Concerns about trafficking in women have reached global proportions in recent years as most countries around the world have in one way or another been affected by the increase in trade of human beings. For Ukraine, the concern is for its young and naive women who are being led into sexual slavery by forces that have flourished under the difficult economic conditions since independence in 1991.

In March 1998 Ukraine's Verkhovna Rada (Parliament) adopted anti-trafficking legislation which included punitive measures for the criminally convicted. Penalties can include imprisonment for a period from three up to fifteen years along with confiscation of property. Although a commendable first step towards eliminating trafficking, the law is considered by many to be virtually ineffective. The first offender was prosecuted only last year and the defendant in that case received a mere slap on the wrist for his crime. To date, 37 cases in all have been brought to trial, but so far only four convictions have been obtained. A few have received sentences of 3 to 8 years in prison.

The government of Ukraine is presently looking into ways to more adequately enforce the law, improve its effectiveness and to guarantee the safety of victims. Exchanges of ideas between countries on how to structure legal, punitive, and support structures with respect to traffickers and their victims are a valuable source of information and such projects are being undertaken by various national and international agencies. An International Organization for Migration (IOM) organized (USAID funded) training program was just completed by 14 representatives from Ukraine. The program was designed to familiarize the group with anti-trafficking methodology and legislation recently adopted in The Netherlands and here in the United States. What follows is a short survey of the laws and policies of these two countries and Italy with respect to this issue.

The fourteen delegates from Ukraine were accompanied by Oksana Horbunova, a Ukrainian who currently heads the anti-trafficking department for IOM in Kyiv. They spent half of their training in Holland and the other half in the Washington DC area. The group's indoctrination involved a wide range of informative lectures and interactive sessions that included meetings with representatives of the Human Rights Law Group, Human Rights Watch, Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the President's Interagency Council on Women (a White House initiative), and other government and non-governmental organizations.

In Washington, the Ukrainian delegates also met with Melanne Verveer, First Lady Hillary Clinton’s Chief of Staff, who is herself an advocate of human rights. Ms. Verveer’s Ukrainian ancestry has probably played a role in the First Lady’s affinity for Ukraine. They visited Ukraine together in 1997 [click for foto], and Ms. Clinton has expressed deep concern about the trafficking issue and its effects on Ukrainian women and children. In June 2000, Melanne Verveer traveled to Kyiv for a workshop for international law enforcement officials on combating trafficking in women and children which was co-sponsored by the governments of Ukraine and the United States. On July 6th, Verveer attended the signing of two optional protocols on the rights of children by President Bill Clinton at the United Nations [click for foto]. These same protocols in addition to the "Optional Protocol to the Convention of Discrimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women" were signed by Ukraine’s President Kuchma [click for foto] during the Millenium Summit that took place in September of this year.

Oksana Horbunova (pictured left), who until recently headed the NGO La Strada office in Kyiv, says that the problem of trafficking of human beings must be addressed on a global scale and Interpol’s participation in unwinding the trafficking networks is critical to the solution of the problem. It is not an internal domestic issue for any country, whether sending or receiving the illegal migrants, because trafficking is based on cross-border trade. It is almost as widespread as the trafficking of narcotics, and possibly even more nefarious. Unfortunately, not all receiving countries are interested in cooperating with Ukraine to prevent the flow of human trafficking. Turkey is one of the least cooperative, yet it is one of the most often used countries for transit or as a final destination for Ukrainian women being forced into sexual servitude.

Olga Kalashnyk, Hotline Coordinator for the NGO "La Strada" in Kyiv, has been seeking out solutions in other countries for assisting victims of traffickers. But so far, there seem to be more questions than answers. Current legislation in Ukraine and abroad has thus far proven to be a weak deterrent to traffickers, and effective solutions for preventing women from falling into traffickers traps are few and far between. More funding and training programs are essential in order to begin to see any reduction among the numbers of Ukrainian victims.

Although many of the women that are preyed upon by sex traffickers come from the rural areas, it is Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, that sees by far the greatest number of the victims. Kyiv is the place where most "established" trafficking agencies that attract the young and naive are found, and Kyiv is the place where most rescued women are brought after their ordeals. Some of those victims are sent to the Kyiv Center of Women issues which is managed by Halyna Honcharuk (Goncharuk). Funding for the Center was allocated by the Kyiv city administration primarily to offer refuge for battered women, but all women who have escaped their traffickers are welcomed whenever La Strada Ukraine or other local NGO’s ask for assistance.

The task that lies ahead for the 14 delegates is to select the most useful and adaptable ideas to which they were exposed during the 10 days of training and formulate proposals for improvements to the system currently in place in Ukraine. The task that lies ahead for Ukraine and the rest of the world is to eliminate trafficking of women.

Click here for more information about the International Organization for Migration (IOM) training program.

BRAMA - Gateway Ukraine (www.brama.com) has been at the forefront of anti-trafficking campaigns since January 1998.

On the initiatives of Hanya Krill of BRAMA-Gateway Ukraine and Olya Stawnychy of the World Federation of Ukrainian Womens’ Organizations (WFUWO), the revealing Michael Specter story on trafficked women from Ukraine titled "Traffickers' New Cargo: Naive Slavic Women," (NYT 1/1198) was immediately translated into Ukrainian (funded by Ukrainian American Professionals and Businesspersons Association of NY & NJ) and distributed to key media organizations and government officials in Ukraine. Svoboda, a US-based Ukrainian language periodical, agreed to publish the translation in its entirety, prefacing it with an action call to all readers to cut out the article and send it to their families and friends in Ukraine. It was reported that this translation was in the hands of Ukrainian officials and NGO’s even before they were aware of the original English language version of the article.

With the NYTimes article at its core, Hanya Krill (BRAMA’s webmaster) created a new section called "Issues" where documentation and current news items about trafficking and other social problems have been compiled and made available to the Internet world. It was the first website about trafficking listed on the popular Yahoo! index, and remains a major center of information on this topic. Ms. Krill has also donated her time towards working with Katya Levchenko and Oksana Horbunova of La Strada Ukraine to create a website for the NGO. BRAMA provides complimentary website hosting for La Strada, and Ms. Krill continues to maintain it free of charge.

WFUWO established itself on the Internet at www.wfuwo.org early this year. WFUWO has been consistently active at the United Nations working to inform the public about the trafficking issue both at the international and local levels. Olya Stawnychy, WFUWO’s main representative to the United Nations, together with junior representative Hanya Krill co-authored the 1998 and 1999 statements to the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations.

WFUWO in partnership with BRAMA coordinated several New York/New Jersey area community meetings with delegates from Ukraine. The first gathering took place in July 1998 at Hunter College in New York City. This function and later events reinforced the efforts launched in early '98 to raise Ukrainian-American community awareness about the trafficking issue.

Last spring Olya Stawnychy initiated a support drive for the trafficking bills being proposed in Congress. With the help of newspapers The Ukrainian Weekly and Svoboda, the bill was given considerable exposure to local Ukrainian communities. Direct support of the bill was provided by BRAMA in the Issues section with links to Senate and Congressional representatives and a form letter that could be sent instantaneously by anyone on the WWW. It is in part due to those individuals who took the time to follow up and place pressure on their representatives that the new U.S. law was finally adopted.

Hanya Krill continues her anti-trafficking work as a certified UN correspondent following developments at the international level. She participates in conferences, on-line forums about the issue, and keeps the Internet public informed about Ukraine-related news and events on BRAMA’s UkraiNEWStand.

For more information about trafficking of women from Ukraine:

Current Social Issues on BRAMA Gateway Ukraine
(includes full text of the NYTimes article in English and Ukrainian)
http://www.brama.com/issues/

World Federation of Ukrainian Womens' Organizations
http://www.wfuwo.org/

La Strada - Ukraine
http://www.brama.com/lastrada/