A regional conference on fostering international co-operation to prevent and address trafficking in persons (TIP) and smuggling of migrants (SOM) kicked off in the Egyptian Red Sea resort city of Sharm el Sheikh on Monday.
The conference is organised by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the regional office for the Middle East and North Africa in co-operation with Egypt’s National Coordinating Committee for Combating and Preventing Illegal Migration and Trafficking in Persons (NCCPIMTIP).
Addressing the inaugural session, head of the NCCPIMTIP Naela Gabr stressed Egypt’s effective role in combating the crimes of human trafficking and illegal migration.
Egypt has been keen on joining the UN Convention against Transnational Organised Crime and its two protocols: the Protocol to Suppress, Prevent and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children and the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air, Gabr said.
At the national level, Egypt has also been acting to suppress the two crimes through an effective legal framework consisting of the 2014 constitution and the laws on combating human trafficking and illegal migration, she added.
Gabr told the conference that the Egyptian vision on how to combat the crimes of human trafficking and illegal migration is based on respecting the internationally-recognised principles of human rights.
She underscored national strategies that include activities to raise public awareness, as well as training courses, noting that inalienable basic human rights are in the heart of all of them.
Development is the main pillar to help create jobs for youth, Gabr said, noting that alternative solutions have been made available, including through small and medium-sized enterprises.
Awareness programmes are meant to inform youth and their families about risks of illegal migration, as well as making clear to them the different forms of human trafficking, she further said.
She finally told the gathering that regional co-operation is an effective tool to exchange expertise and success stories in order to support investigations and judicial pursuit that would eventually lead to dismantling criminal networks that further mushroom in light of the successive political and economic crises.
