Realstars welcome the new EU-strategy against human trafficking – but we are expecting a bigger change that is also connected to sex buying crimes that still lie outside the EU-strategy and directive. Trafficking is today a widely spread problem that affects woman and girls disproportionately. Since the directive came in 2011, EU keeps a more detailed statistic of the crimes and recently the EU-commission released strategy number two. The strategy is welcomed but has few updates. Continued work is required to prevent human trafficking and to counteract the demand of buying sex and to protect woman that has fallen victim to human trafficking.
The EU-commission, with Ylva Johansson in the lead, has communicated an EU strategy on Combatting Trafficking in Human Beings. The new strategy aims to combat trafficking, reduce demand, dismantle the criminal networks and protect, strengthen and support the victims of human trafficking, especially woman and girls.
Despite the EU directive against human trafficking, the commission see that countries lack in the implementation. Realstars welcome further work with minimum EU-rules but the leverage is to implement the Sex Purchase Act fully while the commission mainly discuss a legislation based on the Finnish model, that is to solely criminalize buying sex from victims in human trafficking. Realstars wishes to see increased stakes to follow the money in human trafficking and therefor we see positively on means to break down the criminal business model. We especially welcome that the EU commission mentions massage saloons as a platform for human trafficking.
In our daily work in “Växtkraft Thai” against the thaimassageindustry, we at Realstars hope that going forward, it will be easier to seek funds and constitute joint efforts in this field. We see it as fundamental to our work against commercial sexual exploitation, to expose that the crime mainly affects girls and woman and hope that the Commission actively work towards an EU-campaign against human trafficking.
Today’s statistics show that woman are still seriously exposed to human trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation. Woman and girls make out 72 % of all victims in human trafficking in the EU and account for 99% of all victims in sexual exploitation.
Realstars, as a member of the EU Civil Society Platform, have followed the EU Commission’s work up close and have contributed in workshops twice a year: In 2013, Realstars general secretary Malin Roux Johansson, wrote that “the EU-Commission is facing a big challenge when choosing to balance voices from us that see prostitution as violence against woman (“abolitionists”) and pro-prostitution organizations with strong financial interests”.
We still see that the EU-commission needs to put their foot down with a clear appeal and continue to work towards reducing the demand for buying sex.
Read also our comments about the latest report from 2019
Read the article about EUs challenges from 2013