BRUSSELS—The European Union (EU) on Monday took to task its member-states for not implementing new rules on human trafficking, as a report revealed that convictions of traffickers have been in decline even though the number of victims is on the rise.
“As we speak, men, women and children are being sold for sex, hard labor.... They are forced into marriages, domestic servitude, begging or have their organs removed for trade,” EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom noted.
“It is high time now for member-states to stop dragging their feet and to show the victims that this is taken seriously,” she added, calling the crime the “slavery of our times.”
The EU’s 27 countries agreed in 2011 to the new rules, which would implement a common definition of human trafficking, allow cross-border prosecution and offer more victim support.
But only six of them transposed the rules into national legislation by the April 6, 2013, deadline: the Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Latvia, Poland and Sweden.
Belgium, Lithuania and Slovenia partially transposed the rules.
Malmstrom said she isn’t sure why oth er countries have not followed suit, but warned that the EU is ready to use the tools at its disposal to force implementation—which include the possibility to bring a country before the bloc’s top court.
German government spokesman Steffen Seibert said a draft law is still being debated in his country’s Justice Ministry, but insisted that it has a “resolute stance against human trafficking.”
The report released on Monday was the first on trafficking in the EU prepared by the commission, in conjunction with the bloc’s statistics agency, Eurostat. It found that 23,632 people were “identified or presumed victims” of the crime in 2008-2010. But Malmstrom warned that this is only “the tip of the iceberg,” as many more cases likely go unreported.
More than 60 percent of the victims hailed from other countries inside the EU, most notably Bulgaria and Romania. Most non-EU victims came from Nigeria and China, according to the report.
It said that 62 percent of victims were trafficked for sexual exploitation. But demand for forced labor is also up because of the economic crisis, according to Malmstrom.
Within the three years covered by the report, the number of people trafficked in the EU rose by 18 percent. But, at the same time, criminal convictions of traffickers dropped by 13 percent—going from 1,534 in 2008 to 1,339 two years later.
“We know from contacts with the police that it’s quite difficult to prove the crime of trafficking,” Malmstrom noted. “That’s why it so important to have the [EU] directive in place.”
Source: http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/index.php/news/world/12146-eu-states-told-to-strengthen-drive-vs-human-trafficking
