Sex trafficking
There are a number of misconceptions about sex trafficking. Sex trafficking and human trafficking are not to be confused with human smuggling. Human trafficking for sexual or other labor may involve transporting victims across international borders, but to meet the definition of trafficking, there needs only to be exploitation of an individual after they have been coerced or deceived, so it does not necessarily involve transportation across national borders. Human trafficking and sex trafficking are often used as synonyms. However, trafficking for non-sexual exploitation may be even more prevalent than trafficking for sexual exploitation, though accurate estimates of trafficking rates are extremely difficult to obtain. Sex trafficking tends to receive more attention from aid organizations and donors due to the greater public outrage that forced sexual labor evokes compared to forced non-sexual labor and thus incidents of sex trafficking are more frequently reported.
Human trafficking in the Middle East
For the majority of the 1990s, human trafficking was incorrectly defined as illegal migration, smuggling, or sex work. The UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress, and Punish Trafficking in Persons defines trafficking comprehensively: its focus is on coercion for the purpose of exploitation, and it precludes the possibility of legal consent by the victims of traffickers. In the Middle East, some of the most prevalent forms of human trafficking are forced labor of migrant workers, sexual enslavement and forced prostitution and camel jockeying of young boys.