Category: Projects

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EN PARTES News Projects

Interreligious meeting at the Euro-Arab Foundation in the framework of the PARTES project

On 19 and 20 November, the training and capacity building sessions of the European project PARTES for the protection of places of worship took place at the headquarters of the Euro-Arab Foundation for Higher Studies. Organised in collaboration with the Local Police of Murcia, these conferences allowed to share experiences and good practices, as well as to identify new opportunities to strengthen cooperation between the different institutions involved in the implementation of the project and the key actors in the protection of places of worship, such as religious communities, police forces, public authorities and civil society organisations. Participants and speakers included members of religious communities from Granada and Murcia, State Security Forces such as the Guardia Civil and Mossos d’Esquadra, as well as other key entities such as the Pluralism and Coexistence Foundation (Fundación Pluralismo y Convivencia).

Some of the most relevant results of the PARTES project are the so-called ‘PARTES Guardian Approach’, a holistic model designed in a participatory and inclusive way, which considers all relevant dimensions for the protection of places of worship and the ‘Action Sheets’, a compilation of good practices drawn from the ten countries that make up the project consortium.

PARTES is a project funded by the Internal Security Fund of the European Commission which aims to develop a comprehensive prevention model for the protection of places of worship in the European Union through an empirical, inclusive and participatory methodology in order to prevent hate crimes against religious communities. As part of its priorities, the project has developed awareness-raising campaigns, evaluated and exchanged good practices across the consortium member countries, and developed workshops, training and seminars to improve cooperation between public authorities and religious communities, among other issues related to the protection of places of worship.

Project website.

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Intercepted News Projects

Second INTERCEPTED Seminar: Digital Anti-Trafficking Capacities

On 13 November, INTERCEPTED project held its second  seminar on trafficking under the title Strengthening Digital Capabilities to Counter Human Trafficking. This event was co-organised with the ASIT project, which, as INTERCEPTED, aims to prevent and combat online human trafficking.

The event was opened by Antonio de Nicolo, from the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Trieste (Italy), who commented on the main features of both projects and how they contribute to preventing and counteracting the effects of trafficking, underlining the need for cooperation between different entities at different levels in the field of trafficking in human beings.

Karen Hough, a researcher at the Euro-Arab Foundation for Higher Studies, offered a panoramic analysis of online trafficking, covering the different ways in which this phenomenon manifests itself and the multiple groups and areas it affects, breaking stereotypes about this serious crime and distinguishing it from other crimes. The speaker also stressed the need for cooperation and presented several illustrative cases, whilst offering an interesting catalogue of good practices and solutions from other projects such as OSINT-RADAR or VANGUARD, in which the Euro-Arab Foundation and KEMEA, members of the INTERCEPTED project, also participate.

In his presentation, Lior Mordechai, Director of Customer Success and Marketing at Falkor Ltd., presented the main features of the forensic technology used in human trafficking investigations, which often makes use of open source intelligence (OSINT). Mordechai showed several examples of tools and methods for detecting online grooming and exploitation.

Finally, Sergio Bianchi, Director General of AGENFOR International addressed different strategies to improve collaboration in trafficking investigations, indicating multi-agency intervention models as well as how to develop unified scenarios for action in public-private partnerships against trafficking.

INTERCEPTED is a research project funded by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Migration and Home Affairs that aims to intercept online recruitment and propaganda to disrupt the business of human trafficking, by enhancing the digital capabilities of law enforcement and judicial authorities and cooperating with internet service providers. The project is a partnership between the Public Prosecutor’s Office in Trieste, Italy, the Hellenic Police in Greece, Germany, the KEMEA Centre for Security Studies in Greece, the NGO AGENFOR in Italy and the Euro-Arab Foundation for Higher Studies in Spain, under the coordination of the University of Public Administration in Bremen (HfÖV). More information can be found on the Euro-Arab Foundation’s project page and on the INTERCEPTED project page.

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News Projects victory

A new European project led by the Euro-Arab Foundation will boost restorative justice

The headquarters of the Euro-Arab Foundation in Granada hosted this Thursday the inaugural meeting of VicTory, a project funded by the European Commission, which over the next two years will work to mitigate hate and violent extremism from a restorative approach focused on the victims.

The Euro-Arab Foundation will lead the project with seven other European entities: the Basque Country Ombudsman’s Office – Ararteko, the University of Porto, Innovative Prison Systems – IPS, the association for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Intervention – ILGA, the association Carcere e Territorio di Brescia, the Hungarian Helsinki Committee for the Protection ofhttps://projects.fundea.org/en/victory-2/ Human Rights and the think-tank MAP Finland for research on interactions between diverse communities and societies.

VicTory is designed to promote restorative justice as a key tool to repair the harm caused by hate crime and violent extremism and facilitate reconciliation. It will seek to broaden public awareness, highlight the need to listen to the needs of victims, provide greater access to information to support victims and practitioners and, for the latter, offer them greater preparation. All this, from a perspective of multi-agency cooperation that is embodied in the very nature of the entities that make up the project consortium.

Specific objectives of VicTory

The first objective of VicTory is to create a victim-centred approach to support victims of hate crime and violent extremism and incidents related to (violent) extremism. The second objective is to improve the effective and consistent implementation of legislation and good practices, such as restorative ones, to uphold victims’ rights and mitigate secondary victimisation. The third and final objective is to improve the skills, intervention, support and cooperation of key professionals, i.e. criminal justice practitioners, victim support workers and case managers, when working with victims of hate crime and incidents related to (violent) extremism.

VicTory responds to the priority of the European Union’s call to contribute to the effective and consistent implementation of European legislation in the field of crime victims‘ rights in line with the priorities set by the EU Strategy on Victims’ Rights (2020-2025).

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Intercepted News Projects

2nd INTERCEPTED Seminar

As part of the INTERCEPTED Project’s Online Seminar Series, together with the ASIT Project, an online meeting focusing on Strengthening Digital Capabilities to Counter Human Trafficking, will be held on November 13, 2024 from 14:00 to 16:30 (CET). The seminar will delve into current trends in online human trafficking  and the digital business model.  It will subsequently  present OSINT and forensic technology for trafficking investigations. Additionally, the practical aspects of multi-agency model and public-private collaboration will be addressed. Finally, the ways of developing a common domestic-foreign investigation scenario will be discussed.

Registration survey:

https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/46db3235-39c1-6965-1e88-899f4575ff1d
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News Projects VANGUARD

The VANGUARD project against human trafficking meets in Granada to take stock of its first year

The conference, held this Thursday at the Faculty of Law with more than forty people from different parts of Europe, has been dedicated to reviewing the work carried out in the first year of implementation of the VANGUARD project, as well as defining and organising the steps to be taken in the coming months.

According to Javier Ruipérez Canales, director of the Projects Department of the Euro-Arab Foundation, ‘the balance that can be drawn from this meeting is highly positive, as a large number of activities have been carried out in relation to the research developed around the theme of the project, trafficking and smuggling of human beings, thus fulfilling the objectives set for this first year of the project’s life’.

About VANGUARD

VANGUARD, a project funded by the HORIZON Europe programme, focuses on strengthening the fight against human trafficking through advanced technological solutions, promoting understanding and capacity building to interrupt the trafficking chain at an early stage, fighting the culture of impunity.

Among the most important objectives of VANGUARD is the development of a technological tool that integrates artificial intelligence to facilitate the work of law enforcement agencies in different European countries, including Spain, in this sense, the project is currently in the discussion phase.

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News Projects Rebel EN

The Euro-Arab Foundation invites migrant women in Spain to take part in the ReBel project

The Euro-Arab Foundation based in Granada has opened the call to participate in the ReBel (Redesign Belonging) project, which seeks to foster solidarity and a sense of belonging among migrant women by creating spaces for dialogue and co-creation of strategies. To this end, it invites migrant women over the age of 18 of any nationality who have lived in Spain for more than 5 years who want to share their experiences, talk about the challenges and barriers they face throughout the process of settling in Spain, and form part of the team that will design new integration policy strategies, with better services and more opportunities.

The first of the activities to be carried out by the participants will be a meeting, a reflection group, which will take place on 5 November in Granada. All the data of the participants in the activities of the ReBel project will be treated in accordance with the Data Protection Act (GDPR) and the information they provide will be treated with strict confidentiality.

Those interested should send an email to rebel@fundea.org where they will be able to ask any questions they may have, also with regard to the coverage of transport costs, and will be able to register.

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data quality en News Projects

Launch of DATA EQUALITY, a project that will fight against discrimination based on data

DATA EQUALITY, a European project that seeks to join forces to combat data-based discrimination, was launched at an online event on 20 September. The Euro-Arab Foundation, together with the Court of Appeal of Venice (coordinator of the project), the Agenfor International Foundation, the Municipality of Murcia, Kentro Merimnas Oikogeneaias Kai Paidiou, Hellenic Police, Keshilli i Larte i Prokurorise, Associazione Nazionale Comuni Italiani Emilia Romagna and Kentro Meleton Asfaleias, will develop a common methodology that will allow different actors to cooperate in the identification and prevention of this problem.

The project targets professionals active in the collection, analysis, use and dissemination of data belonging to the two macro-sectors on which the project focuses: public authorities, in particular local law enforcement agencies and judicial bodies, and civil society organisations (CSOs).

The project will train law enforcement officials, judicial bodies as well as members of CSOs in the use of the new methodology, including its impartial OSINT component and in line with the EU General Data Protection Regulation. The students will come from the countries participating in the project: Greece, Italy, Spain and Albania.


The role of the Euro-Arab Foundation

The Euro-Arab Foundation will undertake the task of comprehensively assessing the current methodologies employed in the collection, management, analysis and dissemination of discrimination-related data. The aim is to identify the main shortcomings, omissions and existing demands, as well as best practices to be incorporated into a new methodology. It will also explore the possibilities offered by artificial intelligence and open source tools (OSINT) to detect inherent biases in data.

This will require cooperation between public and private bodies, in particular between CSOs and local and judicial authorities, as well as surveys and interviews with law enforcement and judicial professionals and civil society organisations to understand their perspectives, needs and challenges in relation to data collection, management, analysis and sharing.

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Intercepted News Projects

Multi-agency work and cross-border cooperation: keys to the fight against trafficking in persons

On Thursday 19 September, the INTERCEPTED and OSINT-RADAR projects jointly organised a seminar for law enforcement agencies (LEAs), judiciary and prosecutors. The event, held physically in Tirana (Albania), but in a hybrid format, discussed key aspects of human trafficking, such as public-private cooperation in the fight against trafficking and other crimes such as smuggling of migrants or drug trafficking. The professionals and experts participating in this event placed special emphasis on the analysis of the phenomenon in the Balkans and Eastern Europe and its relationship with the European Union, although experiences located on other routes, such as those of the Central Mediterranean, were also analysed. The access routes from the Balkans to the EU were also analysed, highlighting the geographical value of Trieste (Giulia-Venice-Julia), Bari (Apulia), Slovenia and Albania as key points. In this context, different experiences of cooperation between EU countries and the Balkans, especially between Albania, Italy and Slovenia and, to a lesser extent, France and Spain, were presented and discussed.

In the presentations and discussions, the possible interrelation of the phenomenon of trafficking with other crimes, both online and offline, was analysed. The key role of multi-agency work, cross-border cooperation between different bodies (LEAs, prosecution and judiciary) and the desirability of establishing cooperation agreements between them, both nationally and internationally, was also highlighted.  Many of the interventions underlined the benefits of transferring experiences and techniques from the investigation of other crimes, as is the case of the follow-the-money-approach. The key role of digital tools in the fight against this phenomenon and other criminal activities in which organised crime operates was also discussed.

The next INTERCEPTED seminar on digital trafficking, co-organised by the ASIT project, also of a hybrid nature, will be held on 13 November and will mainly target internet providers and experts in digital tools.

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News Projects VANGUARD

FUNDEA’s researchers present VANGUARD in Laurea University in Helsinki

On the 12th September 2024, researchers from the Euro-Arab Foundation in Granada, Spain presented Vanguard, an EU funded Horizon Europe focused on the prevention and detection of Trafficking inhuman beings as part of the crime prevention module at Laurea University of Applied Sciences in Helsinki. Over 25 students and stakeholders attended the three-hour hybrid session, which focused on both online and offline cases and detection methods. The researchers presented the unique approach of Vanguard, which encompasses the state of art creation of artificial intelligence to be used at land, sea and air borders, coupled with societal awareness.

Researchers also presented statistics and case studies from Spain, outlining how often national citizens are victims of this heinous crime. They also highlighted the need for the inclusion of survivors in both preventative measures and policy making.

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News Projects Rebel EN

Migrant women will actively participate in the European ReBel project

ReBel, a project funded by the European Commission in the framework of the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values Program (CERV), begins its work after the inaugural event held on September 9 in Helsinki. Coordinated by the Finnish Laurea University of Applied Sciences, the consortium is made up of the Euro-Arab Foundation for Higher Studies, for Spain and under the coordination of researchers Karen Hough and Jusaima Moaid-Azm Peregrina; the international organization What Design Can Do for the Netherlands and the training center Visiopintokeskusvisio, for Finland.

The cornerstone of this project are the migrant women who have been in European host countries for more than 5 years, women who will collaborate with professional designers to create models and solutions for different contexts in the countries where this European project is being developed: Spain, Finland and Holland.

The role of the Euro-Arab Foundation

The Euro-Arab Foundation will lead the preliminary research work package that will lay the foundations of the project and will comparatively analyze other European projects that have also focused on the sense of belonging of migrants. Subsequently, a survey will be elaborated -under European standards- that will collect the experience of migrant women and their feelings towards the reception received. Likewise, Euroarab will be in charge of the so-called “research dialogues” in Spain, which will bring together local participants, migrant women, NGOs and authorities in workshops where they will address different topics such as xenophobic attacks, resilience strategies or barriers to overcome. Co-creative collaboration workshops will also be organized to improve the services offered by both authorities and NGOs, and round tables on migration policies will be organized.

The expected impact of the work developed by ReBel will be seen in the empowerment of migrant women, the improvement of their sense of belonging and the promotion of positive narratives. It will also contribute to a broader understanding among society, inform more inclusive immigration policies and provide practical tools to promote solidarity in these contexts.

The models and solutions created by ReBel will be designed within different contexts in the project countries, with input from a wide range of stakeholders, allowing the generation of new concepts that can be used within different settings in the European Union, including municipalities, national authorities, local communities, NGOs and other actors developing the integration of migrants.