The recent Tides Momentum Leadership Conference featured innovators and activists from around the world passionate about discussing current challenges and striving to forge a more equitable and sustainable society.
One such activist, Mimi Chakarova, has spent an extensive amount of time as an undercover photojournalist documenting the lives of sex workers caught in the complicated web of sex trafficking and slavery. Chakarova presented her findings in a gripping speech at the conference and has also co-produced a website along with the Center for Investigative Reporting.
Born in Bulgaria, Chakarova moved to the states at age 13 but then returned to her homeland two years later to catch up with friends and family. Startled to find that many of her peers had left the country and had ceased contact with their families, she later learned that several of them had been forced into sex slavery in countries such as Germany and Italy.
Chakarova has spent the last seven years researching the topic of “the new phenomena of sex slavery in the 21st century.” “I wanted to understand the root causes of how so many women of my generation were sold into prostitution against their will,” says Chakarova. After posing as a prostitute in Istanbul, she compiled her interviews and photos and has lectured at numerous conferences and panels.
Her desire to give voice to her silenced subjects propels her honest and intense reporting. “For me, being sold is the same as being killed; it’s just a different form of dying,” she says. Watch Chakarova’s speech at the Tides Momentum Conference and also at her multimedia website, The Price of Sex–Women Speak.
