The judicial response from an abolitionist and Human Rights perspective, and the procedural improvements in the accompaniment of victims of trafficking and sexual exploitation is one of the axes that are addressed on the second day of the IV Conference on Trafficking in Women and Girls for the Purpose of Sexual Exploitation, “Women in the Context of Prostitution. The response to a violation of Human Rights”, with the presentation of María Gavilán, Judge of the Court of First Instance and Instruction No. 3 of Arganda del Rey.
The Head of the Coordination Unit against Violence Against Women, Laura Segura, has assured that “union and coordination and networking are essential” to address trafficking and sexual exploitation, as well as prostitution, from an abolitionist perspective and from an abolitionist policy.
In fact, he recalled that, precisely, one of the main objectives is “to create a space for training, but also a space for exchange, for sharing, and, above all, for approaches for the future, for how we can also continue to carry out collaborative network alliances”.
Segura has valued the participation in the panel of the different organizations and entities, local and international, that work locally and that today will address the great challenges that are in the city when it comes to addressing the reality of trafficking and sexual exploitation in Melilla.
On the other hand, he stressed that the intervention of Judge María Gavilán is “very necessary to be able to see everything related to that judicial response from a human rights perspective, from a perspective that is also abolitionist”.
Procedural improvements in victim protection
The first presentation of the day, entitled “Procedural Improvements in the Protection of Victims of Trafficking in Human Beings from an Abolitionist Perspective”, was given by María Gavilán, Judge of the Court of First Instance and Instruction No. 3 of Arganda del Rey.
Gavilán regretted that trafficking in human beings “has a very high incidence of gender perspective, since it affects women and girls disproportionately.” In this regard, he stressed that “it is an attack on human dignity and on human rights.
The Magistrate has presented a series of legislative proposals from a point of view and a victim-centered approach, because, she defended, “the victim must in any case be at the center of all these measures.” This with an abolitionist perspective, “so as not to lose sight of the fact that the bodies of people, ultimately women and girls, cannot be rented or sold,” he has made clear.
“We need a comprehensive approach to this criminal phenomenon, with which we need to work above all prevention, then persecution and above all the protection of victims,” he insisted. In this regard, he has expressed the importance of having a Comprehensive Law for the Protection of Victims, “an instrument that would facilitate the fight against trafficking”.
Put victims in the center
For his part, Ezequiel Escobar, Executive Director of the NGO Fiet, explained that abolitionism must be understood as a set of proactive measures in which it is sought to put the victim at the center, without falling into its victimization “or so that everything that happens in the process revolves around what verbalises.”
In this way, he stressed the importance of the parties involved in the process of caring for the victims of trafficking “taking an abolitionist position, which dignifies the woman”. “Sexual exploitation cannot be considered a form of work,” he said.
Finally, he denounced that, “in Spain, the main form of slavery we have is trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and also in the second instance for the purpose of labor exploitation.” “Sexual exploitation, prostitution, is the way to channel slavery today into the 21st century,” he stressed.