"We congratulate for the progress and renew our commitment to rid the world of all forms of slavery.”

This was the inscription by IOM Director General William Lacy Swing, on Friday 5 June, on a panel symbolizing the support for the “50 for Freedom” campaign to end modern slavery, organized by the International Labor Organization.

The campaign has the goal of encouraging 50 member states to ratify, by 2018, the Protocol to the Convention on Forced Labour signed 85 years ago. So far, 177 countries have ratified it.

This Convention is central to IOM’s work on behalf of migrant workers, who are often very vulnerable and can end up modern day slaves.

Fighting modern slavery is the mission for all, by all, because freedom is indivisible and because the fight for our freedom should be the fight for Mankind’s freedom.

“No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.” –Frederick Douglass, 19^th-century African American abolitionist who escaped from slavery.

Watch DG's interview here.