Saint Lucia
Military: SAINT LUCIA
Military branches:
no regular military forces; Royal Saint Lucia Police Force (includes Special Service Unit, Marine Unit) (2012)
Military service age and obligation:
18 years of age for voluntary security service; no national army (2012)
Manpower available for military service:
males age 16-49: 41,414 (2010 est.)
Manpower fit for military service:
males age 16-49: 32,688
females age 16-49: 36,289 (2010 est.)
Manpower reaching militarily significant age annually:
male: 1,574
female: 1,502 (2010 est.)
Military expenditures:
NA
Transnational Issues: SAINT LUCIA
Disputes - international:
joins other Caribbean states to counter Venezuela's claim that Aves Island sustains human habitation, a criterion under United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which permits Venezuela to extend its Economic Exclusion Zone/continental shelf over a large portion of the eastern Caribbean Sea
Trafficking in persons:
current situation: St. Lucia is a destination country for persons subjected to forced prostitution and forced labor; legal and illegal immigrants from Haiti, Jamaica, the Dominican Republic, Guyana, and South Asia, especially those working in domestic service, are vulnerable to human trafficking; some children under 18 are coerced to work in St. Lucia's commercial sex industry
tier rating: Tier 2 Watch List - St. Lucia does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so; the government did not report any investigations, prosecutions, or convictions of trafficking offenders or public officials complicit in human trafficking in 2012 or 2011, although a counter-trafficking act was passed in 2010; the government helps protect trafficking victims by funding an NGO and running a system of informal shelters but lacks formal procedures for identifying victims and referring them to available protection and assistance services; St. Lucia is not a party to the 2000 UN TIP Protocol (2013)
Illicit drugs:
transit point for South American drugs destined for the US and Europe
