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DE RUEHTH #1715/01 3581302
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O 231302Z DEC 08
FM AMEMBASSY ATHENS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 2968
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ATHENS 001715 
 
SIPDIS 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPT ALSO FOR EUR/SE AND G/TIP 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV KCRM PHUM PREL SMIG KTIP GR
SUBJECT: GREECE: DECEMBER 2008 TIP UPDATE 
 
REF: A. ATHENS 959 
     ¶B. ATHENS 1114 
     ¶C. ATHENS 1204 
 
SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED.  PLEASE HANDLE ACCORDINGLY. 
 
¶1. (U) This is Embassy Athens' third regular update on 
Greece's efforts to combat trafficking in persons (TIP). 
REFTELS refer to previous TIP update cables. 
 
¶2. (SBU) SUMMARY: Greek anti-TIP police continued 
aggressively tackling trafficking rings, successfully 
completing two major investigations in two months: Operation 
White Bread, with 15 arrests and 18 victims taken into 
protective custody, and Operation Ilaeira, with 17 arrests 
and 6 victims rescued.  The GOG reorganized its TIP 
portfolio, giving full responsibility to the MFA and creating 
a new TIP section under MFA Secretary General Agathocles. 
Showing renewed political will in the fight against 
trafficking, FM Bakoyiannis highlighted TIP in her statement 
at the OSCE Ministerial in Helsinki as incoming 
Chairman-in-Office.  Greek prosecutors and labor unions held 
their first-ever international conferences focusing on sex 
and labor trafficking.  NGO contacts reported that TIP 
shelter capacity was adequate, with demand for beds declining 
-- the real need was funding for increased counseling, victim 
support, and legal aid.  END SUMMARY. 
 
----------------------------------------- 
Police Tear Down Two Trafficking Networks 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶3. (SBU) The Hellenic Police continued to do a good job 
tackling trafficking rings.  One recent success, Operation 
White Bread, involved INTERPOL and EUROPOL investigators and 
spanned more than a year.  On November 9, police fanned out 
across Athens and arrested 15 suspected traffickers, taking 
18 women -- all of them victims of sexual exploitation -- 
into protective custody.  The operation was named "White 
Bread" after police discovered that the suspected ringleader 
used a chain of bakeries to launder his illicit proceeds. 
The trafficking victims had been recruited from as far away 
as Siberia and were lured to Greece expecting to be 
highly-paid club dancers.  Instead, the women were coerced 
into prostitution, deprived of their travel documents, and 
threatened with physical harm.  The 15 suspects, many of them 
Greek nationals, face a variety of felony charges, including 
human trafficking and grievous bodily harm. 
 
¶4. (SBU) Operation Ilaeira, named for a kidnapping victim in 
Greek mythology, took place from December 3-6 and involved 
eight regional police divisions throughout the country, with 
50 police officers taking part in Athens alone.  Directed by 
Anti-Trafficking Police Chief Georgios Vanikiotis, the 
operation targeted a sex trafficking organization that 
recruited women throughout Eastern Europe.  Pretending to 
offer waitress jobs in Greece, the organization used 
employment agencies based in Russia to facilitate the 
victims' travel to Greece, where they were forced into 
stripping and prostitution and threatened with physical harm. 
 Police arrested 17 suspects (most of them Greek nationals) 
and rescued 6 victims, 5 of whom were granted official status 
as victims of trafficking (one case was pending).  In 
addition, Operation Ilaeira netted two wanted fugitives, one 
of whom had been sentenced to 59 years in prison and had been 
on the lam for 10 years.  Vanikiotis said that this operation 
involved unprecedented cooperation between the Athens-based 
Anti-Trafficking Police Unit and regional police divisions, 
as well as with prosecutors in Athens.  (NOTE: Operation 
Ilaeira was cut short by one day due to the start of 
anarchist and student protests and rioting on the night of 
December 6.  END NOTE.) 
 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
MFA: New TIP Office Helps Reopen Public Shelter 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
 
¶5. (SBU) In OctQer the MFA took on full responsibility for 
the GOG's TIP portfolio, creating a special TIP office under 
MFA Secretary General Agathocles.  This new unit, focused on 
working-level coordination between the MFA and other 
ministries, will take over day-to-day responsibilities from 
the unwieldy high-level Interministerial Committee on 
Trafficking set up under Greece's 2002 anti-TIP law.  One 
positive result has already occurred: MFA pressure compelled 
the Ministry of Health and Welfare to reopen EKKA, a public 
shelter for TIP victims in Athens that had been closed for 
many months.  EKKA's shelter is rehiring staff and is 
expected to be in operation in January 2009. 
 
 
ATHENS 00001715  002 OF 002 
 
 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
NGOs: TIP Shelters Suffice, but Counseling Needed 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
¶6. (SBU) NGO contacts stated that the need for TIP shelters 
had decreased, but that victim counseling and legal aid had 
become more urgent priorities.  Dina Vardaramatou, a leader 
of KEDE / Stop Now, a women's rights and anti-TIP NGO, 
explained that demographic changes among trafficking victims 
led to decreased demand for TIP shelters.  This meant, 
Vardaramatou said, that even after NGO Klimaka's TIP shelter 
closed (REF A), the remaining TIP shelters had enough bed 
space.  Whereas past victims of sex trafficking predominantly 
came from Albania or other eastern European countries, 
recently-arrived sex workers from Nigeria and central Asian 
countries typically did not want to stay in shelters. 
(COMMENT: Greater language and cultural differences between 
Greek shelter providers and the newer TIP victims may be a 
factor.  END COMMENT.)  Victim counseling and legal aid were 
still critical needs, according to Vardaramatou, and Greek 
TIP NGOs offering these services were still desperate for 
funding. 
 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
OSCE: GOG Commitment to TIP at Helsinki Ministerial 
--------------------------------------------- ------ 
 
¶7.  (U) On December 4, Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyiannis, in 
her OSCE Helsinki Ministerial statement, made a clear public 
commitment to combat trafficking:  "...human rights and 
fundamental freedoms, as well as combating trafficking, the 
protection of the rights of women and the reinforcement of 
their role in policy and law-making are of utmost importance 
for Greece."  In addition, an OSCE Human Dimension decision 
stressed a victim-centered approach to combating TIP.  These 
positive results reflect the MFA's desire to tackle TIP 
issues, especially as Greece takes on the 2009 OSCE 
Chairmanship. 
 
--------------------------------------------- - 
New TIP Partners: Prosecutors and Trade Unions 
--------------------------------------------- - 
 
¶8. (U) Mission Greece has continued reaching out to new 
partners in the fight against trafficking.  At a regional 
conference for prosecutors on TIP and cross-border crime in 
the Balkans, Thessaloniki Consul General Hoyt Yee and Poloff 
advocated for our TIP agenda, encouraging the Greek 
Prosecutors' Union to pursue aggressively TIP-related 
convictions and sentences and to focus on good law 
enforcement data collection.  The conference, held November 
15-16, was sponsored by the MFA and the International 
Organization for Migration (IOM).  Greece's independent 
prosecutors wield immense power in determining which cases 
come to trial, and their reaction to our outreach at this 
conference was overwhelmingly positive.  The good news has 
spread -- the National Judges' Union (more than 4,000 members 
throughout Greece) has since expressed interest in TIP 
training seminars. 
 
¶9. (U) Additionally, Poloff met with Greek trade union 
leaders on the margins of the ILO-sponsored 2009 Athens 
International Trade Union Conference on Combating Forced 
Labor and Trafficking, held November 21-23.  Zoe Lanara, the 
Greek General Confederation of Labor's (GSEE) Secretary for 
International Relations, stated that Greece's trade unions -- 
a powerful and influential political force -- had recently 
begun thinking about making TIP a central component of their 
advocacy efforts.  Lanara welcomed the opportunity to work 
with the Embassy in fighting TIP and pointed out that the 
Department of State's Annual TIP Report was quoted numerous 
times throughout the conference. 
SPECKHARD