Malta still napping on anti-trafficking clampdown

Malta remains on the United States’s ‘tier 2’ of countries that are failing to meet its minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking.

Despite significant efforts in 2022, which included investigating and prosecuting more suspected traffickers, increasing funding for victim assistance, and continuing to provide an extensive week-long trafficking awareness campaign, Malta failed to convict any traffickers.

According to the annual Trafficking In Persons report from the US Department of State, gaps in victim identification persisted and the Maltese government did not report identifying any Maltese, children, asylum seekers, or undocumented migrants as trafficking victims.

It also said the government lacked coordination among ministries and that it had never awarded restitution or compensation to any trafficking victims.

“The government did not effectively enforce labour regulations to prevent recruitment fees charged to workers, which increase workers’ vulnerability to trafficking, or make concrete efforts to increase oversight and regulation of massage parlours where there was a higher incidence of trafficking indicators,” the report said.

Malta’s trafficking profile has remained largely unchanged over the past five years: sex traffickers exploit domestic and foreign victims in Malta, while labour traffickers exploit men and women from China, Eastern Europe, Central America, and Southeast Asia, with increasing numbers from the Philippines.

Many women from Central and Eastern Europe, Russia and Ukraine tend to be found working in nightclubs, while Asian women tend to be recruited in massage parlours. GRETA (Group of Experts on Action against Trafficking) and NGOs reported a lack of oversight and regulation on the licensing of massage parlours, which had a higher likelihood of sex trafficking occurring.

With approximately 9,000 refugees and 4,000 asylum seekers residing in Malta, the TIP report also says these people are vulnerable to trafficking in the island’s informal job market, specifically in the construction, hospitality, and domestic work sectors.

Fraudulent labour recruitment remained a significant concern. According to the TIP report, the illegal practice of charging foreign workers recruitment fees by employment or recruitment agencies, was continuing, and no effective law enforcement measures had been enacted to deter agencies from continuing the practice. In October 2022, the government enacted regulations for digital platform work; however, NGOs criticised the efficacy of this effort, claiming it was fraught with loopholes.

Lack of prosecutions

Malta’s penalties for trafficking – six to 12 years’ imprisonment – are said to be sufficiently stringent, but investigations have yet to yield convictions.

In 2022, the police vice squad, consisting of four teams and responsible for investigating human trafficking and other crimes, initiated 12 new investigations – seven for sex trafficking and five for labour trafficking – a slight increase compared with nine investigations initiated in 2021, but less than the 16 new investigations initiated in 2020.

Prosecutors from the AG’s office initiated criminal proceedings against six suspects for sex trafficking, an increase compared with zero prosecutions in 2021, two in 2020, and zero in 2019. Ten prosecutions remained ongoing from prior years, including six for sex trafficking and four for labour trafficking.

But for the second consecutive year, the government did not report convicting any traffickers; this compared with the convictions of three traffickers in both 2019 and 2020, which included significant prison sentences.

“Perennial issues with rule of law, corruption, slow court proceedings, and an understaffed police force continued to hamper prosecutions and convictions. Trafficking convictions were often overturned on appeal for administrative technicalities,” the TIP report states.

“Experts continued to urge the government to increase training for judges on psychological coercion as a means of trafficking, as cases could sometimes be dismissed or pursued as lesser crimes if physical violence and injuries were not sustained by trafficking victims. There were no new investigations, prosecutions, or convictions of government employees allegedly complicit in trafficking crimes; however, official complicity in trafficking crimes remained a significant concern.”

Legal support

While GRETA has complained that Malta lacks specialised judges for trafficking cases and did not pursue financial crime investigations in tandem with human trafficking cases, the government has provided training to the police vice squad and officials working with asylum-seekers – including welfare officers, socials workers, and psychologists – on victim identification, communication approaches, ethics while working with survivors, and mental health issues.

Law enforcement were said to have conducted discreet interviews with potential victims to protect their identities and ensure their safety.

To avoid re-traumatization, the government provided victims with protective support, including the option to testify via video.

Foreign victims who assist police in prosecuting trafficking cases were entitled to a renewable six-month temporary residence permit, police protection, legal assistance, and the right to obtain flexible work permits; however, the government did not report whether it provided these protections to any victim during the reporting period. The government could grant refugee status to victims as an alternative to removal to countries where they may face hardship or persecution; however, the government did not report providing this status to any victims.

Neither did it report having granted the maximum €23,300 in compensation to victims.

In July 2022, the government established a new coordinating body, the Anti-Human Trafficking Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC), which met for the first time in October 2022 and once more in January 2023.

NGOs however continue to report a lack of effective leadership, corruption allegations, and insufficient prioritisation of human trafficking.