MARY WARD LORETO is planting hope with a human rights approach to combating modern day slavery. This challenging mission is implemented through works of justice, education, grass roots action and systemic change.
The aim is to eradicate poverty, the prime cause for human trafficking.
Goal and Objective of the seminar:
The aim of the seminar was to strengthen co-operation between criminal justice authorities and relevant public and private actors in order to address irregular migration-related crimes in South-Eastern Europe, with a particular focus on prevention, prosecution, international and cross-border co-operation and assistance to victims.
The objective of this seminar was to identify gaps, challenges and good practices, as well as to strengthen information, sharing networks between countries of origin, transit and destination, using a multidisciplinary approach, paying special attention to the issue of vulnerability of migrants.
Participants:
The target audience of this meeting was senior experts and practitioners from relevant bodies of the criminal justice systems (judges, prosecutors, law enforcement officers, police liaison officers), central authorities and non-governmental organizations dealing with migration and cases of trafficking in human beings and smuggling of migrants from participating States and Partners for Co-operation, as well as from OSCE field operations and relevant international organizations.
There were present:
19 states represented by central authorities and criminal justice system bodies.
11 International organizations and NGOs including MWL.
Methodology and topics discussed during the seminar:
Structure of the seminar
The seminar had three sessions:
After each plenary session we were divided into working groups. Case studies were presented for discussion and the focus was on the challenges and good practices.
Challenges on fighting migration related crimes:
During the seminar many challenges were identified regarding migration related crimes:
Best practice and new developments:
During this seminar, lots of best practices have been shared. I would like to list some of them as follows:
Recommendations:
The recommendations can be summarised under 3 main issues:
Networking opportunities:
This Seminar has also been a very important meeting for networking. Each participant has received a printed database with all the contacts of all the other participants. During this seminar I got to know more closely the representatives of 2 NGOs from Serbia, a representative of the Holy See, the Albanian delegation and other judges and prosecutors from all over the EU. I shared the work of MWL on Anti-trafficking and business cards of our president and mine as well.
Report’s author
Gazmir Memaj