Nodira Karimova, coordinator of the International Organization for Migration\'s countertrafficking project in Uzbekistan, told a news conference in Tashkent on 12 November that the project has rescued 179 victims of human trafficking in its first year. Karimova said that the project had helped the victims to return home from abroad. A report by RFE/RL\'s Uzbek Service the same day quoted Muzaffar Aminov, a Surkhondaryo resident who recently returned from Russia, as saying that many Uzbeks are currently employed as virtual slaves in Russia. Victims of human traffickers told RFE/RL that most of the people in the criminal gangs that prey on Uzbeks desperate for work are also Uzbeks. (RFE/RL)