Lecture 8 – Human Trafficking (Conny Rijken - Intervict)
What are we going to talk about? We will talk about human trafficking but what is human
trafficking? It is some kind of modern slavery. Its not only about sexual exploitation but also
about forced labour. They are mostly kidnapped but kidnapping is not necessarily. You can
also see human trafficking in art 7 of the Rome Statute and there you can see that it is
broader and not only about sexual exploitation but also forced removal of organs etc.
Students give examples of human trafficking like the news of migrants in the container in UK
or lover boys etc. However, for human trafficking it is not necessary that a border is crossed.
One may be exploited by a neighbour without a border-crossing element. There are 3
elements in human trafficking and we will talk about this later.
If we look into the numbers of human trafficking then we can see that there is a high no. of
estimated victims but many victims remain under the radar out of shame or because they
are afraid. But also because the rate/chance that people get convicted for human trafficking
is very low. Even if the prosecutor thinks that it is a clear-cut-case, even then it is very
difficult to get a person convicted for human trafficking. That is of course not encouraging
for the victim to go to the police. There is also a lack of support. But also because people for
example don’t know that forced criminal activity is labelled as human trafficking, in the
example of lover boys the girls think that it is their own fault etc. The ILO coalifies human
trafficking as a form of forced labour and they estimate that there are 21 million victims of
forced labour worldwide.
,In the Netherlands the no. of victims was always around 1000 but in 2018 it has decreased.
The reason of decreasing no. is probably that victims remain under the radar more because
we have no reason to believe that human traffickers have become more active. Also the
police lacks expertise on human trafficking. People outside Europe who don’t have a valid
residency in the Netherlands, have to cooperate with the police first before getting a
residence permit. That is also a big hurdle because if the police doesn’t see any leads they
will not investigate as where they are obliged. This is a big obstacle specially for people from
third country nationals wo are victim of human trafficking to get access to the support
organization. The government has started a pilot for people who have reported a case of
human trafficking but the case has been dismissed, but who might be a victim of human
trafficking. That is the distinction because you can be a victim of human trafficking but it is
very difficult for the police to find the trafficker. Often people are kept in a house and they
don’t even know that they are in NL or who is sexually exploiting them. Even if they
somehow get to the police, they still can’t provide any information for the police to find the
trafficker. If there is no criminal case then the victim who reported won’t get a residence
permit. If you don’t have a residence permit then you won’t get any help, access to a
support organization or legal support. Victims without a residence permit are deprived of
support for victims of human trafficking. So it’s a big risk for the victim. The reason for the
possibility of victims staying under the radar longer is also for example the European Privacy
regulation (AVG). The number of victims is probably 5-10 times higher than the number of
registered cases. Information about human trafficking in different countries is available via
TIP and the GRETA reports. See the slide above for more information about the numbers.
On this slide you can see the various forms of human trafficking. The list is not limitative,
there are also other forms of human trafficking. The list above is a open norm.
,The most important legal documents is the Human Trafficking Protocol and it is
supplementing the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime. We call the
convention against transnational organized crime, the mother convention. The provisions in
the Convention against Transnational Organized Crime are on extradition, criminal
cooperation, mutual legal assistance etc. That is in cases of transnational trafficking
extremely important because the victims in NL are often from countries where there is no
cooperative agreement with. For instance we had the Colvis (?) case in 2008. The modus
operandi was that there were minor girls who came to NL and said that they were seeking
for asylum. So they were unaccompanied minors and there was a separate accommodation
for unaccompanied minors in the asylum procedure. The girls would stay for e few days in
these accommodations and after a few days they would disappear from the accommodation
and no one knew where they were. Later, in an international cooperation with Belgium and
Italy it was found out that there was a complete human trafficking network from Nigeria.
The network would recruit these girls under a voodoo-scam and they would bring these girls
to the Netherlands. Afterwards the girls would disappear from the accommodation and
brought to Italy and Belgium where they were sexually exploited. So they used the asylum
procedure for accompanied minors to get into a safe place in the country, so they would be
picked up by the network. The girls would be manipulated by saying that if you don’t do this,
then the voodoo will come upon you and bad things will happen to you and your family.
These girls and their familied would agree that these girls go abroad. In this case there was a
need for cooperation with Nigeria but there were no bilateral agreement or whatsoever. The
UN Convention was used as a legal basis for the cooperation and was very successful in the
end.
So next to the trafficking protocol we also have a smuggling protocol which is also a protocol
to the UN Convention against transnational organized crime. On the regional level (the
European level) we have the Council of Europe Convention on action against trafficking in
human beings. We also have an Asian convention on action against trafficking in human
beings and the European convention has been the blue print to the Asian convention. In the
context of the European Union we have the directive on preventing and combating
trafficking in human beings and protecting its victims, which means that it has a direct effect
if not correctly implemented. It is not only a directive on human trafficking but it is much
broader. Here you see the three P-paradigm reflected in the title of the EU-directive. The
, three P-paradigm (prosecution/ punishment, prevention and protection of its victims) is the
obligation States have in relation to human trafficking.
On the slide you can see the definition of human trafficking. The definition is very vague and
shows why there is a need for implementation on national level.
If we rephrase the definition, then it’s actually a forced recruitment with terms of
exploitation.
The first part (‘’trafficking in persons shall mean….receipt of persons’’) is the forced
recruitment part which consists an act. So it’s not only about transporting a person
but also for example if you accommodate a person or recruit a person online by
saying that you have a nice job in Dubai. That is also recruitment because your aim is
to not let the person actually work in a restaurant but to exploit that person.
The second part (‘’by means of….’’) means that recruitment process is done
forcefully. It is very broad because it’s not only about using violence but also ‘’abuse
of power’’ (if you have some kind of control over a person) or the abuse of the
vulnerability. So it is a very broad concept because when is a person a vulnerable
person? For example having a low income in NL doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re
in a position of vulnerability. If you are a refugee with a status and you don’t
understand how it works in NL, have some trauma from the past in the country of
origin and have a low income, that might be a position of vulnerability. So
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