Blaming the victims instead
According to estimates of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), between 120,000 and 500,000 women from Central and Eastern Europe alone are brought to the western part of the continent by human traffickers, who force them into prostitution. Many of the victims are underage.
The EU guideline calls for special protection measures for children. "Children are more vulnerable and therefore at greater risk of falling victim to trafficking in human beings," the guideline states.
But Germany in particular offers them very little support. "These are teenagers that are brought to Germany and are forced to work in the field of prostitution or in other fields. If they get picked up by the authorities,
the focus is not on them being the victims of someone else's crime but that they themselves have broken the law - by being in Germany illegally," says Tarneden.