More than 29 million people worldwide live like slaves

The country has the highest percentage of slaves in terms of population. In absolute numbers, the most slaves lived in india: 14 million people.

Western countries landed in the bottom quarter of the slave index. "But that does not mean that there are no slaves in these countries," the report states. Germany comes in 136th out of 162 countries. Around 10,000 people are to live here like slaves. The authors admit that they arrived at this figure only by mathematical comparison with other countries. "Because modern slavery is a hidden crime, the true numbers are probably higher," it says. At the bottom of the ranking – i.E. With the fewest problems – are nine european countries and new zealand.

"Modern slavery has many forms," it continues. "Human trafficking, forced labor, debt bondage, forced marriage, abuse of children in armed conflicts", are paid off. "Victims of modern slavery are denied freedom and are used and controlled by others, either for money, sex, or for the lust of domination."

Slavery has deep roots in mauritania, write authors. Slave families were inherited like other owning families, and children of slaves also became serfs again. Haiti and pakistan are in second and third place. In absolute numbers, china (3 million) and pakistan (2.1 million) follow india by a wide margin. Russia is the only country in the top ten that is not from asia or africa, with a good half million slaves.

Australian commodities magnate andrew forrest founded the "walk free" foundation with his own money a few months ago, according to a spokeswoman. Their mission is the abolition of slavery. She wants to publish a similar report every year from now on. Lead author is american anthropologist and sociologist kevin bales, who has been researching slavery for years. According to a spokeswoman for the foundation, "walk free" took its data material as well as information from the UN children’s fund unicef on the marriage of minors and information on human trafficking and used it to calculate the number of slaves in individual countries.