Report by Hamburg on THB March 2010

Parliament of HamburgHamburg, 1th of April 2010BSPC Working Group on Civil SecurityGabi Dobusch, MPDescription of the trafficking-situation in the Federal State of HamburgHave there in your country been made any analyses giving a picture of the extent of the problem trafficking in human beings? Does there exist a concrete picture of the problem?In October 2009 the Senate stated in its response to an interpellation of the SPD Parliamentary Group on the subject of human trafficking that it had not addressed the matter of evaluating the situation in relation to human trafficking/trafficking of women in Hamburg.The response stated the number of registered cases according to the German Criminal Code Human Trafficking for the Purposes of Sexual Exploitation and the Exploitation of Human Labour [(StGB) (§§ 232, 233 and 233a)], the number of charges and convictions for 2007, 2008 and the first half of 2009. The temporary decrease in the number of cases was seen by the Federal Ministry of the Interior as a result of the changed situation after the enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe. Koofra, a NGO coordinating the efforts against trafficking of women in Hamburg, reckons that there is no actual decrease in trafficking but a situation which makes it more difficult to identify and contact possible victims. Hamburg had updated its police concept against human trafficking dating from 2003 in 2007 in view of the new legal environment due to the enlargement to Central and Eastern Europe and the reform of criminal law in February 2005 – whether with positive effects remains to be seen.According to the response given to the interpellation organized smuggling of human beings (§96 AufenthG) is not seen as relevant any more in the context of human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation since most prostitutes in Hamburg come from EU-member states. The Baltic Sea Region is not seen as significant in the context of human trafficking from a Hamburg point of view. As for the exploitation of human labour (from 2007 to the middle of 2009 only 3 cases got registered): no indicators for the identification of victims of this crime are being generally applied, each case is treated individually.Crimes against § 232 StGB get dealt with by a special team “Crimes of the red-light-milieu” in the Hamburg Office of Criminal Investigation which is part of the department dealing with organized crime.Does your country have a National Co-ordinating Mechanism, a National Action Plan, and a National Rapporteur on trafficking in human beings?As for Mecklenburg-Vorpommern the data of these crimes are processed by the Office of Criminal Investigation for the Federal Office of Criminal Investigation for an annual Federal situation report.Does your country have any special laws concerning trafficking in human beings?There is no special legislation in Hamburg.