La Strada International Statement on the Directive on rights of victims
- Document number
- 2887
- Date
- 2012
- Title
- La Strada International Statement on the Directive on rights of victims
- Author/publisher
- La Strada International
- Availability
- View/save PDF version of this document
- Document type(s)
- Guidelines/Recommendations, LSI publication,
- Keywords
- human trafficking, victims, statement, directive
- Summary
La Strada International (LSI), the European NGO Network against Trafficking in Human Beings, welcomes the Commission’s Proposal for a Directive of the European parliament and of the Council establishing minimum standards on the rights, support and protection of victims of crime, such as the delinking of support and practical assistance from the decision to report a crime, prevention of secondary and repeated victimisation and individual assessment mechanisms for vulnerable victim identification. However, the network and its members are worried that the proposal for the Directive seems to exclude a large group of victims of crime from protection and support, in particular people with an insecure migration status.
Many of our clients, who are all victims of trafficking in human beings, do not have a regular residency status in the country where their rights are being violated and crimes have been committed against them. It is widely acknowledged that, due to failing identification processes, the majority of trafficked persons are not recognised as victims of crime, but often regarded as irregular migrants. If they are identified by law enforcement as victims, they have to cooperate with the authorities in the criminal case against the perpetrators, in order to be protected under the regulations of the Directive 2011/36/EU on preventing and combating trafficking in human beings and protecting the victims. Many of our clients do not dare to press charges against their traffickers and are therefore excluded from protection and support. The new Directive could be the safety net for these victims, as it provides for access to support and practical assistance from the earliest possible moment irrespective of whether the crime has been reported to authorities. But if the Directive does not include people with an insecure migration status, a large group of victims of trafficking in human beings will be withheld form their right to protection and support and be deported without justice been done.
The report of the rapporteurs Teresa Jiménez-Becerril Barrio, Antonyia Parvanova and the opinion of the JURI committee provide a number of good amendments that strengthen the position of victims, but unfortunately also do not mention the situation of victims with an insecure migration status.
Therefore, La Strada International has formulated several recommendations for amendments in the Proposal for a Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing minimum standards on the rights, support and protection of victims of crime, in order to overcome this omission in the Directive.
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