RACE in Europe: fighting trafficking for criminal exploitation
Children and adults are trafficked across Europe for forced criminal activities and forced begging. Traffickers force them to beg in towns and cities and they are forced to commit crimes such as pickpocketing, ATM theft, metal theft and cannabis cultivation.Those trafficked are often treated as criminals. Many end up being prosecuted, convicted and imprisoned for crimes they have been forced to commit, while their traffickers enjoy impunity. In Ireland we are currently seeing a trend of people being trafficked for cannabis cultivation. MRCI are conducting research on this at the moment which will be available shortly.
The RACE in Europe project, funded by the European Commission and led by Anti-Slavery International in conjunction with MRCI, EXPAT UK, La Strada Czech Republic, Multicultural Centre Prague, Police Academy of the Netherlands and Vietnamese Mental Health Services to improve knowledge about the nature and scale of trafficking of children and adults for forced criminal exploitation and forced begging.
Trade unions speak out against forced labour and trafficking
MRCI and the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU), together with the Trade Union Federation of Berlin-Brandenburg and victims of slavery in Ireland, held a high-level meeting to discuss the increasing problem of forced labour and trafficking in Irish society. ICTU and affiliates will highlight and publicly oppose forced labour, push for the rights of undocumented workers to be realised in the reform of employment bodies, and assess how best they can support victims of forced labour, who often require financial help as well as other supports.
This event was part of a European Commission-funded project, FINE TUNE, which seeks to embed responses to labour trafficking across a range of civil society and statutory organisations. This project is being led by the International Trade Union Confederation in collaboration with MRCI, Antislavery International, CCME, Caritas, PAM, La Strada, AIDRom, LEFOE & UGT.