Russians cite Malta in human trafficking destinations

Russian trafficking specialists said the Mediterranean has developed into a new route for women forced into slavery, with Malta becoming a likely destination.

According to Tatiana Azhakina, chief deputy head of the criminal investigation department of Russia's interior ministry, in 2010 the unit stopped activity of a particular group involved in the sex exploitation activities in the territories of Malta and Spain.

Azhakina said about 70 per cent of victims of people traffickers in Russia are women in sexual slavery, where 8% are also girls under legal age. Another 24 per cent of trade in people is for the purpose of slave labour.

Azhakina said that in many cases, Russia is also a transit country, where people are trafficked to Greece or Cyprus via Prague or Warsaw.

During 2010, about 200 women were taken from the Far East to Greece via the Czech Republic. Another direction is the Middle East. Via Egypt and Israel, women are trafficked to oil producing countries, like Bahrain.

Malta, Cyprus as well as Estonia appear on the US Department of State's human trafficking report's Tier 2 'Watch List' along with - among others - Russia, Afghanistan and Belarus: the Watch List signifies that such countries do not comply with US norms and while they are making significant efforts to do so, there is little or no evidence that these efforts are proving effective. 

Malta's home affairs minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici, who recently issued a draft trafficking action plan, has previously said he does not consider that there is widespread human trafficking activity in Malta. "Government strongly believes that even a few cases of human trafficking cannot be tolerated and is acting to identify these and prosecute as necessary."

Earlier this year, the Prime Minister appointed Malta's first anti-Human Trafficking Coordinator, as well as a high-level Monitoring Committee which includes the major stakeholders in the sector. The Coordinator ensures that human trafficking is addressed in a strategically effective manner, whilst the Monitoring Committee, among its other tasks, monitors the performance of individual stakeholders.

The Human Trafficking Action Plan for Malta will provide for action in all spheres of the fight against human trafficking, such as the prevention of human trafficking, prosecution of offenders and protection of victims, further to providing for the further allocation of resources to counter this crime.