Diplomatic community must take responsibility for prevention of trafficking for domestic servitude, says OSCE Special Representative in Kyiv

The OSCE Special Representative and Co-ordinator for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings, Maria Grazia Giammarinaro, at a workshop in Kyiv held from 12 to 13 June 2013 urged the Organization’s participating States to take concrete steps to prevent the little-known phenomenon of trafficking for domestic servitude in diplomatic households.

“Domestic servitude is no less serious or harmful than other forms of trafficking; it is simply another way in which people are subjugated,” said Giammarinaro. “When a person is obliged to be permanently at the disposal of the employer in a household, and when this person works all day and receives no salary, little food, is allowed to sleep for just a few hours, is psychologically abused, and has no days off, this is no longer domestic work; it is slavery.”

Representatives of protocol departments from Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Germany, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Poland, Switzerland, Tajikistan, Ukraine, the United States and Uzbekistan are participating in the workshop alongside experts from the OSCE and the International Labour Organization (ILO).

The workshop is the second in a series to be held in different OSCE regions to enhance the prevention of trafficking in human beings for domestic servitude in diplomatic households. The initial workshop was held in Geneva, Switzerland in June 2012.

The OSCE Special Representative has taken leadership on this subject, with a view to disseminating good practices. Momentum has also been generated by the adoption of the ILO Convention 189 on Decent Work for Domestic Workers in June 2011.

“We as the diplomatic community must take the lead in sensitizing our community to this hidden form of exploitation and to the existing good practices to prevent it,” Giammarinaro said.

The Office of the Special Representative published the first path-breaking study on the topic in 2010, Unprotected Work, Invisible Exploitation: Trafficking for the Purpose of Domestic Servitude, also available in Russian and French.

The event was held at Ukraine’s Diplomatic Academy and funded by the United States, Austria and Switzerland.