The US Department of State: Estonia does the state business on a slave trade!

The edition “Free press” has published a material which opens eyes to rather “democratic customs”, reigning in the Baltic countries: it appears that, at least, one of them, namely Estonia, having considering its insignificant sizes, appreciably forms the budget in the expense of... prostitution and a slave trade!

So, the US Department of State has exposed Estonia. In its report it is said that this Baltic republic is the country-source, the country of transit and the country of appointment for... slaves.

Speech is about the women who force to be engaged in prostitution, people who have compelled to work abroad in the conditions of forced labour. US Department of State ascertains: the Estonian women from the rural areas, who got to sexual slavery, are compelled to be engaged in prostitution as at home so in Europe - in Finland, the Netherlands, Great Britain, Germany and Italy. The Estonian girls, as it is told in the report, who forcedly married abroad after promises to be employed, also became the object of trade.

According to the American experts, the authorities of Estonia react to it poorly. Though, last year the republic government has taken measures against this harm. The training courses for workers of public sector on revealing of victims of a slave trade have been spent. The country has a little increased the budget for struggle against this phenomenon - from 200 to 242 thousand dollars. However that is surprising: till now there is no law directly forbidding a slave trade in Estonia. And laws in force which indirectly concern the trade in people do not define the punishment for sale of “live goods”, including transportation, concealment, acquisition and recruitment of victims, compulsion use. The persons connected with a trade in people often receive only suspended terms.

The civil activists inform with alarm that the victims of a slave trade quite often are afraid to co-operate with police, to give evidences in court, often simply disappear after preliminary investigation. In such cases the system of witness protection is applied seldom. Justice does not protect victims from threats or intimidation.

Meanwhile, in 2008 the head of organization “Living for Tomorrow” Liliya Ivanchenko warned that many Estonian firms offering good work abroad, actually are engaged in a slave trade. The organization has made the black list of such firms and warned about them through mass-media. Instead of getting the promised work at plants, factories, hotels, the inhabitants of Estonia came into the hands of slave traders. Applicants for good work tried to force to do what they did not want, they did not pay to them, selected documents, phones, did not give the chance to return home. But the preventions from “Living for Tomorrow” have not so helped: people can be trusted in miracles.

As the experts consider, there are many cases of slave trade in Estonia, however the statistics considers not all cases and such episodes become known only from mass-media. For example, in 2008, the group of builders has got to slavery to Estonian businesswoman who carried out the orders in Odessa. She has taken away the passports from workers, did not pay, frightened of gangsters and... security service of Ukraine. Eventually, the workers were pulled out from a captivity, have come back home, but law enforcement agency have not helped them. If not mass-media, so it would not become known about this case at all.

Not at once the law enforcement agency has helped the 23-year-old inhabitant of Tallinn Julia who was the girl from a children’s home. The girl who looked for 15 years, the pander forced to be engaged in prostitution, giving her out for the minor. She called the police but her words have turned a deaf ear. Julia is the insane person and prostitution in Estonia is legal employment. However this activity is regulated by a number of rules. For example, the prostitutes should have the health certificate. They are allowed to render the services only in own or rented premises. And the man has taken away her to himself, has forbidden to leave without escort and to speak the phone. But the main thing is that the activity of panders is forbidden in Estonia. He was caught only on this. Most likely, he will have problems because of the panderage, instead of a slave trade.

Last year, as the report of the US Department of State ascertains, the Estonian authorities have made only three investigations of trade in people and have prosecuted the three criminals connected with trade in women for the purpose of sexual service. In 2009 such cases were five. In 2008 year there were two cases.

The deputy of the Estonian parliament, social democrat Andres Anvelt has declared with indignation that the government does not struggle properly with a slave trade. He has noticed: the report of the US Department of State “puts us in one number with Nigeria, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan and Bangladesh”.

The politician has urged to add in the law the punishment for a crime “with the simple name – a trade in people”. According to his words, those existing articles are not enough for effective struggle against the phenomenon. “Intermediary in prostitution or enslavement is quite concrete crimes but through them is very difficult to investigate all wide spectrum of a trade in people as criminal activity”, he considers and offers a number of other measures, namely the public education, the help to victims, preventive maintenance of crimes.

Meanwhile, the Estonian experts give advice how to avoid the slavery through mass-media. The firm which offers the work is obliged to give the detailed contract. The kind of activity, the name of the employing organization, its registration number and the address of office, a working condition, residing, the size of a payment should be specified in contract. The contract should be issued properly, signed by the employer and the applicant for a workplace. Thus the applicant has the right to take the contract home that carefully to study it, instead of to sign on the run. Experts advise to refuse the offered work if the they do not allow to take the contract home.

The Minister of Social Affairs of Estonia Hanno Pevkur has expressed the hope that in 2012 year the US Department of State will exclude his country from the shameful list. But for this purpose it is necessary to do the big “homework”.

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What has forced to begin to see clearly the US Department of State is the big mystery as “prostitute” business and a slave trade prospered in Estonia and even when this country was accepted to the NATO. In that case there is a question: whether the slave trade is one of criteria of reception in the NATO of new members from among the former communist countries and the Soviet republics? In that case, it is necessary to sympathize only with moral shape of incorporated armed forces of the block...