Photo: Dragan Todorović

“An arrest for human trafficking and mediation in prostitution” - not a month goes by without newspaper columns being filled with articles about the exploitation of people, workers, women for the purpose of human trafficking. “Blic” has been exploring this phenomenon, who the most common victims are, but also how we can deal with it as a society.

(Budikarakter.rs, photo: Dragan Todorović)

Jelena Hrnjak: Human Trafficking Victims are the Bravest Women of All

Some of the bravest women and girls I have ever met were human trafficking victims. Those were the women who boldly stood in a courtroom and put traffickers in their place, resisting the system that crucified them with social attitudes and expectations. That boldness and bravery is what drives me, and should drive us all.  

Photo: Profimedia

After drug and arms trafficking, human trafficking is one of the most lucrative illegal businesses. The most common victims are children and women. The number of people globally at risk of falling prey to this crime ranges between tens of thousands to several millions. Since the beginning of the year, 25 victims of human trafficking have been identified in Serbia. On European Anti-Trafficking Day, a message is sent to all the citizens that they are obliged to report this criminal offense.

Photograph: Vesti Online

Jelena Hrnjak, Programme Manager of Citizens’ Association for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings and All Forms of Gender-Based Violence Atina, points out that the greatest challenge lies in the fact that this position of victims before the court depends on judicial discretion. That is, whether a person has the status of a particularly sensitive witness that can provide them with a lower degree of stress and secondary victimization, depends solely on the judge's decision.

Photo: Profimedia

Without any discussion or explanation, the mother sent her underage daughter with a bag of clothes, stating that the young man was her husband. “When a girl is promised, it is set in stone, there is no refusal”, she was told. The girl was too afraid to say anything, she just cried. In the house where she was married, or sold, she lived with this man and his family. On the same day when she came, she was forced to have her first sexual intercourse with her “husband”, after which she was beaten and threatened, which occurred on a daily basis.

Photograph taken from the website RoditeljSrbija.rs

Amendments and addenda to the Family Law are being prepared: Expert associations question how prohibition of child marriages will be controlled

Some 2,000 child marriages occur every year in Serbia, and our country is only now preparing to prohibit them, according to the latest amendments and addenda to the Family Law ("Official Gazette of RS", No. 18/2005, 72/2011 - ot. law and 6/2015).

Bagel Bejgl – social enterprise with a soul

The second story we bring to you is the story of NGO “Atina” from Belgrade. We have had a pleasure to welcome Jelena Hrnjak who agreed to talk about the social enterprise this nongovernmental organization that assists human trafficking victims founded to facilitate the mission they have been dedicated to for decades.

Tar and feathers without condemnation

Leader of the Radical Party, Vojislav Seselj, threatened a member of Democrat Party, Aleksandra Jerkov, with tarring and head-shaving, while all Serbian institutions, except for the Commissioner for the Protection of Equality Brankica Jankovic and a number of opposition MPs ignored these threats, the same as last year when the leader of Serbian Radical Party called his colleague "Ustasha whore".