Categories
Journalistic Survey
Articles
Reportage
Analitic
Photo Reportage
Exclusive
Interview
Foreign Media about Georgia
Editorial
Position
Reader's opinion
Blog
Themes
Children's Rights
Women's Rights
Justice
Refugees/IDPs
Minorities
Media
Army
Health
Corruption
Elections
Education
Penitentiary
Religion
Others

Human Trafficking Is Still Urgent Problem

January 21, 2008
Human trafficking in Georgia like all over the world is urgent problem. Although many measures were taken to eradicate the problem during recent years, it is still important to speak about trafficking. Thus, on January 17 the Public Defender’s Office held a meeting to discus the problem.

Georgian Public Defender, the chairperson of the State Fund for the Protection of Trafficked Victims, the Secretary of the Coordination Council of the Inter-Institution Activities against Human Trafficking, representatives of the USA International Development Agency, International Organization for Migration and International Labor Organization attended the meeting.

Georgian Public Defender, Sozar Subari, reported that Georgia has succeeded in the fight against trafficking; however it is not enough. In order to resolve the problem the whole society should take part in the fight against the trafficking.

Georgia has achieved some success in the field after adopting the Law on the Fight against the Trafficking. The Coordination Council for Inter-Institution Activities was created from those institutions that fight against the trafficking; these are international organizations, representatives of the civil society, Ombudsman, non-governmental organizations. The council is headed by the Georgian Prosecutor General.

The meeting of the council is held once in three months and directions of future activities are discussed there.

Keti Khutsishvili, the Secretary of the Coordination Council of the Inter-Institution Activities against Human Trafficking, stated that it is a good forum for NGOs in order to introduce their activities and coordinate with governmental organizations. They should preserve their resources and make the activities of the governmental bodies easier.

“The council implements preventive activities too. Similar meetings support us to provide more information to the society about the trafficking.”

“The coordination council has prepared documents that are necessary for the assistance, identification and final reintegration of the trafficked victims.”

Keti Khutsishvili speaks about the stereotypes of the society. People think that only young, inexperienced woman can become a victim of trafficking. Besides that it is a wrong claim that a person can become a trafficked victim only abroad. While the practice shows the opposite: “A person might be trafficked anywhere, event in the native village.”

The secretary of the council stated that our legislation is one of the most effective in comparison to other countries. A person is considered a trafficker if s/he enjoys the service of the trafficked victim at least once. Georgian legislation discharges the trafficked victim from the criminal liability. Thus, many people try top pretend himself/herself as a victim.

Mari Meskhi, the chairperson of the State Fund for the Protection of Trafficked Victims, stated that there are not legislative problems in Georgia. We face only technical and social problems now. “Many problems regarding the trafficking were regulated in July of 2006 when the Law on Trafficking was adopted. There were established the council, to classify the priorities; the fund to protect the trafficked victims and permanent group working on the status of trafficked victim. As a result of above-mentioned activities Georgia was moved in the first tire last year. Countries, which have reinforced preventive measures as well as protection of trafficked victims, etc, are placed in the first tire.”

The State Fund for the Protection of Trafficked Victims was set up in 2006. In order to be assisted from the fund a person should have victim status. People are provided with legal, medical, psychological assistance. Besides that there is a hot-line service at the fund and people are given over-phone consultations.

“The victim is given 1 000 lari after leaving the asylum. Social worker gives advice how to spend the money. After the victim leaves the asylum we continue working within the rehabilitation policy with them. Social worker works with the victim during twelve months. However, the meetings are not frequent; we try not to interfere in their personal life. The rehabilitation policy is the final document that was enacted by the council. In the past we had cases when people lived in the asylum for nine months because of lack of rehabilitation policy.

Mark Hulst, representative of the International Organization for Migration, stated Georgian legislation enables them to foresee all measures that taken in support of trafficked victim. The practical usage of the laws should be improved however the situation is much better than in previous years.

“The main reason to involve a person in the trafficking is unemployment. People get in hold of traffickers in the search of employment. Potential victims travel abroad to get employed illegally. Mark Hulst said that European Union will face lack of employees in the future; thus the resolution of the problem should be thoroughly considered.

“At certain levels they started to work on making the labor market more open. In the list of those countries where a wave of workers is expected to enter, the European Union has created a program “Circular Migration.”  For example, a person arrives in any country of the EU. S/he remains there for 2-3 years based on the contract. Then s/he returns to Georgia. Afterwards that person will have right to go back to the same or other country of the EU. The documents have been prepared on this issue. A political phase might be started and the EU might announce those countries from where people would be able to migrate to employing countries. In July of 2007 Georgia also was on the list of migrating countries. However it was finally omitted from the list. I think the reason for the omission was famous events in November of 2007. In June of 2008 the list will be discussed again and we hope that Georgia will be inserted on the list of probation countries.

The role of religion on resolving social and trafficking problems was much spoken about at the meeting. Regarding that case the Council of Religions work on joint social conception.

Beka Mindiashvili, Senior Expert of the Center for Tolerance, said that it is unique document because every confession has its own social conception.  The document will reveal the potential of the religion in resolving the social problems; how it can support the state and society. Recommendations will be sent to the government and media sources.

The conception will be introduced to the society in various forms. Religious unions can introduce their parish with the information. Religious minorities make up no more than12 % of the Georgian population. The conception might be introduced through the cooperation with the government and media sources. The point is that neither religious nor political belongings would hinder the resolution of problems. It will be appreciated if Georgian Patriarchate would involve the situation more actively.

Nona Suvariani, Tbilisi 

News