Human trafficking must be bitterly fought

Speaking during a House of Representatives Social Affairs Committee meeting the other day, chairman Edwin Vassallo said it was believed Malta might be experiencing human trafficking.

The fact is that in terms of human rights Malta needs to ensure the full implementation of the country’s October 2011-December 2012 Action Plan on Combating Trafficking in Persons. The plan lays out the road map of appropriate action to prevent trafficking in persons, to prosecute offenders and to protect victims of this crime.

Human trafficking should not be confused with people smuggling, that is when people freely agree to pay a smuggler to facilitate illegal or irregular entry for them into another country or territory. Trafficking in human beings, especially of women and minors, is different. Here, people are used for sexual or labour exploitation, domestic servitude and forced marriages. This has become a powerful global hidden business involving many countries of origin, transit and destination.

The US State Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report, issued last June, put Malta on the tier 2 watch list for human trafficking. The island is one of only three EU countries that feature on this list.

The Maltese authorities do not consider that there is widespread human trafficking activity in Malta. However, they fittingly strongly believe that even a few cases of human trafficking cannot be tolerated and so are committed to identify them and prosecute as necessary.

One of the main reasons Malta was placed on the US watch list appears to have been that although the government is seen to be taking the issue seriously, its policies and actions are viewed by the US State Department as not yet yielding effective results. They argue that no victims of human trafficking were identified in the year of the report and no investigations or prosecutions begun.

Terence Coonan, an executive director of the Florida State University Centre for the Advancement of Human Rights, who visited Malta, believes that the official figures, which show 10 cases of human trafficking investigated in Malta between 2002 and 2010, resulting in 14 convictions, are just the tip of the iceberg.

He believes that when one goes deeper there may well be more. “I think that may have been the concern of the State Department, that there are potentially cases that are not being looked at or not being prosecuted as expeditiously as they could be,” he said, while also expressing concern about the proliferation of gentlemen’s clubs in Malta.

The well-defined aims of the action plan mentioned earlier include the consolidation of procedures and initiatives relating to trafficking in persons; identifying areas of concern requiring action; enhancing accountability in relation to the delivery of actions within the plan and providing the necessary tools and resources for the development of a holistic strategy in the fight against trafficking in persons.

Additional targets that also require full attention seek to raise awareness among public authorities on the importance of trafficking cases with a view to register greater effectiveness in relation to the prosecution of cases and the identification of victims, and, where necessary, enhancing the administrative capacity of the authorities to deal with human trafficking.

The driving force behind the country’s approach should be the resolve to counteract the scourge of trafficking in human beings with full determination, inspired by a strong belief in the dignity of every person and sustained by the right tools for the identification and proper punishment of traffickers.