Malta on US migration failures watch list

The US has put Cyprus, Estonia and Malta on a "watch list" for failures to stop "severe" levels of human trafficking, EUobserver reports.

A US State Department report, issued yesterday, says that "the absolute number of victims of severe forms of trafficking is very significant or is significantly increasing" in the three EU members, but governments are guilty of "failure to provide evidence of increasing efforts" to combat the problem.

Six other EU states - Bulgaria, the Czech republic, Greece, Hungary, Latvia and Romania - were also named for not meeting US standards.

Poor marks were also handed to he majority of EU-aspirant countries in the western Balkans and Turkey, as well as countries seeking EU visa-free travel, such as Moldova, Russia and Ukraine got similarly poor marks.

Secretary of State Hilary Clinton said US diplomats will take backsliders to task.

"This week, US diplomats around the world will be meeting with their host-country governments to review action plans and provide recommendations when needed," she noted. "Even in these tight economic times, we need to look for creative ways to do better."

On Malta, the report says: "African migrants currently residing in Malta may be vulnerable to human trafficking in Malta's informal labour market. There were anecdotal reports that Malta may be a transit country for African women subjected to sex trafficking in continental Europe."

In an example of Maltese shortcomings, it cited the case of a Somali woman in July 2010 who complained to police she was being press-ganged into prostitution and got a six-month suspended sentence for possession of false travel permits.

On Cyprus, the survey complained of sex clubs that use trafficked women from post-Soviet countries, Latin America and Asia.

It added that the government did not convict or sentence any officials complicit in trafficking in Cyprus, which observers allege continued to be a significant problem.

In Estonia, rural Estonian women were trafficked to sex clubs in Tallinn as well as in Finland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy. But the government spent just a little over €100,000 in total on victim assistance in 2010.