Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia TRM regional guidelines: "now we speak the same language!"

Project : Regional Office 1 Jun 2009 |

Orhid, Macedonia: The organisers of the final regional seminar of the Transnational Referral Mechanisms (TRM) chose the beautiful lake of Orhid to complete the last phase of the 3-year program. It was the occasion for the national implementation teams to draft conclusions and propose new steps for the future. The director of the Albanian anti-trafficking unit, Ms Irena Taga, admitted that even if the TRM guidelines are not yet officially adopted by the government, they are now put into practice, giving example of cooperation with Kosovo and BiH. She called for a regional agreement of all beneficiary countries for the implementation of the guidelines to “speak the same language”.

From Sarajevo, Mr. Joso Corluka concluded his speach by saying that “Knowing better our colleagues in other countries help us to have first hand information and not to repeat the mistakes we made in the past." As for the identified gaps, the adviser to the director of the state border service expressed the need to “develop alternatives to help victims, indicating that safe houses are not the only situation! We have to find solutions with families.” Most of the country’s representatives agreed on the need to formalize the implementation of the guidelines by signing agreements with countries of destination.

Several workshops were organised to address specific issues, related to major challenges to fight trafficking in human beings at the regional level. Regarding information exchange and data protection, the experts asked many questions on the practical use of Europol services, mentioning also some good practices with Eurojust. Most of the participants to this workshop confirmed the repeated difficulties to obtain quick answers, either on traffickers or on victims, at the transnational level. The most practical solution remains direct contact between counterparts. These contacts are made possible because of knowing and trusting each other, thanks to the participation to such regional meetings where professionals can meet and discuss concrete cooperation.