periodic skirmishes persist over water and grazing rights among related pastoral populations along the border with southern Sudan
since 2003, ad hoc armed militia groups and the Sudanese military have driven hundreds of thousands of Darfur residents into Chad; Chad wishes to be a helpful mediator in resolving the Darfur conflict, and in 2010 established a joint border monitoring force with Sudan, which has helped to reduce cross-border banditry and violence; only Nigeria and Cameroon have heeded the Lake Chad Commission's admonition to ratify the delimitation treaty, which also includes the Chad-Niger and Niger-Nigeria boundaries
Refugees and internally displaced persons
refugees (country of origin): 5,774 (Democratic Republic of Congo) (2021)
IDPs: 727,161 (clashes between army and rebel groups since 2005; tensions between ethnic groups) (2021)
current situation: Central African Republic (CAR) is a source, transit, and destination country for children subjected to forced labor and sex trafficking, women subjected to forced prostitution, and adults subjected to forced labor; most victims appear to be CAR citizens exploited within the country, with a smaller number transported back and forth between the CAR and nearby countries; armed groups operating in the CAR, including those aligned with the former SELEKA Government and the Lord's Resistance Army, continue to recruit and re-recruit children for military activities and labor; children are also subject to domestic servitude, commercial sexual exploitation, and forced labor in agriculture, mines, shops, and street vending; women and girls are subject to domestic servitude, sexual slavery, commercial sexual exploitation, and forced marriage
tier rating: Tier 3 - the Central African Republic does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so; the government conducted a limited number of investigations and prosecutions of cases of suspected human trafficking in 2014 but did not identify, provide protection to, or refer to care providers any trafficking victims; the government did not directly provide reintegration programs for demobilized child soldiers, leaving victims vulnerable to further exploitation or retrafficking by armed groups, including those affiliated with the government; in 2014, an NGO and the government began drafting a national action plan against trafficking but no efforts were reported to establish a policy against child soldiering or to raise awareness about existing laws prohibiting the use of children in the armed forces (2015)
current situation: human traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Chad and Chadians abroad; most trafficking is internal; some children are sent by their parents to relatives or intermediaries to receive education, an apprenticeship, goods, or money and are then forced to work in domestic service or cattle herding; children are also forced to work in agriculture, gold mines, charcoal vending, and fishing, and those attending Koranic schools are forced into begging and street vending; girls from rural areas who search for work in larger towns are exploited in sex trafficking and domestic servitude; terrorist groups abduct children to serve as soldiers, suicide bombers, brides, and forced laborers
tier rating: Tier 2 Watch List - Chad does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so; one trafficker was convicted, the first under a 2018 law, but the government did not report investigating or prosecuting alleged traffickers, including complicit government officials; the government adopted a formal Road Map to implement its 2108 National Action Plan but did not report executing it; authorities did not identify any victims and have not drafted victim identification and referral procedures; the government continued to make no effort to raise awareness on trafficking (2020)
