The EU Council has adopted changes to the EU Anti-Trafficking Directive which fail to address root causes of trafficking and fail to protect and empower trafficked people. 

Lilana Keith, Senior Advocacy Officer at PICUM, said: “The revision of the Anti-trafficking Directive is a wasted opportunity to make a difference for trafficked people. The changes don’t address the barriers to safe reporting, remedy and compensation, they don’t improve access to residence permits. The focus was narrowly on doubling down on a criminalisation approach that’s ineffective and actually raises concerns for victims and those at risk.” 

One of the main changes is that the revised Directive obliges member states to criminalise the knowing use of services of trafficked people, when this was previously optional. This is despite the lack of evidence that this measure is effective in tackling trafficking or strengthening the rights of victims. Currently two-thirds of EU member states already have such a provision, and prosecutions and convictions are rare. On the contrary, further criminalisation will likely harm the rights of sex workers and those who are trafficked and exploited in the sector.  

Sex workers already face a multitude of harms when their clients are criminalised and when targeted by anti-trafficking actions. These risk being exacerbated by criminalising the knowing use of services of trafficked people, due to lack of understanding, fear among clients and discriminatory policing.  

Such measures will likely weaken efforts to enhance identification of trafficked people and their referral to support services, including by clients. Rather than focusing on identifying victims of trafficking, resources will be directed to identifying people who have “knowingly used” the services. Victims can be worse off too, being treated primarily as “witnesses” to an offence and having to testify against the users of their services, rather than victims of trafficking entitled to protection and support. 

The new Directive does introduce the requirement to let trafficked children report abuse in a safe and confidential way, but it fails to extend this crucial provision to adults. Fear of immigration enforcement is one of the major reasons preventing people experiencing abuse from contacting authorities and receiving the protection and services they are due. 

The final text also no longer requires member states to establish independent national Rapporteurs, which are important institutions to monitor human trafficking trends and policy responses.  

The only really positive improvement is that the revised Directive says it must be possible for member states not to punish trafficked people for administrative offences (in addition to criminal offences) they might have committed while trafficked. This should be implemented so that undocumented trafficked people do not face immigration enforcement or any sanction related to their undocumented residence or work. 

Suzanne Hoff, International Coordinator of La Strada International, said: “If there are indications of trafficking, the law already grants the person access to unconditional support, regardless of their status or engagement with authorities or legal proceedings. However, this hardly happens in practice, and also prevents access to remedies. The revision should have addressed this, and incorporated more binding provisions to strengthen rights for trafficked people. This includes the possibility to access a residence permit on personal grounds, the erasure of any criminal record and sanctions linked to their trafficking, and the prefinancing by States of compensation awarded”. 

Today, the Council of the EU officially adopted the EU Directive on combating violence against women and domestic violence.¹ As 13 civil society organisations² which advocate for human rights, gender equality, and the right for all to live free from violence, we welcome this first ever binding EU legislation on this issue as a groundbreaking step.

The Directive adopts a holistic approach to combat violence against women and domestic violence, incorporating measures relating to prevention, protection, support for victims, access to justice and prosecution of perpetrators. This achievement is the result of long-term advocacy by feminist movements and Members of the European Parliament championing the European Commission’s ambitious proposal. We extend our gratitude to everyone involved in making this Directive as strong as possible.

We applaud the fact that the Directive recognizes the perpetration of female genital mutilation, forced marriage and certain forms of online violence as crimes. Unfortunately, other forms of violence were ultimately not criminalised, including intersex genital mutilation and forced sterilisation. We deeply regret that some Member States managed to derail the unprecedented opportunity to criminalise rape with a consent-based definition at the EU level. Sexual violence against women is endemic across the EU, with widespread impunity. Consent-based definitions of rape allow for all cases of rape to be included and strengthen protection and access to justice for victims of rape. We continue to call on all Member States who have not yet done so, to move towards adopting consent-based laws.

Crucially, the Directive will require Member States to do more to prevent rape, by raising public awareness of the fact that sex without consent is a crime, through awareness raising programmes and educational materials. We encourage Member States to embrace the comprehensive prevention approach outlined in the Directive, in particular primary prevention initiatives, and to provide mandatory comprehensive sexuality education, which includes consent education and challenges harmful gender norms.

The Directive further guarantees comprehensive support to victims of violence against women and girls and domestic violence and access to both general and specialist support services, shelters, support for child victims, as well as access to comprehensive medical care including sexual and reproductive health services. This is the first time that EU law imposes explicit obligations on Member States to provide access to this essential medical care for victims of sexual violence. Member States will also have to provide training for professionals likely to come into contact with victims, on how to provide this support.

The Directive recognises that victims of violence against women and domestic violence who experience intersectional discrimination are at a heightened risk of violence, and obliges Member States to meet their specific needs. Targeting a public figure, a human rights defender, or someone for their personal characteristics will constitute an aggravating circumstance. In the implementation of the Directive, Member States must ensure that all victims and survivors of gender-based violence are protected, no matter their sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression or sex characteristics.

However, EU lawmakers yet again silenced women impacted by EU migration policies. The only concrete step forward for migrant women is that the text requires Member States to make shelters available to all women experiencing domestic abuse, regardless of their residence status. Nonetheless we condemn that the final text does not retain provisions on protecting undocumented women’s personal data from being transmitted to immigration authorities (neither in the context of accessing shelters, nor in terms of accessing justice). Member States must ensure that women are not deterred from going to the police because of their residence status, by including access to safe reporting in the ongoing revision of the Victims’ Rights Directive³.

We call on the European Commission to provide guidelines and training to Member States, based on international standards and in consultation with civil society organisations. We urge Member States to fully implement the Directive as soon as possible. Recalling that the Directive sets minimum standards, we call on Member States to go beyond these and to realise the highest standards across the EU.

We call on the European Commission to review the Directive in the next five years and to work towards comprehensive and inclusive measures to address all forms of sexual and gender-based violence without discrimination.

We, together with our members across Europe, are committed to providing our expertise, and look forward to supporting a strong implementation of the Directive, to progress towards a Europe where everyone is safe from gender-based violence.

Signatories

• Amnesty International
• Center for Reproductive Rights
• EL*C – Eurocentralasian Lesbian* Community
• End FGM European Network
• European Sex Workers Rights Alliance
• Human Rights Watch
• ILGA-Europe (The European region of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association)
• International Planned Parenthood Federation European Network (IPPF EN)
• La Strada International
• Organisation Intersex International Europe (OII Europe)
• Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM)
• TGEU (Trans Europe and Central Asia)
• Women Against Violence Europe (WAVE)

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¹ Throughout this statement, the term “women” should be understood as including “women and girls”, as in the definition of “violence against women” proposed by the European Commission in the Directive, which encompasses “violence directed against a woman or a girl”.

² Amnesty International, Center for Reproductive Rights, EuroCentralAsian Lesbian* Community (EL*C), End FGM European Network, European Sex Workers’ Rights Alliance (ESWA), Human Rights Watch, ILGA-Europe (The European region of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association), International Planned Parenthood Federation European Network (IPPF EN), La Strada International, Organisation Intersex International Europe (OII Europe), Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM), TGEU (Trans Europe and Central Asia), Women Against Violence Europe (WAVE).

Our organisations work on a diverse range of women’s rights issues. In the drafting of this document, we have been led by the expertise of women’s rights organisations and women human rights defenders from communities most impacted by the specific forms of violence described in each section. Our commitment to the text below represents our coming together as a collective with shared values, even though not every organisation has its own policy or programme of work dedicated to each issue.

³ For more information, see a joint civil society statement on the revision of the Victims’ Rights Directive, signed by some of our organisations who are advocating for victims’ rights.

MEPs in the European Parliament’s LIBE and FEMM committees voted today on their joint report revising the EU’s rules on victims’ rights (the EU Victims’ Rights Directive).

The committees’ vote improves the European Commission’s original proposal in several ways. The European Parliament LIBE and FEMM committees voted to:

• Allow third parties to report abuse to police (instead of undocumented people having to report a crime themselves). This helps address the need for victims to report crimes without direct involvement with law enforcement.
• Ensure people held in (de facto) immigration detention can report abuse from any place of detention or restricted liberty. This expands the more restrictive scope of what the European Commission’s proposal intended with “detention facilities” and brings it in line with the expected rise in (de facto) immigration detention due to the EU Migration Pact.
• Establish mechanisms for reporting potential crimes committed by public officials while on duty. The Commission’s proposal however did not address abuse perpetrated by public authorities such as police, border guards, and staff in immigration detention centres.
• Ensure access to legal aid free of charge for particularly vulnerable victims, including trafficked persons and victims of violence against women.
• Consider residence status in the individual needs assessment, both in the personal characteristics and the dependence to the offender. This will ensure that the specific needs of undocumented victims linked to their residence status are taken into account.
• Ensure victims can not only obtain a decision on compensation, as the Commission proposed, but also to claim compensation. This will strengthen their right to remedies. 

At the same time, to our regret, the MEPs failed to introduce comprehensive protections from immigration enforcement.

The original revision proposed by the European Commission prohibits police from sharing data related to the victim’s migration status with immigration enforcement from when they report the crime until the completion of the first individual needs assessment. The LIBE-FEMM committees vote lengthens this time limitation until the completion of the criminal proceeding.

But this partial shield is not enough. In line with the right to privacy and data protection enshrined in Article 8 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, at no stage should a victim’s residence status be shared with migration authorities. Faced with the risk of detention and deportation, many victims would not report abuse to the police. This means they won’t be identified as victims of crime and won’t receive the support and protection they need and are entitled to.

Michele LeVoy, Director of PICUM, said: “Today’s vote is a welcome step forward in helping undocumented people report abuse safely. But undocumented people must be able to trust that they will not face immigration consequences, including detention and deportation when reporting a crime. We regret that the European Parliament did not take a bolder position to ensure people don’t get punished to get the support they need.”

Suzanne Hoff, Coordinator of La Strada International, said: “We regret that safe reporting protection stops after the completion of criminal proceedings. Especially, we see in practice that victims, including trafficked persons, have no access to support if there are no investigations, and if they do not lead to a successful prosecution. We hope that the Council will use its opportunity to strengthen the text further and ensure equal access to all victims of crime, regardless their residence”.

Over 50 human rights organisations had released a joint statement calling on EU lawmakers to shield undocumented migrants from immigration enforcement when they report abuse to the police, as the EU is discussing new rules to protect victims of crime. Signatories include Amnesty International, the Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM), La Strada International, and Victim Support Europe.

Over 40 human rights organisations have released a joint statement calling on EU lawmakers to shield undocumented migrants from immigration enforcement when they report abuse to the police, as the EU is discussing new rules to protect victims of crime. Signatories include Amnesty International, the Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM), La Strada International, and Victim Support Europe.

The EU Victims’ Rights Directive, which sets out minimum rights for victims of abuse across the EU, is currently being revised and the Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) and Women’s Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM) committees of the European Parliament should vote on their position in April.

The revision proposed by the European Commission includes a prohibition for law enforcement to share personal data related to the victim’s migration status with immigration enforcement only while the first needs assessment is completed. This partial shield is not enough. Undocumented people must be able to trust that they will not face immigration consequences, including detention and deportation, throughout the reporting process.

We urge the European Parliament and the Council to take a clear stance for safety and protection for all victims, and ensure that no data transfer occurs between police and immigration enforcement as a result of undocumented victims reporting abuse.

Michele LeVoy, Director of PICUM, said: “Undocumented people too often fear approaching the police to report abuse because they might risk detention and deportation instead of getting support and protection. The revision of the Victims’ Rights Directive must address this and make sure that everyone can safely report abuse, whatever their migration status.”

“EU lawmakers already failed to protect undocumented women from immigration enforcement should they report abuse to the police in the Directive on Violence Against Women. The revision of the Victims’ Rights Directive – which applies to women as well – must fill this gap and ensure that anyone who reports abuse gets the support they need and is not punished with detention and deportation for coming forward”.

Suzanne Hoff, Director of La Strada International, said: “In the revised EU Anti-Trafficking Directive, EU policy makers were only willing to include safe reporting mechanisms for children victims of trafficking, but not for adults. It is all the more important that this right to safe reporting will be strongly embedded in the new Victims’ Rights Directive. This will do justice to all victims of crime.”

The full statement and policy recommendations can be read here.