A/HRC/11/36/Add.2 page 9 23. Slavery was first abolished in Mauritania in 1905 following colonization by France, in a colonial decree implementing in Mauritania the law adopted in 1848 abolishing slavery in all French colonies. Abolition was reaffirmed at independence by the 1961 Constitution, which incorporated the principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 24. Order No. 081-234 of 9 November 1981 on the abolition of all forms of slavery was promulgated in the context of a review of basic legal texts following the proclamation of sharia law in 1980 in order to underscore the acceptance by Muslim jurists of laws adopted under positive law. Article 1 of the Order definitively abolished slavery throughout the national territory but did not impose a criminal penalty for slavery. Article 2 stated that compensation for the abolition of slavery would be provided to rightful claimants, i.e., slave-owners. However, no implementing regulations were adopted for the Order, which rendered it without practical effect. 25. On 25 June 2003 the Government adopted Act No. 025/2003 on combating human trafficking. Pursuant to that Act, the expression human trafficking means, inter alia, the recruiting, transport or transfer of persons by force, intimidation or other forms of constraint; by abduction, deceit, abuse of authority or exploitation of a person in a vulnerable situation; or by offering or accepting payment or other advantages with a view to obtaining the consent of a person in a position of authority over another, for the purpose of exploitation. The Act provides for criminal penalties up to hard labour for life for the perpetrators of such crimes. 26. The adoption on 3 September 2007 of the Act criminalizing slavery and punishing slavery-like practices was a turning point in the approach to this issue in Mauritania. The Prime Minister, introducing the bill, described it as “a decisive turning point, aimed at the elimination of all the wrongs inherited from the past, the promotion of a culture of equality, tolerance and citizenship and the establishment of favourable conditions for progress and the emancipation of all Mauritanians”. That position is in contrast to the attitude of complete denial at the highest level of the State in the past, as evidenced for example in 1997 when President Ould Taya stated that those who raised the issue of slavery were only trying to tarnish the country’s image and must be linked to a group previously involved in an attempted coup d’état. More recently, in September 2001, a representative of the Government of Mauritania stated to the Committee on the Rights of the Child that “Mauritanian society had never known servitude, exclusion or discrimination [...] and no vestiges of such practices could thus persist”.1 27. Article 2 of the Act defines slavery as “the exercise of all or some of the rights of property over one or more persons”. Article 3 prohibits “discrimination, in any form, against a person alleged to be a slave”. The crime of slavery is held to occur when “any person reduces another person, or a person under their care or responsibility, to slavery or incites them to forfeit their liberty or dignity, for the purpose of enslaving them” and is punishable by 5 to 10 years’ imprisonment and a fine of 500,000 to 1 million ouguiyas (art. 4). 1 Summary record of the 724th meeting of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, 25 September 2001 (CRC/C/SR.724).