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Malta ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in September 2003. [1]
In 2010 Malta was a destination country for European women subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced prostitution. During this reporting period and in the past, the Maltese media also covered possible cases of Maltese teenage girls who may have been involved in forced prostitution in Malta. Malta was likely a destination country for men subjected to forced labor, as reflected by a report in 2009 that three Pakistani males were forced to work in Pakistani restaurants in Malta. The dozens of children and 4,304 total irregular migrants currently residing in Malta from African countries may have been vulnerable to human trafficking in Malta’s “grey” informal labor market. [2]
The Government of Malta does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so. Despite these efforts, the government did not demonstrate progress in convicting and punishing trafficking offenders, or in identifying and ensuring the protection of trafficking victims during the reporting period.
The U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 2" in 2017 [3] and 2023. [4]
From 2017 to 2020, the country identified 44 victims of the crime. [5]
The government of Malta has attempted to combat human trafficking through several initiatives, including the development of victim assistance services, training of government officials, and raising of public awareness.
Malta has experienced a limited number of cases of human trafficking, all of which involved the sexual exploitation of women. The victims were mainly third-country nationals from Eastern Europe, including in particular Russia and Ukraine, who had entered Malta through legal channels. Only one case involved the sexual exploitation of an EU national. The cases encountered so far did not involve organized crime networks.
No new cases of human trafficking were encountered during 2009 and 2010, although a new case has been brought before the Courts this year.
In view of the limited number of cases encountered so far, particularly during the last three years, it is difficult to extrapolate any particular trends.
One new TIP case was registered in Malta in 2011. 4 persons were accused, 2 Maltese nationals and another 2 from Romania. There were 3 identified victims from Romania who were recruited while they were on holiday in Greece. This case follows previous registered trends experienced in Malta, which is trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation.
The United States TIP report published in June 2012 rated Malta in Tier 2, up from the Tier 2 (Watch list) rating of the previous reports. Whilst making recommendations in relation to further actions, the report also notes that significant progress has been registered by the Maltese authorities in the sphere of human trafficking.
Since February 2012 2 cases of human trafficking were encountered.
One case involved trafficking for labor and sexual exploitation. It concerned Chinese nationals working in a massage parlor and in a restaurant and resulted in the identification of 3 victims, 2 males and 1 female. All victims were being employed irregularly and under poor working conditions. The female was also being asked to provide sexual services to clients. This case was discovered during ad hoc inspection by the Police unit responsible for prostitution and trafficking. The alleged perpetrator is a Chinese National.
The other case was of a Filipino young woman who was being employed by a foreign family in Malta. The victim communicated with an NGO through her lap top, the social welfare agency was alerted and the victim was helped to flee the house. The victim has a valid passport and visa therefore she can stay in the country. So far, the victim has not yet taken a decision to take the case further to the police and thus report her employers.
In terms of new cases of THB 1 new case was encountered by the Police and brought before the court in February 2013 for charges of human trafficking. This is being considered as an internal trafficking case since the perpetrator and the victim are both Maltese Nationals. It is the first case of its kind in Malta. [6]
The Government of Malta demonstrated minimal progress in its efforts to prosecute trafficking in persons offenses and punish trafficking offenders during the reporting period. Malta’s criminal code prohibits trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation and labor exploitation and prescribes punishments of two to nine years’ imprisonment. These prescribed penalties are sufficiently stringent and commensurate with punishments prescribed for other serious crimes, such as rape. The government did not convict and punish any alleged trafficking offenders during the reporting period. Several ongoing court cases cited in the 2008 and 2009 Reports remained unresolved: the case of a police officer convicted in 2005 who remained out of jail pending an appeal; the Maltese nationals arrested for the trafficking of eight Russian and Ukrainian women; the four people prosecuted for allegedly trafficking a Romanian woman in 2004; and the 2008 case in which three men were arrested for trafficking a Swedish woman. The Police Commissioner in January 2010 directed his subordinate staff - who are responsible for criminal prosecution as well as investigation - to expedite and conclude current and future trafficking cases within 90 days from date of arraignment. There was one new human trafficking prosecution initiated during the reporting period. The government did not sponsor any new trafficking-specific training for police, prosecutors or judges during the reporting period, though it did provide such training for border officials. [2]
The Government of Malta made no discernible progress in protecting trafficking victims during the reporting period. The absence of anti-trafficking NGOs in Malta likely contributed to challenges in victim protection as NGOs traditionally provide valuable partnership in identifying and assisting potential victims. Lack of victim identification increased the risk that victims were punished for immigration violations or other unlawful acts as a direct result of being trafficked. The government continued to lack formal procedures to guide first responders in identifying forced labor cases among vulnerable groups, such as foreign workers, and referring them to trafficking-specific services. The government did not show evidence of adequately implementing its formal system for referring all women in prostitution apprehended by police to government social workers. The government incorporated indicators for human trafficking as part of the asylum process for irregular migrants but did not have formal procedures on how to refer potential victims in migrant detention centers to trafficking-specific services. According to a 2009 UN Report, the government initially imposed detention on all irregular migrants upon arrival in Malta. While the government applied a fast-track procedure for vulnerable migrants, including pregnant women, families, and unaccompanied minors to be released from detention to open centers (where migrants are provided with housing and government-sponsored social services available to all Maltese citizens), it may still take up to three months. The government did not provide trafficking victims with shelter or services during the reporting period, nor were potential foreign labor trafficking victims offered residence permits, social, medical and legal assistance, and other potential safety and protection resources available under Maltese law prior to their return to their country of origin. The government has not developed or implemented standardized procedures for safe, voluntary repatriation for victims exploited in Malta. The government encourages trafficking victims to assist in the prosecution of their traffickers and attempted to implement creative ways of doing so; one victim in the past was allowed to provide testimony against her trafficker through video conferencing. [2]
The Maltese government made some progress in advancing anti-trafficking prevention activities over the last year. The government’s agency for social welfare, Appogg continued to produce detailed brochures to raise awareness about human trafficking, including information on identifying potential victims and outlets for victim assistance, and distributed them at health clinics, community centers, churches, and in entertainment areas to target potential clients of the sex trade. In late 2009, the government and an international cosmetics company forged a partnership whereby proceeds from products sold by the business would assist the government in developing an awareness campaign on child trafficking. Malta’s government Employment and Training Corporation conducted informational sessions within migrant detention centers to inform migrants about their rights and the process by which to attain work permits and proper employment, if they are granted asylum and released. The government did not formally monitor its anti-trafficking efforts and continued to lack an anti-trafficking national action plan. The government did not report any specific measures to reduce the possible participation of Maltese nationals in child sex tourism abroad. [2]
In 2008, Syria was a destination and transit country for women and children trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor. A significant number of women and children in the large and expanding Iraqi refugee community in Syria were reportedly forced into commercial sexual exploitation by Iraqi gangs or, in some cases, their families. Similarly, women from Somalia and Eastern Europe were trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation. Foreign women recruited for work in Syria as cabaret dancers were not permitted to leave their work premises without permission, and they had their passports withheld - indicators of involuntary servitude. Some of these women may also have been forced into prostitution. Anecdotal evidence suggests that Syria may have been a destination for sex tourism from other countries in the region. In addition, women from Indonesia, the Philippines, Ethiopia, and Sierra Leone were recruited for work in Syria as domestic servants, but some face conditions of involuntary servitude, including long hours, non-payment of wages, withholding of passports, restrictions on movement, threats, and physical or sexual abuse. Syria may also have been a transit point for Iraqi women and girls trafficked to Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.), and Lebanon for forced prostitution. The Government of Syria did not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and did not making significant efforts to do so. Syria again failed to report any law enforcement efforts to punish trafficking offenses over the last year. In addition, the government did not offer protection services to victims of trafficking and may have arrested, prosecuted, or deported some victims for prostitution or immigration violations.
Italy ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in August 2006.
Afghanistan is one of the source, transit, and destination country for men, women, and children who are subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. Trafficking within Afghanistan is more prevalent than transnational trafficking, and the majority of victims are children. In 2005 the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) reported 150 child trafficking cases to other states. Afghan boys and girls are trafficked within the country and into Iran, Pakistan and India as well as Persian gulf Arab states, where they live as slaves and are forced to prostitution and forced labor in brick kilns, carpet-making factories, and domestic service. In some cases the boys and girls were used for organ trafficking. Forced begging is a growing problem in Afghanistan; Mafia groups organize professional begging rings. Afghan boys are subjected to forced prostitution and forced labor in the drug smuggling industry in Pakistan and Iran. Afghan women and girls are subjected to forced prostitution, arranged and forced marriages—including those in which husbands force their wives into prostitution—and involuntary domestic servitude in Pakistan and Iran, and possibly India. Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) report that over the past year, increasing numbers of boys were trafficked internally. Some families knowingly sell their children for forced prostitution, including for bacha bazi - a practice combining sexual slavery and child prostitution, through which wealthy men use harems of young boys for social and sexual entertainment. Other families send their children with brokers to gain employment. Many of these children end up in forced labor, particularly in Pakistani carpet factories. NGOs indicate that families sometimes make cost-benefit analyses regarding how much debt they can incur based on their tradable family members.
Bangladesh is a source and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. A significant share of Bangladesh's trafficking victims are men recruited for work overseas with fraudulent employment offers who are subsequently exploited under conditions of forced labor or debt bondage. It also includes the trafficking of children – both boys and girls – within Bangladesh for commercial sexual exploitation, bonded labor, and forced labor. Some children are sold into bondage by their parents, while others are induced into labor or commercial sexual exploitation through fraud and physical coercion. Women and children from Bangladesh are also trafficked.
Botswana ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in August 2002.
Tunisia ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in July 2003.
In 2009 Qatar was a transit and destination country for men and women subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and, to a much lesser extent, forced prostitution. Men and women from Nepal, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, Sudan, Thailand, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and China voluntarily travelled to Qatar as laborers and domestic servants, but some subsequently faced conditions indicative of involuntary servitude. These conditions included threats of serious physical or financial harm; job switching; the withholding of pay; charging workers for benefits for which the employer is responsible; restrictions on freedom of movement, including the confiscation of passports and travel documents and the withholding of exit permits; arbitrary detention; threats of legal action and deportation; false charges; and physical, mental, and sexual abuse. In some cases, arriving migrant workers found that the terms of employment in Qatar were wholly different from those they agreed to in their home countries. Individuals employed as domestic servants were particularly vulnerable to trafficking since they are not covered under the provisions of the labor law. A small number of foreign workers transited Qatar and were forced to work on farms in Saudi Arabia. Qatar was also a destination for women who migrated and became involved in prostitution, but the extent to which these women were subjected to forced prostitution is unknown. Children have been used in Qatar and other Gulf countries as camel jockies. Most children are trafficked from Africa and South Asia. This practice has ceased in most areas though. Workers have been forced to work in bad conditions; their salaries are sometimes withheld.
Panama ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in August 2004.
In 2009, Papua New Guinea was a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced prostitution and forced labor. Women and children were subjected to commercial sexual exploitation and involuntary domestic servitude; trafficked men were forced to provide labor in logging and mining camps. Children, especially young girls from tribal areas, were most vulnerable to being pushed into commercial sexual exploitation or forced labor by members of their immediate family or tribe. Families traditionally sold girls into forced marriages to settle their debts, leaving them vulnerable to involuntary domestic servitude, and tribal leaders trade the exploitative labor and service of girls and women for guns and political advantage. Young girls sold into marriage were often forced into domestic servitude for the husband's extended family. In more urban areas, some children from poorer families were prostituted by their parents or sold to brothels. Migrant women and teenage girls from Malaysia, Thailand, China, and the Philippines were subjected to forced prostitution, and men from China were transported to the country for forced labor.
Portugal ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in May 2004.
Oman ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in May 2005.
Iraq ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in February 2009.
Guinea ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in November 2004.
In 2009 Morocco was a source, destination, and transit country for men, women, and children who are subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced labor and forced prostitution. Children were trafficked within the country from rural areas to urban centers to work as maids or laborers, or for commercial sexual exploitation. Moroccan men, women, and children were exploited for forced labor and prostitution in European and Middle Eastern countries. Young Moroccan girls from rural areas were recruited to work as child maids in cities, but often experienced non-payment of wages, threats, and physical or sexual abuse, and sometimes faced restrictions on movement. These practices indicate that these girls are subjected to involuntary servitude. Moroccan boys experienced forced labor as apprentices in the artisan and construction industries and in mechanic shops. A few Moroccan men and boys were lured to Europe by fraudulent job offers, and are subsequently forced to sell drugs. In addition, men and women from sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and the Philippines entered Morocco voluntarily but illegally with the assistance of smugglers; once in Morocco, some of the women were coerced into prostitution or, less frequently, forced into domestic service. Nigerian gangs, who engaged in a variety of criminal activities like human smuggling and drug trafficking, competed to control the trafficking of sub-Saharan Africans in Morocco.
Burundi ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in May 2012.
Croatia ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol in January 2003.
In 2009, Cyprus was a destination country for women who were subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically forced prostitution, as well as for men and women in forced labor. Women identified as sex trafficking victims in Cyprus originated from Moldova, Ukraine, Bulgaria, the Philippines, Morocco, and Hungary. A large number of Romanian nationals were subjected to forced labor in the country in 2009. Sex trafficking occurred within venues used by Cyprus' commercial sex industry, including cabarets, bars, pubs, and massage parlors disguised as private apartments located throughout the country. Groups vulnerable to forced labor included domestic workers, asylum seekers, and migrants working in the farming and agricultural sectors. According to a 2008 EU Thematic Study on Child Trafficking for Cyprus, some children within migrant and Roma communities may be vulnerable to trafficking.
Djibouti is a transit and, to a lesser extent, a source and destination country for men, women, and children who are subjected to trafficking in people, specifically conditions of forced labor and forced prostitution. There is little verifiable data on the human trafficking situation in Djibouti. An estimated 150 000 voluntary economic migrants from Ethiopia and Somalia passed illegally through Djibouti en route to Yemen and other locations in the Middle East in 2022; among this group, a small number of women and girls may fall victim to involuntary domestic servitude or forced commercial sexual exploitation after reaching Djibouti City or the Ethiopia-Djibouti trucking corridor. An unknown number of migrants – men, women, and children – are subjected to conditions of forced labor and forced prostitution after reaching Yemen and other destinations in the Middle East. Djibouti's large refugee population – consisting of Somalis, Ethiopians, and Eritreans – as well as foreign street children remain vulnerable to various forms of exploitation within the country, including human trafficking. Older street children reportedly act, at times, as pimps for younger children. A small number of girls from impoverished Djiboutian families may engage in prostitution with the encouragement of family members or other people in prostitution. Members of foreign militaries stationed in Djibouti contribute to the demand for women and girls in prostitution, including trafficking victims.
In 2009 Equatorial Guinea was principally a destination for children subjected to trafficking in persons, specifically conditions of forced labor and possibly commercial sexual exploitation. Children were believed to be recruited and transported from nearby countries, primarily Nigeria, Benin, Cameroon, and Gabon, and forced to work in domestic servitude, market labor, ambulant vending, and other forms of forced labor, such as carrying water and washing laundry. Most victims were believed to be exploited in Malabo and Bata, where a burgeoning oil industry created demand for labor and commercial sexual exploitation. Women may also have been recruited and transported to Equatorial Guinea from Cameroon, Benin, other neighboring countries, and from China for forced labor or forced prostitution. In October 2009, the vessel Sharon was detained in Gabon with 285 immigrants aboard, including 34 children identified as trafficking victims destined for Equatorial Guinea. Reports that women of Equatoguinean extraction were trafficked to Iceland for commercial sexual exploitation during the last reporting period have not reappeared.
Women, and children from Eastern Europe, West Africa, and Asia, as well as the Caribbean and Brazil, subjected to trafficking in persons, forced prostitution and forced labor. U.S. State Department's Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons placed the country in "Tier 1" in 2017. Women and children, many from Africa, continued to be subjected to forced domestic servitude. Often their "employers" are diplomats who enjoy diplomatic immunity from prosecution, including those from Saudi Arabia. Reportedly men from North Africa are subjected to forced labor in the agricultural and construction sectors in southern France. The Government of France estimates that the majority of the 18,000 women in France's commercial sex trade are likely forced into prostitution. It also estimates a significant number of children in France are victims of forced prostitution, primarily from Romania, West Africa, and North Africa. Romani and other unaccompanied minors in France continued to be vulnerable to forced begging. There were reportedly six French women subjected to forced prostitution in Luxembourg in 2009.