Authorities in five African nations rescued some 500 victims of human trafficking, including 236 children, a November 23 Interpol report said. Two days later, Mexican police rescued 30 women from sex trafficking.

The African operation took place in Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and Senegal and led to the arrest of 40 suspected human traffickers, most of whom are women. Interpol said female traffickers ensnared many of the vulnerable girls and young women into prostitution rings, while other victims were handed over by destitute parents on promises that traffickers would provide them with a better life. But instead, the victims were forced “to engage in activities ranging from begging to prostitution, with little to no regard for working conditions or human life,” Interpol said.

In Mexico, the 30 women—mostly from Colombia and Venezuela—were being held against their will as sex workers.

The two events came during an international outcry after footage emerged of Africans in Libya being sold as slaves for $400 each.

These heart-wrenching accounts show that human trafficking and slavery continue to thrive even in the modern age. In fact, the International Labor Organization (ilo) estimates that in 2016, some 40.3 million men, women and children around the world were victims of slavery. This is more than three times the total number of Africans who were shipped to the Americas during the entire 360-year history of the New World slave trade.

The ilo’s report on modern slavery says traffickers generally prey on the more vulnerable: Seventy-one percent of victims are female, and 1 in 4 is a child.

And it is not limited to the third world. Across the United States, 7,621 cases of trafficking and enslavement were reported in 2016—up from 5,575 the year before.

In the February 2014 Trumpet issue, we wrote about the diabolical modern slave trade that has spread into all corners of the globe—and the solution to the problem:

Slavery isn’t just a scourge of the past. It is in your country, your city, even your neighborhood. But a solution is coming soon that will break the shackles that bind them all. … [T]his evil won’t be cured by anything short of a global revolution. Mercifully, exactly such a revolution is just on the horizon. During Jesus Christ’s earthly ministry, He witnessed some extremes of human suffering. He relieved that suffering among those He healed and preached to personally, but He also made clear that He wasn’t on Earth at that time to use His power to overthrow the existing world order (e.g. Matthew 26:51-54; John 18:36). However, He did promise to return in power and glory, and that at that time He would obliterate injustice! Psalm 12:5 records God saying, “I have seen violence done to the helpless and I have heard the groans of the poor. Now I will rise up to rescue them, as they have longed for me to do” (New Living Translation).

Based on these and other Bible prophecies, world-renowned educator Herbert W. Armstrong painted a vivid and inspiring picture of the age of freedom that Christ will bring about very soon:

All crime and organized rebellion will be put down by force—divine supernatural force. … See, now, a glimpse into a world of no illiteracy, no poverty, no famine and starvation, into a world where crime decreases rapidly, people learn honesty, chastity, human kindness and happiness—a world of peace, prosperity, abundant well-being.

Mr. Armstrong wrote those hope-saturated words in his booklet The Wonderful World Tomorrow—What It Will Be Like, which you can receive a free copy of.

Men, women and children all over the world are in desperate need of this future age of rescue, liberation and peace. The good news is that nothing can prevent the worldwide revolution that will break the shackles off all enslaved and trafficked people.