Trafficking fought by Right of residence for victims?

On the agenda in Strasbourg this week, is the own-initiative report by the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality on strategies to prevent the trafficking of women and children who are vulnerable to sexual exploitation. The problem of Trafficking is growing and should be seen as a global crime of modern slavery that, as we all agree, needs to be halted at all costs. However, over the past years the situation has worsened rather than ameliorated, in this light, the Commission’s plan to abolish the DAPHNE programme seems a very peculiar solution. Annually, an estimated 600,000 to 800,000 human beings are trafficked across international borders; approximately 80 percent are women and girls and up to 50 percent are minors.

Naturally, governments from the nations where the girls and women are trafficked from have an obligation to do everything in their power to inform citizens about the danger and to prosecute traffickers. To a great extent, however, it is the market for sexual services in the countries where the women are trafficked to, that determines the state of affairs. The bigger the demand for prostitutes, the larger their number; the shoddier the policies against traffickers, the worse the women’s conditions; the more neglectant the police, the more unlikely that the women will get out of their miserable situations.

Recognising this, the report calls on all levels of government to give priority to the battle against trafficking and start awareness raising activities to lower demand, zero-tolerance policies towards the criminal networks, and to follow the example of Belgium and Italy, which grant a "right of residence" for victims after the traffickers have been tried. Guaranteed assitance would encourage victims to give statements and help secure the conviction of offenders. This approach, I would add, is also supportive to the interests of the women who don’t deserve to be treated like criminals for being trafficked without a residence or working permit.

Indeed, it is vital that any anti-trafficking programme prioritises victims to offenders and assists the women in getting out of prostitution and on with their lives. The report calls for re-intergration programmes and international telephone help-lines. Of course, the women should be helped by people who speak their language and they must not be hosted in regular women’s houses where former prostitutes are often seen as outcasts. Yet, more important and most complicated is to ensure that they make the first step away from their pimps.

Five years ago, the Netherlands legalised prostitution in an effort to decriminalise the scene and to facilitate the police in their role to effectively help the women who are being abused to quit the “business”. It was perceived as a very smart way to modify the police to a prostitute’s friend and trustee; there would be, and are indeed, inspections every night. Pimps would no longer be needed by the newly empowered prostitutes because only self-employed sexworkers themselves have a right to hire a window in the red light districts.

Yet, if recent reports are true, this approach – in spite of good results regarding the position of native Dutch prostitutes - has failed dramatically and facilitated trafficking in stead of eliminated it. Local politicians as well as NGOs, awaiting the results of further investigation, blame the police for not acting when they are confronted with forced prostitution. Austrian Socialist MEP Christa Prets, who drafted the European Parliament’s report, does not directly reject the legalisation either but also calls for more research.

More and better data on the situation and policy-effects in the EU Member States is urgently needed, especially from Belgium, Italy, Sweden, and the Netherlands, to give insights to the most (and least) effective means to protect the victims and stop the traffickers. The right of residence for trafficked and exploited women should be installed everywhere as soon as possible and the European Commission and Parliament should take the lead in bringing about a comprehensive common policy Programme for the elimination of human trafficking and forced prostitution.

Janna Besamusca
ECOSY Feminist Network coordinator and Bureau Member
Jonge Socialisten in de PvdA, Netherlands