ABOUT US

The Campaign

NAWO and Eaves for Women are working together to address and challenge trafficking for sexual exploitation, through a variety of campaigning activities. These activities have particularly focused on influencing the draft Modern Slavery Bill, partly through the ‘Tiny Protest‘ campaign.

The Project

This is all part of the wider European Commission-funded Safety Compass project, in partnership with Marta (Latvia), The Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Latvia, the State Inspectorate for Protection of Children’s Rights (Latvia), Youth with a Mission, MTÜ Eluliin (Estonia) and Women@thewell (UK).

The project aims to:

  • raise awareness about the latest forms of human trafficking, as well as the risks and recruiting tendencies on the internet and social networks;
  • reduce the demand for services and products provided by victims of human trafficking and to facilitate fair trade;
  • reduce instances of human trafficking by promoting greater inter-institutional cooperation between the public, private and non-governmental sectors, and developing exit/support programmes for victims;
  • develop international referral mechanisms for the support and protection of trafficking victims between Estonia, Latvia and Great Britain.

Project Activities:

  • An internet study – recruitment mechanisms, latest tendencies and forms of the sex trade, e.g. fictitious marriages;
  • Challenging demand and provision of human trafficking services through creative activities/campaigns;
  • Elaboration of functional exit/support programmes for victims of sex trade/fictitious marriages
  • Exchange of experience of exit programmes in Estonia, Latvia and Great Britain, through round table discussions/study visits
  • Feasibility study on the specifics of the Estonian, Latvian and British target group
  • In Estonia and Latvia, elaboration of the exit programme for victims of sex trade and fictitious marriage;
  • Development of international referral mechanisms for the support and protection of victims of human trafficking, by means of a hotline system between partner countries.

Partnership Events.

Our Latvian and Estonian partners came to London in August 2013 to learn about the UK’s National Referral Mechanism to support identified victims of trafficking. They returned last month (16 – 18 September) to explore ways to develop functional cross-border support systems for victims, and to undertake study visits to see anti-trafficking work in the UK and strengthen cross-border cooperation.

The group toured two centres which provide support services for women: women@thewell and the Poppy Project, and also had a tour of Southwark Crown Court where they heard about witness/victim services and sat in on part of a Court session.

The Metropolitan Police hosted us for a roundtable, at which we discussed the research aims of the project (a research report will be forthcoming and available on NAWO’s website) and explored cross-border projects and support systems – which included hearing from key stakeholders like the Salvation Army and the Met Police’s Human Trafficking and Kidnap Unit.

Leave a comment