Hidden Truths: Recruitment Practices and Human Trafficking
On the 30th of September 2020, the Panel Discussion Hidden Truths: Recruitment Practices and Human Trafficking was organised within the framework of a transnational project “Competence building, Assistance provision and Prosecution of labour exploitation cases in the Baltic Sea Region” (CAPE). The aim of CAPE is to support relevant national and local authorities in the Baltic Sea Region in combating and prosecuting cases of forced labour and labour exploitation as well as assisting victims of this form of human trafficking. For this purpose, and to provide a better understanding of trafficking for labour exploitation, research was carried out in Germany, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. These four studies focused on recruitment practices of labour migrants in countries of origin and examined different forms that human trafficking for labour exploitation takes in destination countries and were presented at the panel discussion by the authors. The panel discussion was held in English and was attended by approximately 50 professionals from the CBSS Member states, such as Police, Social services, NGOs and Migration agencies.
Although the four authors in the panel – Dr. Julia Muraszkiewics, Luiza Lupascu, Dr. Reda Sirgediene, Gita Miruskina – focused on different aspects of Human Trafficking for Forced Labour and Labour Exploitation in their reports, they identified common challenges and best practices. First and foremost, Human Trafficking does not occur isolated from our societies but must be viewed in a broader context. Legislation affecting the presence, and extent of, labour exploitation must be looked into in order to understand the phenomenon of exploitation. If a country is equipped with poor labour legislation and weak institutional mandates to counter exploitation, it is likely that Human Trafficking for Forced Labour and Labour Exploitation will increase, and the perpetrators go unpunished.
The victims continue to be individuals with a poor socio-economic background and in the majority of cases foreign nationals. However, as identified in the Polish report, traffickers also pray on vulnerable individuals such as young men who were previously inmates or homeless persons.
Moreover, the recruitment practices play a major role in the complex set-up which is Labour Exploitation. Criminal and unscrupulous recruitment companies adjust quickly to the existing legislation in order to identify loopholes or simply break the law as they view the chances of being punished as narrow. Moreover, although some states offer job opportunities abroad through safe and legal channels, it is frequently the case that unemployed persons go through informal channels and through friends and relatives as they are deemed as trustworthy. The Lithuanian report however noted that the informal channels are likely to end up in exploitation or clear-cut Human Trafficking.
The authors agreed that this demands that states need to think long-term and be several steps before the perpetrators and criminal actors involved in this phenomenon.