• Increase efforts to investigate and prosecute cases of human trafficking, including hereditary slavery, and seek adequate penalties for convicted traffickers, which should involve significant prison terms.
• Dedicate adequate resources to the new special tribunal.
• Proactively screen for trafficking indicators among communities historically exploited in hereditary slavery, migrants, Cuban regime-affiliated workers, women in commercial sex, domestic workers, children in the informal labor sector, and vulnerable women and girls subjected to physical and sexual abuse.
• Continue to implement the NRM to identify and refer all trafficking victims to appropriate care, and train front-line actors, including law enforcement, security forces, judicial officials, social workers, independent labor unions, and civil society, on its use.
• Ensure victims are not inappropriately penalized solely for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficked, such as for prostitution or immigration violations, and cease detaining and prosecuting victims of sexual violence, including victims of sex trafficking and labor trafficking, including hereditary slavery, for fornication or adultery.
• Direct law enforcement to investigate all allegations of human trafficking, including hereditary slavery, and hold government officials accountable for inhibiting or interfering in investigations.
• In collaboration with NGOs, increase trafficking victims’ access to resources, civil documentation, and protection services, including through the dedicated victims’ fund.
• Institutionalize training for law enforcement and judicial actors – including prosecutors, investigative magistrates, and appeals court judges – on the 2015 anti-slavery and 2020 anti-trafficking laws, legally-required procedures for transferring hereditary slavery cases to the special tribunal, and ordering restitution in criminal cases.
• Implement a systematic victim-witness assistance program to increase protective services for victims participating in the criminal justice process, including protection from intimidation or retaliation, and train law enforcement and judicial officials to use victim-centered approaches during investigations and court proceedings.
• Empower the Instance National to Combat Human Trafficking and Migrant Smuggling (INCHTMS) to coordinate the government’s anti-trafficking response, including by implementing a comprehensive NAP, and promoting information sharing and data collection across government agencies.

The government increased anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts.

The 2020 Law on the Prevention and Punishment of Trafficking in Persons criminalized sex trafficking and labor trafficking and prescribed penalties of 10 to 20 years’ imprisonment and a fine of 250,000 to 500,000 Mauritanian ouguiya (MRU) ($6,295 to $12,590). These penalties were sufficiently stringent and, with respect to sex trafficking, commensurate with those prescribed for other grave crimes, such as rape. The 2020 anti-trafficking law correctly included hereditary slavery as a form of human trafficking. Additionally, the 2015 anti-slavery law criminalized hereditary slavery and prescribed sufficiently stringent penalties of five to 20 years’ imprisonment and a fine of 250,000 to 500,000 MRU ($6,295 to $12,590).

The government reported initiating 26 trafficking investigations, compared with 23 investigations during the previous reporting period. The government prosecuted 15 alleged traffickers (five for sex trafficking and 10 for labor trafficking, including two for forced begging) and convicted eight traffickers (six sex traffickers and two labor traffickers). This compared with prosecuting 10 alleged traffickers and convicting nine traffickers during the previous reporting period. The government did not report prosecuting or convicting any traffickers for hereditary slavery crimes, compared with prosecuting nine alleged traffickers and convicting five traffickers for hereditary slavery crimes during the previous reporting period. Courts sentenced traffickers to between two years and 10 years imprisonment. During the reporting period, courts ceased operations for six months to establish a new, dedicated court to hear trafficking-related cases. The government increased collaboration with foreign counterparts, including officials from Senegal and Mali, on law enforcement activities. The government also reported extraditing individuals charged with trafficking crimes but did not provide additional details. An MOJ working group continued collecting and reporting data on cases prosecuted under the anti-trafficking and anti-slavery laws.

Corruption and official complicity in trafficking crimes remained significant concerns, inhibiting law enforcement action during the year. The government reported firing the police commissioner in charge of the Central Office for the Suppression of the Smuggling of Migrants and Trafficking in Persons (COSSMTP) due to allegations of corruption. Observers previously reported some police, prosecutors, and investigative judges refused to investigate and try hereditary slavery crimes, and local authorities encouraged victims and their families to resolve trafficking cases, including hereditary slavery cases, through social mediation rather than the criminal justice system. Some prosecutors reportedly settled cases outside of court (a practice forbidden by the law) or encouraged victims to withdraw their complaints in exchange for a small amount of financial compensation. Corrupt Quranic teachers suspected of exploiting students in forced begging often entered agreements with prosecutors to drop cases.

In February 2025, the government established a new Special Tribunal to Combat Slavery, Trafficking in Persons, and Smuggling of Migrants, replacing the three anti-slavery courts that previously had jurisdiction over all cases charged as hereditary slavery. The special tribunal included a dedicated prosecutor, investigative judge, and two advisors and aimed to be more efficient in handling hereditary slavery and trafficking cases. Experts previously expressed concerns with the three anti-slavery courts, noting courts lacked the adequate staff, resources, and structure to effectively investigate and prosecute cases, which often remained pending for years. Additionally, the previous anti-slavery courts mostly prosecuted slander-related cases rather than cases of hereditary slavery. Observers also reported the appeals court lacked training on the anti-slavery and anti-trafficking laws. In prior years, defendants charged with hereditary slavery frequently absconded to neighboring countries. The Commissariat for Human Rights, Humanitarian Action, and Relations with Civil Society had the authority to introduce cases on behalf of hereditary slavery victims, but reportedly did not do so.

The government provided training for magistrates and judicial officials on the new special tribunal. In collaboration with international organizations, the government trained judges, prosecutors, and law enforcement officials throughout the country on the anti-trafficking and anti-slavery laws. However, some judicial and law enforcement officials continued to lack sufficient training and understanding of human trafficking, including hereditary slavery. Judicial officials conflated human trafficking with other crimes, such as migrant smuggling or sexual abuse. The Ministry of Interior’s Central Office for the Suppression of Migrant Smuggling and Human Trafficking was responsible for screening migrants for trafficking indicators but did not report identifying any trafficking cases.

The government increased efforts to identify and protect trafficking victims.

The INCHTMS identified at least 112 trafficking victims, including 66 children and 46 women. Of the 112 victims, the government reported 30 victims were exploited in hereditary slavery; these were the first hereditary slavery victims the government identified in several years. The government did not report how many of the identified victims it referred to services. This compared with the government identifying at least 105 trafficking victims and referring at least 91 to care in the previous reporting period.

The INCHTMS operated a special fund to aid trafficking victims, including hereditary slavery victims, and support NGOs providing victim services. The INCHTMS signed formal partnerships with two civil society organizations to administer the fund to survivors of hereditary slavery and provide psycho-social services and income-generating activities; the fund provided services to 123 victims. The government allocated 18.1 million MRU ($455,758) to the fund, a significant increase from 8.1 million MRU ($203,958) allocated during the previous reporting period.

The government operationalized an NRM with standardized procedures to identify and refer trafficking victims and vulnerable migrants to services; it provided trainings to frontline officials on the NRM’s use. INCHTMS also distributed a manual on indicators for the identification of trafficking victims to military and law enforcement officials. The National Human Rights Commission (CNDH), a quasi-governmental body, coordinated with an international organization to screen potential hereditary slavery cases brought forth by civil society; CNDH did not screen for other forms of human trafficking, and no cases were identified through this screening mechanism during the reporting period. Observers reported officials previously dismissed or misclassified some cases demonstrating indicators of forced labor as other crimes.

The Ministry of Social Action, Children, and Families (MASEF) managed seven centers nationwide for short-term protection and social integration of vulnerable children, including potential trafficking victims, with financial support from an NGO; three of the centers provided overnight care for children. MASEF opened one new center in Guidimakha during the reporting period. MASEF also operated day centers throughout the country providing psycho-social, food, and vocational assistance to vulnerable families. MASEF generally referred victims to NGOs for long-term care. The government operated a day center in Nouadhibou for adult female victims of sexual violence, including potential trafficking victims, and placed them with host families at night; the center also accommodated migrant and refugee women and girls. There were no specialized services for trafficking victims. NGOs continued to provide the majority of victim services, including shelter, medical, psycho-social, legal, and educational assistance. Shelter and services for adult victims remained severely inadequate, and no shelter could accommodate adult male victims. Foreign nationals and Mauritanian victims were eligible for the same services. Foreign national victims who faced hardship or retribution in their country of origin could apply for asylum or refugee status, but authorities did not report granting these protections to any victims. The government reported repatriating two Mauritanian trafficking victims from Nicaragua but did not refer them to services upon their return.

The government did not have a victim-witness assistance program to support victims’ participation in investigations and prosecutions; it also did not report providing any assistance to protect victim-witnesses from threats or intimidation or protect their identities. Victim-witnesses could not always afford to travel to court proceedings, and the government did not provide transportation or per diem support. The government had legal aid offices throughout the country to support crime victims and maintained a dedicated legal assistance fund for trafficking victims; however, the government did not report providing such legal assistance to any trafficking victims. The government prohibited the use of video testimony, and observers previously reported the government often brought victims and accused traffickers together when conducting interviews, which placed enormous pressure on victims to change their testimony. Pursuant to existing laws, access to victim services was not conditioned on cooperation with law enforcement proceedings; however, this provision was not always respected, and officials sometimes required victims to participate in law enforcement proceedings to receive services. The law allowed victims to obtain restitution, but the court did not report ordering restitution in any cases. However, the complex and opaque legal system and lack of enforcement made such efforts extremely difficult, and ordered restitution was rarely paid. Victims could file civil suits against the traffickers; however, no victims reportedly used this provision, and many victims were not aware of this option.

Due to inadequate screening, the government did not take effective measures to prevent the inappropriate penalization of potential trafficking victims solely for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of being trafficking, including among victims of domestic servitude and sex trafficking as well as individuals in commercial sex and undocumented migrants. Officials previously prosecuted female victims of sexual violence, including some potential sex trafficking and hereditary slavery victims, which discouraged them from participating in investigations and prosecutions; however, the government did not report any such cases during the reporting period.

The government maintained efforts to prevent human trafficking.

The INCHTMS coordinated the government’s nationwide anti-trafficking response, and it met regularly. The prime minister’s office continued to lead an inter-ministerial committee charged with monitoring the government’s progress to combat human trafficking, including hereditary slavery. The INCHTMS continued to implement the 2024-2026 NAP. The government allocated 40.5 million MRU ($1,019,792) to support INCHTMS’s operations, including awareness raising campaigns; this compared to 35 million MRU ($881,301) allocated the previous year.

The government, in collaboration with civil society and religious leaders, continued to hold awareness campaigns and workshops engaging local and civil society leaders across the country to increase public awareness of the anti-slavery and anti-trafficking laws and provided information on identifying and reporting trafficking cases. The government provided some assistance to mahadras (Quranic schools) to support students; however, the government did not report efforts to monitor or regulate mahadras to prevent cases of child forced begging. The INCHTMS and an NGO jointly operated a hotline to report trafficking crimes; it processed more than 300 calls, but the government did not report identifying any trafficking victims from the hotline. The CNDH also operated a hotline to report trafficking crimes, but it did not report identifying any victims. The government also continued to fund an NGO hotline for women and child victims of crime, including trafficking. Despite efforts to raise awareness, some local government officials denied the existence of hereditary slavery, and some high-level officials claimed NGOs and anti-slavery activists fabricated or overstated the number of hereditary slavery cases.

The Ministry of Labor provided minimal anti-trafficking training to new labor inspectors. Inspectors lacked the capacity and training to effectively monitor the large informal sector and did not identify any cases of potential trafficking. The government did not effectively regulate foreign labor recruiters or penalize them for fraudulent recruitment. Although the law prohibited worker-paid recruitment fees, the government’s limited capacity hindered its ability to enforce this provision, especially in the informal sector. Unscrupulous subcontracting agencies (known as tacherons) recruited workers for mining, fishing, and construction work, where workers were vulnerable to labor exploitation, including labor trafficking.

Communities traditionally exploited in hereditary slavery faced difficulty obtaining identity documents, which were required to access basic services. The government did not report any efforts to reduce the demand for commercial sex acts. The government provided peacekeepers with pre-deployment briefings on human rights, including trafficking. Although not explicitly reported as human trafficking, there was one open case of alleged sexual exploitation with trafficking indicators by Mauritanian peacekeepers deployed to the UN peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic in 2018; the government had not reported the accountability measures taken, if any, by the end of the reporting period.

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 Mauritania, and traffickers exploit victims from Mauritania abroad. Traffickers exploit adults and children from the Haratine (Black Moor) and Afro-Mauritanian (Halpulaar, Soninke, and Wolof) communities in hereditary slavery practices rooted in ancestral master-slave relationships, where they are often forced to work without pay as cattle herders and domestic servants. Traffickers force enslaved children as young as five years old to work, and some traffickers hold children as collateral to incentivize their parents’ labor. Traffickers physically and sexually assault enslaved women and girls, who then could be charged with fornication or adultery. Women and girls are charged for Zina (sex outside of marriage) – some women and girls have been convicted of Zina after being raped by their traffickers. Observers report that violence and discrimination against women and girls increases their vulnerability to trafficking. Many survivors of hereditary slavery and their descendants are vulnerable to forced labor, including in the fisheries, mining, domestic work, livestock-herding, and construction sectors, due to a lack of alternate economic opportunities and a lack of legal rights to the land upon which they have traditionally farmed and lived. It is especially difficult for children of Haratine and Afro-Mauritanian descent to obtain birth certificates, resulting in their denial of services, education, and assistance, increasing their vulnerability to trafficking. Traffickers exploit Mauritanian women and girls – especially those from the Black Moor and Afro-Mauritanian communities – in domestic servitude, especially in larger cities. Corrupt Quranic teachers force boys from Mauritania and other West African countries who study at mahadras to beg for food and money; refugee children and children with disabilities are particularly vulnerable to forced begging. Mauritanian and migrant children working in domestic work, livestock-raising, fishing, agriculture, garages, construction, local shops, and garbage-collecting are vulnerable to forced labor.

Traffickers exploit foreigners, especially Malian and Senegalese nationals, in forced labor in the informal sector where they often work without contracts and are exploited in debt bondage. West African women and children are vulnerable to domestic servitude and sex trafficking in Mauritania. During the reporting period, there was a significant influx of Malian refugees and asylum seekers, who are vulnerable to trafficking. Migrants in Nouadhibou have reportedly engaged in commercial sex due to their dire financial situations, increasing their vulnerability to sex trafficking. Traffickers in the port city of Nouadhibou exploit Sub-Saharan African, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi migrants transiting Mauritania en route to Europe in forced labor and sex trafficking; some traffickers pose as migrant smugglers but subsequently exploit migrants in forced labor, sometimes through debt bondage. Mauritanian migrants transiting South and Central America to illegally immigrate to the United States are charged exorbitant smuggling fees and are vulnerable to trafficking. Fraudulent labor recruiters offer Mauritanian women jobs abroad and subsequently exploit them in domestic servitude and sex trafficking in the Gulf, including Saudi Arabia. Observers report social stigma and discrimination of individuals based on their sexual orientation or identity increases vulnerabilities to trafficking. There were Cuban regime-affiliated workers in Mauritania, whom the Cuban regime may have forced to work.