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A new international convention is needed to prevent trafficking in kidneys and other organs and potentially life-saving tissues and cells, according to a joint study [PDF] by the United Nations and the Council of Europe released Tuesday.
The study calls for international experts to agree on a definition that is recognized worldwide of what constitutes "trafficking in organs, tissues and cells."
Carmen Prior, the public prosecutor of Austria and a co-author of the study, said the definition should be incorporated into an international convention that would include measures to prevent the crime, to protect and assist donors, and to prosecute the traffickers -- "especially intermediaries and brokers and doctors and medical staff involved in such activities."
The study stressed that trafficking in human beings for the purpose of removing an organ is a small part of the wider problem of organ trafficking.
It said exploiting a living person to get an organ is already a crime under a U.N. protocol and a Council of Europe convention against human trafficking, but there is currently no international legal instrument against trafficking in...
The study calls for international experts to agree on a definition that is recognized worldwide of what constitutes "trafficking in organs, tissues and cells."
Carmen Prior, the public prosecutor of Austria and a co-author of the study, said the definition should be incorporated into an international convention that would include measures to prevent the crime, to protect and assist donors, and to prosecute the traffickers -- "especially intermediaries and brokers and doctors and medical staff involved in such activities."
The study stressed that trafficking in human beings for the purpose of removing an organ is a small part of the wider problem of organ trafficking.
It said exploiting a living person to get an organ is already a crime under a U.N. protocol and a Council of Europe convention against human trafficking, but there is currently no international legal instrument against trafficking in...