isabel – Page 13 – Research and Projects

Twenty-two organisations from twelve different countries joined forces for a new Research and Innovation EU project, VANGUARD (adVANced technoloGical solutions coupled with societal-oriented Understanding and AwaReness for Disrupting trafficking in human beings).

VANGUARD is a three-year project, funded by the European Union under the Horizon Europe programme, which aims to strengthen the fight against trafficking in human beings (THB), at the nexus of advanced technological solutions of understanding, awareness raising, and training to disrupt the trafficking chain (online and offline) at an early stage and to address the culture of impunity. In addition, it aims to provide an improved intelligence picture of THB, with particular focus on THB for purposes of sexual exploitation, labour exploitation, and forced criminality.

This will be achieved through developing a modular and trustworthy suite of tools for detecting, identifying, investigating, and preventing online-facilitated THB activities and THB-related activities at (border) checkpoints based on the analysis of online multimedia content and multimodal streams, by leveraging the latest advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI).

CERTH-ITI, and in particular the Multimodal Data Fusion and Analytics Group (M4D), being the Coordinator of the VANGUARD project, together with the Visual Computing Lab (VCL) of CERTH-ITI, hosted the two-day kick-off meeting of the project on November 7 and 8, 2023 at their premises in Thessaloniki, Greece. More than 30 attendees representing all the partners from research and academic institutions, technology-oriented companies, and civil society organisations, as well as Police and Border Guard Authorities, had the opportunity to set up a clear action plan for the upcoming months, thus facilitating the fruitful and successful implementation of VANGUARD objectives. The kick-off meeting was also attended by the European Commission Project Officer who welcomed this attempt, underlining in parallel the need for continuous collaboration and a multidisciplinary approach to effectively tackle THB behaviours, resulting in effective policy making initiatives.

The Consortium

Coordinator: CERTH (EL); Partners: GGMH (DE), UCSC (IT), WAT (PL), KU Leuven (BE), ΚΕΜΕΑ (EL), CEA (FR), ICCS (EL), FUNDEA (ES), ENG (IT), ATOS IT (ES), ITTI (PL), RAD (RO), BayHfoD (DE), MJ (PT), MCH (ES), GPI (MD), HELLENIC POLICE (EL), EPBGB (EE), RBP (RO), GIBP (MD), CENTRIC (UK).

On November 30, the Euro-Arab Foundation held the conference ‘Prevention, detection and intervention in situations of trafficking in minors under guardianship’, organized by the Andalusian Regional Government with the collaboration of the Euro-Arab Foundation and the INTERCEPTED project.

The conference was aimed at professionals who work with minors who may be victims of human trafficking. It was organized by the Regional Delegation of Social Inclusion, Youth, Families, and Equality of the Andalusian Regional Government, with the collaboration of the Euro-Arab Foundation.

The conference addressed the issue of human trafficking, a form of modern slavery that is a violation of human rights and an attack on human dignity. The violence that derives from this end forces us to rethink the world from another perspective, from a more humanist and gender perspective. In this sense, the human rights approach must lead to the preparation and training of professionals who are in contact with trafficked minors and guarantee the protection of victims through their laws. For this reason, prevention, awareness-raising, and, above all, detection mechanisms must be increased.

The main objectives of this conference were to propose tools and guidelines to strengthen detection, identification, and prevention procedures in order to protect, safeguard, and consolidate the rights of minors in a trafficking situation, as well as to raise awareness of the INTERCEPTED project, which aims to interrupt the digital model of traffickers by improving the digital capacities of police and judicial authorities.

The conference was introduced by Matilde Ortiz Arca, territorial delegate for Social Inclusion, Youth, Families and Equality of the Andalusian Regional Government; Antonio Sánchez Ortega, Deputy Secretary of the Euro-Arab Foundation, who presented the European INTERCEPTED and BIGOSINT projects in which Euro-Arab is working, and Jorge Alberto Torres Segura, head of the Child Protection Service in Granada.

This was followed by the two conferences Trafficking of Minors in the Global Context of Migrations by Habiba Hadjab Boudiaf, intercultural mediator of the Granada Child Protection Service, and Public Policies in Andalusia and Trafficking of Minors by Ramón Rodríguez Gómez, Head of the Childhood Observatory.

The day concluded with the conference Socialising Agents in the Child Protection System by Ana Isabel Cruz Ortiz, director of the ISL La Huerta Minors’ Centre.

Interview with Habiba Hadjab on the prevention, detection, and intervention in situations of trafficking of children in care: