• Increase and institutionalize anti-trafficking training for police, prosecutors, judges, and the Inter-institutional Commission to Combat Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking in Persons’ (CICESCT) Immediate Response Team (IRT), with a focus on applying trauma-informed, victim-centered procedures and investigating and prosecuting forced labor.
• Ensure authorities order all convicted traffickers to pay compensation to victims, as required by Honduran law.
• Increase training for front-line officials on implementing SOPs for victim identification and referral, including screening for indicators of trafficking among migrants.
• To prevent forced labor among Cuban workers in Honduras, hire any Cuban workers directly and utilize hiring practices in line with domestic and international law, and provide adequate protection to Cuban victims of human trafficking.
• Investigate and prosecute traffickers, including complicit officials and perpetrators of forced labor crimes, and seek adequate penalties for convicted traffickers, which should involve significant prison terms.
• Increase the availability of and resources for protection services – including short-term and long-term shelters – for all trafficking victims.
• Expand access to services for male victims and victims outside major cities.
• Ensure the definition of human trafficking within the law includes force, fraud, and coercion as essential elements.
• Expand prevention measures, including raising awareness of fraudulent recruitment for employment in Honduras and abroad and punishing employers or employment agencies for illegal practices that facilitate trafficking, such as fraudulent offers of employment or illegal fees for migration or job placement.

The government slightly increased prosecution efforts.

Amendments to Article 219 of the Honduran penal code, which took effect in November 2021, criminalized sex and labor trafficking and prescribed penalties of 10 to 15 years’ imprisonment. These penalties were sufficiently stringent and, with respect to sex trafficking, commensurate with those prescribed for other grave crimes, such as rape. However, the 2021 amendments included a definition of trafficking that established the use of force, fraud, or coercion as aggravating factors rather than essential elements of the crime.

The government reported investigating 42 trafficking cases, including 34 for sex trafficking and eight for forced labor; this was compared to investigating 84 cases (81 for sex trafficking and three for forced labor) in 2023. Authorities initiated prosecutions of 69 suspects (51 for sex trafficking and 18 for labor trafficking), an increase from 2023, when authorities initiated prosecutions of 48 suspects (42 for sex trafficking and related crimes and six for labor trafficking). The government did not report continuing prosecutions initiated in prior years. Courts convicted 30 traffickers, including 28 for sex trafficking and two for forced labor, an increase from 21 traffickers convicted in 2023 (including 18 for sex trafficking and three for unspecified forms of trafficking). Some of the cases reported by the government may have included crimes that did not constitute trafficking as defined by international law. The government did not report sentencing information for convicted traffickers. The government did not report any prosecutions or convictions of officials for alleged complicity in trafficking crimes. However, corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained concerns. The government did not report updates to a previously initiated investigation of one police officer for alleged complicity in trafficking crimes.

The government maintained a specialized prosecution unit responsible for investigating and prosecuting trafficking, commercial sexual exploitation, and alien smuggling crimes. This unit included prosecutors and investigative police officers and had offices in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula. However, experts observed police and prosecution units remained understaffed and lacked sufficient resources to effectively investigate and prosecute trafficking crimes, particularly outside major urban areas. Experts observed that judges lacked specialized knowledge of human trafficking crimes, impeding successful prosecution and conviction of traffickers, and judges frequently re-traumatized victims.

The government maintained mixed protection efforts.

The government identified 49 victims, including 42 exploited in sex trafficking, five exploited in labor trafficking, one exploited in unspecified trafficking, and one exploited for the purpose of forced criminality. This was a decrease compared to identifying 95 victims in 2023, including 78 exploited in sex trafficking and 17 exploited in labor trafficking. Sex trafficking victims included 32 girls, eight women, and one boy; labor trafficking victims included four girls, and one man; one woman was identified as a victim of unspecified trafficking; and one boy was exploited for forced criminality. Identified victims included four Honduran sex trafficking victims exploited abroad, including two in Guatemala, one in Mexico, and one in Spain.

First responders referred trafficking victims to CICESCT’s IRT and protection centers, which were funded by the government and managed by NGOs, for immediate support. The IRT employed a multidisciplinary team that provided immediate care to victims and coordinated with relevant government institutions and NGOs to provide victims with comprehensive services including mental health counseling, legal services, medical care, lodging, food, family reintegration, and immigration assistance. The government did not report providing services to victims identified in 2024 compared to providing services to all 95 victims identified in 2023.

CICESCT did not report the number of victims it referred to shelters. The government could refer child victims to shelters operated by its child protection agency, the Secretariat for Children, Adolescents, and Families. These shelters served children in need of protection but did not provide specialized services for trafficking victims. Some shelters allowed children to leave and attend public schools following an evaluation of their individual needs. CICESCT could also refer some victims to NGO shelters, including a shelter that served children vulnerable to trafficking and child victims of crime and a temporary shelter that served women victims of crimes, including trafficking. None of the shelters that assisted trafficking victims accepted men. While the government did not operate specialized shelters, CICESCT allocated funds in support of at least two NGO specialized shelters. The government provided supplies including food, medications, educational material, and toiletries, and covered travel expenses and medical examinations for victims. The government offered few services for victims in rural areas, and the quality of care for victims outside urban areas was inadequate.

The government implemented a victim assistance manual with SOPs for the proactive identification of victims among members of at-risk groups and interagency coordination procedures for referring victims to services. In partnership with foreign governments, the specialized prosecution unit developed a new manual for investigating human trafficking cases; however, the manual was not approved or disseminated by the end of the reporting period. The government continued funding CICESCT offices with permanent staff in the departments of Atlántida, Colón, Cortés, and Islas de la Bahia, and an office based in the Garifuna community of Corozol providing access to services for members of this at-risk community. CICESCT used an action protocol for the IRT and developed three new localized action protocols for local committees on victim identification and assistance in their respective municipalities. The protocols were implemented in 19 of CICESCT’s 24 local committees. Local experts reported the government made insufficient efforts to identify labor trafficking victims. The government did not screen Cuban regime-affiliated professionals working in Honduras for trafficking indicators, despite concerns the Cuban regime may have forced many of them to work. The government followed a regional protocol to facilitate the repatriation of Honduran victims identified in Guatemala, Mexico, and Spain, and provided them with specialized services. The government allocated 40 million lempiras ($1.58 million) to CICESCT in 2024. The government did not make operational the Fund for the Care of Victims of Human Trafficking and Related Activities, which it approved in November 2023 with plans to allocate up to two million lempiras ($79,000) to provide direct support to victims though the fund.

The government provided victim-witness assistance services, including long-term reintegration support, to some victims participating in investigations or prosecutions. Authorities permitted victims to provide testimony through written statements or pre-recorded interviews in one of its four secure Gesell chambers. The government implemented measures to ensure victim-witnesses’ and their families’ personal data remained confidential. IRT members accompanied victims throughout their participation in the criminal justice process and referred some victims to legal aid services for additional assistance. Provisions in Honduran law directed courts to order convicted traffickers to pay victims compensation; the government reported judges ordered an unspecified number of convicted traffickers to pay restitutions to victims during the year, and authorities reported difficulties enforcing payments of restitutions to victims. NGOs reported Gesell chambers were unavailable outside large cities and officials in rural areas often used harsh questioning that re-traumatized some victims, especially children. Honduran law prohibited the prosecution of victims for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked. The government reported officials screened for trafficking indicators when detaining illegal migrants or other individuals vulnerable to trafficking. However, the government lacked formal procedures for identifying victims among children apprehended for gang-related criminal activity and NGOs reported authorities did not properly identify some children forced to engage in illegal activities by criminal groups; as a result, authorities did not take effective measures to prevent the inappropriate penalization of potential victims solely for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked. Honduran law allowed foreign victims to receive temporary or permanent residency status, including authorization to work.

The government slightly increased prevention efforts.

CICESCT partnered with a foreign government, international organizations, and NGOs to develop a survivor-led advisory council to inform policies on human trafficking. CICESCT held three roundtables with survivors to analyze and propose amendments to the trafficking law. The government allocated 2.56 million lempiras ($101,130) for CICESCT-led prevention efforts. The CICESCT board of directors met monthly and provided support to 24 local interinstitutional committees across each of Honduras’ 18 departments. The government reported implementing its Strategic Action Plan against Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Trafficking in Persons 2023-2030, but it did not make this plan public. CICESCT conducted information events and monthly trainings and fora on trafficking prevention for the tourism sector and law enforcement officials, healthcare personnel, teachers, students, and transportation employees. CICESCT implemented informational campaigns and workshops, organized media appearances, and led direct engagements with populations vulnerable to trafficking.

CICESCT maintained a public website and social media accounts to share information on human trafficking with the public and encourage reporting of suspected trafficking crimes. CICESCT opened an additional trafficking-specific hotline to increase capacity and continued operating a second trafficking-specific hotline. The hotlines could receive phone calls and messages. CICESCT forwarded all reports to the Office of the Public Prosecutor for the identification of potential victims and investigation of potential cases. The anti-trafficking prosecution unit and CICESCT managed email accounts for trafficking complaints.

In February 2024, the government signed a bilateral agreement with the Cuban regime for the hiring of 120 Cuban regime-affiliated medical workers despite ongoing concerns by international experts that the Cuban regime compels many of them to work. Honduran regulations prohibited charging recruitment fees to workers. The Secretariat of Labor and Social Security monitored compliance with labor laws and policies that could decrease workers’ vulnerability to trafficking, including those regulating private employment agencies, recruitment and contracting of Honduran workers abroad, and employment of at-risk groups, such as domestic workers and seafarers. However, the government did not report efforts to hold employers or employment agencies accountable for unlawful practices that facilitated trafficking in 2024. CICESCT and the Honduran Tourism Institute continued to coordinate with their regional counterparts to conduct an awareness raising campaign aimed at the prevention of extraterritorial commercial child sexual exploitation and abuse by foreign tourists in Honduras. The government did not report efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts.

Trafficking affects all communities. This section summarizes government and civil society reporting on the nature and scope of trafficking over the past five years. Human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Honduras, and traffickers exploit victims from Honduras abroad. Traffickers exploit Honduran women and children in sex trafficking within the country and in other countries such as Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Spain, and the United States. Traffickers particularly target Hondurans based on their sexual orientation or identity, migrants – including those seeking to illegally immigrate to the United States – Indigenous and Afro-descendant Hondurans, IDPs, persons with disabilities, children in child labor, children whose parents have migrated, and individuals living in areas controlled by organized criminal groups. Traffickers exploit victims within their own homes or communities, including their own family members or friends. Traffickers exploit Honduran adults and children within the country in forced labor in street vending, forced begging, domestic service, drug trafficking, and the informal sector. Traffickers also exploit Honduran victims in forced labor in other countries, particularly Guatemala, Mexico, and the United States. Children are at risk of debt bondage, slavery, and forced labor in the agricultural, construction, manufacturing, mining, and hospitality industries. Children experiencing homelessness are at risk of sex and labor trafficking. Criminal organizations, including gangs, exploit girls in sex trafficking, force children into street begging, and coerce and threaten children and young adults to transport weapons, produce and sell drugs, commit extortion, or serve as lookouts; these acts occur primarily in urban areas. Criminals increasingly use social network platforms to recruit victims, often through fake advertisements and false promises of employment or deceptive romantic relationships, and continue to target populations vulnerable to trafficking. The Cuban regime may have forced Cuban regime-affiliated workers, including at least 120 medical professionals and 123 teachers, to work in Honduras. Men from Canada and the United States exploit Honduran children in extraterritorial commercial child sexual exploitation and abuse. Illegal aliens from Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Central America, the Middle East, and South America who transit Honduras en route to the United States are vulnerable to trafficking.