yet to respond to trafficking complaints.

The government did not have effective laws or policies regulating labor recruiters and did not prohibit worker-paid recruitment fees. Labor inspectors overseeing working conditions in the country conducted irregular inspections, and observers reported most inspections occurred only at urban worksites. The government did not report providing anti-trafficking training for labor inspectors. The government did not report identifying any potential trafficking crimes through labor inspections. The Republic of the Congo was not a party to the 2000 UN TIP Protocol. The government maintained coordination with the governments of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Benin to strengthen screening and identification of vulnerable unaccompanied children. The government did not report efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts. The government provided anti-trafficking training to its diplomats.

As reported over the past five years, human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in the Republic of the Congo, and traffickers exploit victims from the Republic of the Congo abroad. Forced labor involving adults and children continues to be the primary type of trafficking, predominately in the agricultural sector. Most trafficking victims originate from Benin, Mali, the DRC, and to a lesser extent from Gabon and other neighboring countries. Traffickers exploit children, primarily from West Africa, in domestic servitude or traditional market vending in the cities of Brazzaville, Pointe-Noire, Ouesso, Dolisie, and Nkayi. Anecdotal reports indicate Beninese children make up the majority of children exploited in Brazzaville.

Congolese authorities and civil society representatives report fraudulent employment agents located in Benin, the Central African Republic, the DRC, and Gabon recruit victims into exploitative conditions in the Republic of the Congo. Foreign business owners and Congolese exploit most foreign victims in forced labor in domestic service, market vending, and the fishing sector. Some hotel owners and other criminal actors exploit adults and children in sex trafficking, with the most common victims being from the DRC. Parents in foreign countries, mostly West African countries, sometimes send their children to the Republic of the Congo with the expectation the child will send remittances or receive an education, but instead traffickers exploit the children in sex trafficking or forced labor.

Internal trafficking primarily involves recruitment from remote rural areas for exploitation in cities. Certain communities, including refugees and Indigenous populations, are particularly vulnerable to trafficking. Individuals in the fishing industry and market shop owners were the primary exploiters of victims within the country. Observers reported an influx of refugees from neighboring Central African countries; this population is increasingly vulnerable to trafficking as displacement, food insecurity, and lack of economic opportunity persists. Traffickers, including members of the majority Bantu community, exploit some members of minority Indigenous populations – Baka, Aka, and Kola, in forced labor in the agricultural sector, with Indigenous populations comprising the majority of internal trafficking victims. Cuban government-affiliated medical professionals working in the Republic of the Congo may have been forced to work by the Cuban government.