Abolishing Slavery in the 21st Century

This is very sad (emphasis mine):

On the night the British parliament passed the bill abolishing the British slave trade, William Wilberforce turned to his colleague Henry Thornton and asked, “Well, Henry, what shall we abolish next?” As we near the 200th anniversary of British abolition we should take up Wilberforce’s question as our own, answering as he did: slavery. For despite the extraordinary work of the abolitionists, there are more slaves today than were seized from Africa in four centuries of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.*

In 2004, the U.S. Government estimated that of the 600,000 to 800,000 men, women, and children trafficked across international borders each year, approximately 80 percent are women and girls, and up to 50 percent are minors.

Related: View the interactive map that shows the reach of modern-day slavery

*National Geographic, "21st Century Slaves"

(1) State Department, Trafficking in Persons Report, June 2003
(2) Free the Slaves, Slavery Today facts

Read the whole thing.