ANA PALACIOS, SPAIN
BENIN: FREED FROM SLAVERY
Sometimes they are sold for about 30 Euros by their extremely poor families. Sold to people who exploit them as housekeepers or for other kinds of labor. It is a modern form of slavery across country borders and still a part of the sad reality in the lives of thousands of children in West Africa. But there are institutions that fight against this kind of child trafficking. They are a kind of back door to escape slavery.

© Ana Palacios, Spain (Freelance Photographer)
Spanish photographer Ana Palacios therefore called her photo series about rescue centers for slave children, like the one in Cotonou, Benin, “The Back Door”. At the center, children who have managed to flee or were no longer of use to their “owners” are taken care of by psychologists and teachers. There they try to identify the children they have taken in and to find their natural parents. Sometimes there are even girls and boys from Togo and Ghana. And even though these rescue centers are meagerly equipped, they provide for something essential: Security.
Curriculum Vitae: Ana Palacios (Freelance Photographer)

© Ana Palacios