DFA kicks-off anti human trafficking workshop in Mexico

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The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), together with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), has begun the second Regional Workshop on Anti-Trafficking in Person, which is being held in Mexico City from Sept. 22 to 26.

The workshop seeks to provide “assistance-to-nationals” personnel who are sufficiently equipped with legal, psychological and practical training to help them properly identify situations of trafficking, and render the required assistance in such cases.

This (workshop) is in line with the third pillar of Philippine Foreign Policy and our country’s international commitment under the United Nations Convention on Transnational Crime and its protocol on trafficking in persons,” Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert del Rosario said.

“This second regional workshop comes on the heels of the success of the workshop for the posts in the Middle East and Africa last April. It is important to bring this training program to other regions such as the Americas to ensure that the DFA continues to enhance protection to significant number of Filipinos vulnerable to being trafficked overseas.”

The workshop will involve around 30 assistance-to-nationals officers and staff from 13 Philippine Foreign Service Posts (FSPs) in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Mexico and the US.

The DFA reported that in 2013, a total of 2,947 Filipino victims of human trafficking and illegal recruitment worldwide sought and received assistance from the Philippine Foreign Service Posts (FSPs). It also noted that 432 of these cases were assisted by FSPs in the Americas.