VZCZCXYZ0000
PP RUEHWEB

DE RUEHDS #2314/01 2710521
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 280521Z SEP 09
FM AMEMBASSY ADDIS ABABA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 6302
INFO RUEAWJA/DEPT OF JUSTICE WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHINGTON DC PRIORITY

UNCLAS ADDIS ABABA 002314 
 
SIPDIS 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR G/TIP RACHEL YOUSEY AND MARK FORSTROM 
PASS TO USAID 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: KTIP SMIG PHUM ASEC ELAB KWMN PREL EAID ET
SUBJECT: MONITORING REPORT ON ETHIOPIA G/TIP PROGRAM 
 
REF: A. 08 STATE 104394 
     ¶B. ADDIS ABABA 47 
 
¶1. (U) This cable provides monitoring information, requested 
ref A, to the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in 
Persons (G/TIP) to evaluate the effectiveness of G/TIP's USD 
324,000 grant to Project Concern International (PCI).  PCI's 
used the funds to support the Government of Ethiopia (GoE) to 
identify and assist TIP victims and to prevent and prosecute 
TIP.  The project began July 17, 2008 and will conclude July 
17, 2010.  As of August 31, 2009, PCI's expenditures for this 
project totaled USD 103,274, or 32 percent of the total 
grant.  (Note:  This represents a significant increase in 
initially slow spending of only 1 percent of the total grant 
at the 5.5 month mark, per Ref B.  End note.)  PCI 
anticipates that by September 30, 2009, it will have spent 50 
percent of the total grant, and notes that based on the 
project agreement, 7 percent of the grant is reserved for 
final evaluation. 
 
¶2. (U) PCI Country Director Walleligne Alemaw and PCI TIP 
Project Manager Aytenew Meheret briefed PolOff on PCI's 
activities under the G/TIP grant during a September 9, 2009 
site visit and subsequent correspondence. 
 
¶3. (U) Grantee's general activities to meet the goals and 
objectives of the grant proposal:  Under the terms of the 
G/TIP grant, PCI committed to improving the delivery of 
victim protection and assistance services for both children 
and adults and to increasing prosecutions in Ethiopia of 
human trafficking perpetrators.  By the end of the two-year 
funding cycle, PCI also seeks to have improved cooperation 
and coordination among key anti-TIP stakeholders, such as 
civil society organizations (CSOs), non-governmental 
organizations (NGOs), and the GoE. 
 
¶4. (U) Between January 16 and September 9, 2009, PCI scaled 
up its activities and overcame a number of the challenges 
reported in Ref B.  In late January, after months of lobbying 
the Ministry of Justice to approve its sub-grantee 
agreements, PCI signed a sub-grant agreement with the 
Multi-Purpose Community Development Project (MCDP), an 
Ethiopian NGO working in the Southern Nations, Nationalities, 
and Peoples (SNNP) Region of Ethiopia.  With technical advice 
from, and in cooperation with PCI, MCDP established numerous 
"Child Protection Committees" and "Child Clubs" in SNNP, and 
provided TIP awareness and prevention training to 879 club 
members.  In addition, MCDP provided basic business skills 
training to 89 members identified as at-risk for TIP, and 
established two savings and credit cooperatives, both with 
the aim of reducing members' vulnerability to TIP by 
increasing their economic well-being in their own 
communities.  MCDP also operates a temporary shelter for TIP 
victims in SNNP, and intercepted 23 trafficking victims 
during the reporting period (mainly children being trafficked 
within SNNP). 
 
¶5. (U) PCI also signed a consultancy service agreement with 
Empire Consult, an Addis-based consulting firm with TIP 
experience from South Africa, to draft a handbook on the 
protection of trafficking victims and management of 
traffickers, and to jointly conduct a series of Anti-TIP 
workshops with PCI throughout the country.  An English 
version of the 201-page handbook has now been drafted and 
will be published in the coming month.  Based on feedback 
from workshop participants, PCI is considering translating 
the handbook into Amharic.  (Note:  PolOff strongly 
encouraged PCI to publish an Amharic version of the handbook, 
as the majority of TIP victims in Ethiopia come from rural 
areas where English is not widely spoken.  End note.)  The 
handbook provides background on the nature and causes of TIP, 
detailed information on international and Ethiopian laws 
pertinent to TIP, strategies for preventing TIP, 
recommendations for the treatment of TIP victims, and 
government and NGO TIP case management.  PCI has utilized the 
handbook to conduct three workshops with a total of 77 
participants (36 government and prosecutors, 17 police, 11 
Child Protection Committee members, and 13 NGO), in Addis 
Ababa, SNNP, and Amhara.  Recognizing the critical role that 
judges, prosecutors, and police play in prosecuting and 
preventing TIP, and the relative unfamiliarity with TIP of 
many of these professionals in Ethiopia, PCI plans to host 
workshops for 1,000 legal professionals in the next 10 
months, utilizing the training materials it has developed. 
 
¶6. (U) In July, PCI signed a sub-grant agreement with the 
Justice Professionals Training Center (JPTC), which is 
operated by the Supreme Court to train judges and 
prosecutors, to train 120 legal professionals on TIP.  PCI 
has granted the JPTC full rights to use and modify the TIP 
handbook it produced, and is encouraging the center to adopt 
all the training materials it has provided into its standard 
curriculum. 
 
¶7. (SBU) Special issues or problems the grantee has 
encountered:  The GoE's interministerial task force on TIP 
has not met since June 2007, and PCI has not been able to 
convene the task force or assist in coordinating its 
functions.  PCI has had limited success working with the 
Federal Police, Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, and 
Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs, and has therefore 
been unable to meet many of its project objectives related to 
building the government's capacity to combat TIP and 
improving intra-government and government-civil society 
cooperation.  Participants in each of the three training 
sessions conducted to date noted the importance of involving 
these senior government officials who are capable of 
implementing the recommendations made in the training on a 
larger scale.  Interaction with the Federal Police may 
improve through PCI's recent agreement with the JPTC, but PCI 
has not developed plans for lobbying other ministries. 
 
¶8. (SBU) PCI's operating context, sustainability of grantee 
activity:  Despite resource constraints, the GoE is committed 
to combating the international trafficking of Ethiopian 
nationals.  In contrast, it has done very little to combat 
internal trafficking, and many Ethiopians (including police 
and government officials) do not consider internal 
trafficking a major problem.  Interagency coordination has 
not been strong, as evidenced by the failure of the 
interministerial task force to meet in over two years.  Most 
NGOs with anti-TIP programming are under-funded, and there is 
still a lack of awareness regarding TIP amongst working-level 
public and private actors.  PCI has not identified funding to 
continue its TIP programming once G/TIP funding has been 
exhausted.  However, many of its activities, including 
production of Ethiopia-specific training materials (which 
will hopefully be made available in Amharic), awareness and 
capacity building amongst government, non-governmental, and 
community organizations, and training of legal professionals, 
will enable PCI's partners to continue anti-TIP programming 
in the future. 
 
¶9. (U) Grantee's capacity and qualifications for its current 
activities and location:  PCI has more than 30 years of 
experience managing grants, contracts, and cooperative 
agreements from USAID in a variety of countries, and has the 
requisite familiarity  with U.S. Government reporting 
procedures.  In Ethiopia, PCI has firmly established itself 
as a leading voice in the network of anti-TIP NGOs, and 
enjoys positive working associations with nationally and 
internationally recognized NGO stakeholders.  Via its 
relationship with MCDP, PCI has established a significant 
presence in the SNNP region, and is successfully conducting 
training in other regions of the country as well. PCI has not 
directly hired staff for its TIP project beyond the Project 
Manager; its sub-grantees develop and provide training with 
his assistance and supervision.  PCI's Country Director, 
Regional Director, and Senior Technical Officer provide 
managerial support, oversight, and technical assistance. 
 
¶10. (U) Recommendations for G/TIP grantee assistance: 
 
-- Encourage PCI to further develop its relationship with the 
JPTC, as well as with the Federal Prosecutor's Office (which 
prosecutes the vast majority of TIP cases) and Federal 
Police, and to meet its goal of training 1,000 legal 
professionals in the next 10 months. 
 
-- Support PCI's efforts to convene the interministerial task 
force, and to lobby senior GoE officials to enact policies 
and allocate resources to support the anti-TIP work being 
done by working level government offices and civil society. 
 
-- Encourage PCI to translate its handbook and all training 
materials into Amharic, and to offer workshops solely in 
Amharic, particularly outside of Addis Ababa. 
 
¶11. (SBU) How the activities address key deficiencies in 
Ethiopia's anti-TIP work:  To improve victim protection and 
assistance, PCI must work with government and NGO actors to 
allocate further resources to and promote awareness of 
anti-TIP measures.  PCI has demonstrated its ability to work 
with judges, prosecutors, and police to improve the 
prosecution and prevention of trafficking in Ethiopia, and 
has a solid goal of training 1,000 additional legal 
professionals and working with the JPTC to train even more. 
As prosecution of TIP has been a weakness for the GoE, this 
attention addresses a key deficiency. 
 
¶12. (SBU) Summary of the grantee's overall performance:  PCI 
has both the national and international reputation to carry 
out its anti-TIP work in Ethiopia.  The PCI and sub-grantee 
staff in place are knowledgeable of the issues presented by 
their working environment, and are building strong 
relationships with both government and civil society actors. 
PCI has significantly scaled up its anti-TIP programming, 
accomplished a great deal during the reporting period, and is 
primed to accomplish more in the coming year.  It is unclear 
if PCI will be able to sustain its anti-TIP work, based on 
its inability to identify future funding for the project. 
MEECE