A new CoE structure will monitor the implementation of the Convention on human trafficking in Moldova

Independent experts will form a Group of Experts on Action against Human Trafficking (GRETA), a structure specialized in monitoring the implementation of the Council of Europe’s Convention on combating human trafficking in Moldova and other states which ratified the document, says a press communiqué of the CoE’s press service sent to Info-Prim Neo. At the CoE conference in Strasbourg, the member states and those with an observing status, together with international governmental structures and NG-0rganizations, discussed the constitution, selecting criteria and working methods for GRETA. The members of the group, totalling from 10 to 15 persons, will be selected for a period of four years, in correspondence to a geographic and gender balance, with the possibility of a one-time re-selection. These will constitute experts in the human rights field, as well as in social assistance and protection of human trafficking victims, mentions the communiqué. The structure will be created during a year after the launch of the Convention. The group will define its own methods for evaluation, like surveying the national authorities or gathering information from the civil society. GRETA will organize country trips in order to present reports on implementing the Convention and will suggest proposals for solving the identified problems. According to the Ministry of Justice of Moldova, our country is the first state to ratify the document, in this way proving its intention to cooperate in the field of combating human trafficking. The Convention on human trafficking is a complex tool which requires the states to adopt a large scale of legislative, economic and social measures, concerning the combating of human trafficking, as well as the appropriate assistance to victim, especially to women and children. This assistance consists of guaranteeing certain rights and fundamental liberties, which are essential for a successful recovery. Also, the participating states will be required to adopt a series of penal legislation reforms in order to incriminate the human trafficking and to facilitate interstate juridical cooperation on this matter. The Convention will be reinforced on February 1, 2008. Up to this moment, the document was ratified by Moldova, Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Georgia, Romania and Slovakia – countries which will constitute the subject to GRETA’s monitoring.