"PREKYBOS ŽMONĖMIS IR FIKTYVIŲ SANTUOKŲ PREVENCIJA: TARPDISCIPLINIS SPRENDIMAS" (HESTIA) 2015 M. – 2016 M."

It is difficult to assess physical or moral traumas for a person resulted from forced enter into a sham marriage against her own will. A human trafficking victim is deprived of freedom, is sexually abused by being subjected to violent and degrading treatment and sometimes even being forced to give birth to a child, thus completely ensuring the third country citizen with the opportunity to stay within the European Union. The respective person is employed against her own will, whereas the documents are used to obtain credit and loans.

At the moment it is difficult to predict to what extent the inflow of asylum seekers in Europe and the future migration processes will affect the involvement of Latvian citizens in sham marriages, but it is indicated in Europol’s 18th February publication of this year that the migration crisis in North Africa and the Middle East will have a major impact on the trafficking of human beings, and there is also an assumption provided that attempts to gain legitimate residency within the European Union will result in more forced marriages of convenience. The main countries of origin of victims of sham marriages that are mentioned in the Europol report are the eastern member states of the European Union – including Latvia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia, the female citizens of which are willingly or fraudulently taken to western states to enter into sham marriages with citizens of third countries. Many of these cases originate, for example, in Ireland, which is now the home country of many Latvian citizens.

Whereas over the last year there were 71 marriages registered between Latvian citizens and third country citizens, statistically taking up a stable second place behind Portugal, 122 marriages of such sort were concluded between citizens of Portugal and third countries. Certainly, not all civil acts are fictious, but, as practice shows, almost half of such marriages have not been concluded with the aim to establish a family, but in order for third country nationals to acquire a residence permit in the European Union. As one can see, the number of marriages between Latvian nationals and third country citizens has decreased at least in Ireland. This has been promoted by public awareness campaigns and activities in Latvia, as well as the regulatory framework of our state that prescribes criminal liability for ensuring a third country national with a possibility to legally acquire the right to stay in Latvia, another member state of the EU, member state of the European Economic Area or in the Swiss Confederation in bad faith.

(It is necessary to give a reminder that the deliberate and willing conclusion of a sham marriage for remuneration is a criminal offence against the state, for which the organisers of such marriages, as well as recruiters, intermediaries, and persons entering into a sham marriage are to be held criminally responsible, and according to Section 285.² of the Criminal Law may be punished with deprivation of liberty for a term of up to five years.)

Positive results have also been provided through the education of those specialists and practitioners in Latvian regions who are working directly with groups of citizens that are most at risk and that could be persuaded or deceived by human traffickers by luring the respective people abroad and forcing them to enter into a sham marriage.
A significant contribution has also been provided by initiatives of the Irish government by increasing the powers of marriage registrants to refuse the registration of suspicious marriages and inform the authorities about such cases, as well as by forming a specialised police unit, the main task of which is to combat such illegal activities.
 
Collaboration on an international level
The fight against sham marriages has been expanded to a multinational level of cooperation: during January of the previous year the international project “Preventing Human Trafficking and Sham Marriages: A Multidisciplinary Solution” (HESTIA) was started under the leadership of the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Latvia, and it is being implemented with the support of Directorate General of Home Affairs of European Commission “Prevention of and Fight against Crime Programme”.
There are significant aims and objectives for solving the respective problem determined within the project – forming awareness about sham marriages as a form of human trafficking and a criminal offence against a person, developing specific methodology for specialists and practitioners in order for it to be possible to prevent possible human trafficking, identify human trafficking cases and victims, and provide them with state and local government support and assistance.
Partners of the HESTIA project from Estonia, Lithuania, Ireland, Slovakia, and Finland have provided information about the project, its goals and the researched problem at various national, regional and international events, and as a result it is already possible to observe that an understanding regarding the problem is forming among EU member states and a desire to combat this new form of human trafficking is growing.
On 11 and 12 April of this year Vienna will host the high level conference “Alliance against Trafficking in Persons”, organised by Ambassador Madina Jarbussynova, OSCE Special Representative and Co-ordinator for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings. The main theme of this event will be human trafficking for forced criminality. The Latvian delegation is invited to promote a discussion on sham marriages as a new form and trend of human trafficking during the conference.
In the current political conditions it is of utmost importance to continue to raise public awareness about the possibility of human trafficking and its forms, by directly addressing those groups of Latvian citizens that are subjected to the risk of human trafficking. Those are members of the society who are in the situation of vulnerability, convince and persuade due to various reasons, as there might be a situation of vulnerability when the respective people do not have any acceptable or real choice for further living and they do not have the experience to make decisions on their own and act on behalf of their future. They are mostly young people (especially from orphanages), individuals with mental or physical health problems, people who have been out of work for a long time, or have credit liabilities, debts.
It is very important to help these socially vulnerable people in solving their problems, so that the situation does not worsen and they do not accept tempting but unfair offers to earn “easy” money abroad, thus also concluding marriages with third country nationals and frequently getting into cruel enslavement.
 
Sham marriages are not common in Latvia
There are no cases of Latvian citizens forcibly entering into sham marriages with third country nationals identified within our own state. According to data of the Office of Citizenship and Migration Affairs, in 2013, temporary residence permits issued in Latvia were terminated in three cases (in which sham marriages were concluded between Latvian citizens and citizens from Kazakhstan, Pakistan, and Ukraine), whereas in 2014, there was only one temporary residence permit that was terminated, and it was issued on the basis of a concluded sham marriage between a citizen of Latvia and a Jordan national. There were no signs of human trafficking identified in any of these cases. But that does not mean that we can afford to lower our guard in the fight against sham marriages.

On 18 August 2015 amendments to the Civil Registration Act of Ireland came into force, providing marriage registrars with more power in the assessment of suspicious applications to marry and the ability to refuse to register a marriage in the case that suspicions about a sham marriage are confirmed.
According to the information provided by the society “Shelter “Safe House””, which provided state-funded social rehabilitation services to victims of human trafficking during the period from December 2007 to June 2015, during this time help was provided to 113 victims of human trafficking, with 59 of the persons having suffered from human trafficking with the purpose of a sham marriage. Portrait of the victim: a woman aged up to 28 years old, elementary/secondary education, no children/ with 1 or 2 children born in an unregistered marriage and being raised by the mother alone.
According to the information provided by the Embassy of Latvia in Ireland, more than 1,600 marriages between citizens of Latvia and third country nationals have been registered in Ireland since 2004. Since 2006, almost 2,000 third country nationals have submitted their documents to the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service in order to receive a residence permit on the basis of a marriage with a Latvian citizen (the marriages are often concluded in Pakistan, Nigeria, India or in another European Union member state – Denmark, Cyprus, Spain, Sweden – with the residence permit being requested in Ireland). Many of these marriages are concluded with the aim to establish a family and there are no grounds to believe that they could be sham marriages.
 
Project “Preventing human trafficking and sham marriages: A multidisciplinary solution”(HESTIA) is being implemented by Directorate General of Home finance of European Commission (EC) “Prevention of and Fight against Crime Programme”. Grant Agreement Nr. HOME/2013/ISEC/AG/THB/4000005845.
HESTIA project partners:  Ministry of the Interior (Latvia), NGO “Shelter “Safe House”” (Latvia), NGO “Mittetulundusühing”” “Living for Tomorrow” (Estonia); NGO “Caritas Lithuania” (Lithuania); Immigrant Council of Ireland (Ireland); Ministry of the Interior of Slovak Republic (Slovakia); European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control of the United Nations (HEUNI) (Finland).
Dublin has held the first coordination meeting of the project HESTIA
30.06.2015. In order to discuss the progress of the project HESTIA*, results and conclusions of national and regional round table meetings**, the first project coordination meeting was held in Dublin from 3 to 5 June (Ireland) chaired by the Department of Justice and Equality of Ireland in collaboration with the Immigrant Council of Ireland. It was attended by 20 project coordinators and researchers from Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovakia, Finland and Ireland.
During the first day of the meeting participants concluded that the project partners have no common understanding of connection between sham marriages and human trafficking, because sham marriages are mainly regarded as the violation of national legal regulation related to migration and residence permits.
Ms Lāsma Stabiņa, National Anti-Trafficking Coordinator and the Manager of the project HESTIA: “Having evaluated sham marriages, we concluded that even if a woman is not subject to the exploitation, such a marriage has unintended negative consequences. According to the national regulatory framework of the project partners’ countries, the couple must live in a marriage for at least five years before the marriage can be dissolved. By this time the woman may develop a new relationship in which children are born, but they are legally considered to be the spouse’s children and can be used to bind a woman to sham marriage even more.”
Summarizing the views of the member states of the project and different concepts of sham marriages (sham marriage, forced marriage, marriage of convenience, fake marriage, false marriage, bogus marriage, fictitious marriage, exploitative marriage, grey marriage), the participants of meeting agreed that in the framework of the project and until the publication of the project research scheduled for May 2016, the term “human trafficking involving exploitative sham marriage” will be used because right now it reflects the least confusing nature of the problem.
The second day of the meeting was devoted to the acquisition of project research methodology provided by Finnish project partner – HEUNI, which is one of the leading research institutes in the Baltic Sea Region. In order to develop high-quality research, HEUNI project partners offered a single research methodology on the basis of which each partner of the project will develop the national report, reflecting the situation of particular country: national legislation and the legal framework for sham marriages and human trafficking, awareness of nexus between sham marriages and human trafficking analyzing the reasons why the person agrees to go abroad to enter into sham marriages, who are those persons who agree to enter into sham marriages and to become the victims of exploitation.
“In practice human trafficking and sham marriages are difficult to identify, therefore HESTIA project is currently even more topical. There is a need for the description of the situation and problem, which will give a clear answer as to whether the marriages is a form of human trafficking or a mean to involve a person in exploitation, whether it is possible to provide a concrete definition of this phenomenon, whether changes to legislation are required at European level,” says L. Stabiņa. “It is expected that the project research will answer the key questions: what are the weaknesses of the system/legislation/administrative procedures that enable trafficking in the context of sham marriages; what are the weaknesses of the system/legislation/administrative procedures that enable trafficking in the context of sham marriages; what can be done to prevent exploitation.”
Also Irish Ministry for Justice and Equality noted that a common understanding on this issue will be possible when there will be a clear description of the situation, of what and how happens in the country of origin of the victims and in the country of exploitation. In their view, a comprehensive description of the situation is necessary in order to achieve a common understanding and the research of project HESTIA will provide it.
In order to discuss the topicality of human trafficking and sham marriages, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Latvia as an associate partner of the project HESTIA organized the meeting of the project partners in the Latvian Embassy in Dublin on 5 June. The meeting was hosted by the Latvian Ambassador to Ireland H.E. Gints Apals, Counsellor of the Embassy Ms Vija Buša and Senior Officer of Embassy Consular Section Ms Guna Āboliņa, who presented the experience of the Latvian Embassy in this matter.
Since 2004 in Ireland more than 1,600 marriages between Latvian citizens and third country nationals have been registered. Since 2006 nearly 2,000 third country nationals have submitted documents to the Irish Naturalisation and Immigration Service for a residence permit on the basis of marriage with a Latvian citizen (often the marriage was concluded in Pakistan, Nigeria, India or in another European Union Member State – Denmark, Cyprus, Spain, Sweden). Embassy staff found that many of these marriages were concluded with a purpose to create the family and there was no reason to think that they could be sham marriages
Within the framework of the project during two years a variety of activities are provided: by the organization of discussions of legislators, policy planners and practitioners at national and regional level in each country a comprehensive research of the problem of sham marriages will be prepared; learning methodology will be developed and training will be implemented during which social workers, social educators, workers of educational institutions, media representatives, state and municipal police officers and representatives of non-governmental organizations will be educated; awareness raising campaigns and final conference of the project will be implemented. Overall, during the activities of the project it is planned to involve and address more than 700 thousand members of the society in six European Union (EU) countries. HESTIA project was launched on 1 January 2015 and will last 24 months.
 
*Project “Preventing human trafficking and sham marriages: A multidisciplinary solution” (HESTIA) is being implemented by Directorate General of Home finance of European Commission (EC) “Prevention of and Fight against Crime Programme”. Grant Agreement Nr. HOME/2013/ISEC/AG/THB/4000005845.
**National and regional meetings – with the aim to define and solve the problems of sham marriages – were held since this year’s February in HESTIA project partner countries – Estonia, Lithuania, Ireland and Slovakia.

With the support of the European Commission Latvia and five EU countries have launched an ambitious project to reduce sham marriages
05.02.2015. In order to solve the problem of sham marriages in Latvia and Europe the Ministry of the Interior (MoI) with the support of Directorate General of Home Affairs of European Commission (EC) “Prevention of and Fight against Crime Programme” has launched a project HESTIA* in activities of which public and non-governmental organizations of six countries – Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland, Slovakia and, Ireland are involved.
Within the framework of the project during two years a variety of activities are provided: by the organization of discussions of legislators, policy planners and practitioners at national and regional level in each country a comprehensive research of the problem of sham marriages will be prepared; learning methodology will be developed and training will be implemented during which social workers, social educators, workers of educational institutions, media representatives, state and municipal police officers and representatives of non-governmental organizations will be educated; awareness raising campaigns and final conference of the project will be implemented. Overall, during the activities of the project it is planned to involve and address more than 700 thousand members of the society in six European Union (EU) countries.
Dimitrijs Trofimovs, the Deputy State Secretary of the MoI: “A sham marriage used for legalization of the residence is an urgent problem for the whole EU, so it is important to look for solutions to reduce this phenomenon in all policy planning and inter-professional levels in Latvia and abroad. Sham marriages create not only uncontrolled migration, but are also a threat to the internal security of the EU Member States. We hope that the results of this project will not be “temporary patch” for the growing problem of sham marriages, but will provide a coherent and effective action of the EU Member States to address sham marriages and human trafficking with the purpose of sham marriages.”
Lāsma Stabiņa, National Anti-Trafficking Coordinator and the Manager of project HESTIA: “So far the problem of trafficking in human beings with the purpose of sham marriages has not been studied in any of the EU Member States, there is no information on persons engaged in sham marriages, on their use in other forms of trafficking in human beings, as well as a study has not been made about the laws used for the restriction of this phenomenon in other EU countries. HESTIA project activities – national and regional discussions in five countries, the study, specialist education, and informative activities are a combined set of measures aimed at raising awareness and establishing a comprehensive action in the EU Member States to prevent this form of trafficking in human beings.” L.Stabiņa explains that the meaning of the project name “HESTIA” in the Ancient Greek religion is the goddess of hearth, family, domesticity, who played an important role in the social, religious and political life. This prototype was chosen as a source of inspiration for the project and as an opposition to sham marriages, trafficking in human beings and abuse of people.
The Ministry of the Interior in cooperation with the association “Shelter” “Safe House”” developed a project application in 2013 and after its submission for the targeted call for proposals on the prevention of trafficking in human beings announced by the European Commission (EC) it was one of the 13 projects, which acquired the EC funding. Overall, 76 projects were submitted for the targeted call.
“Our aggregate statistical data shows that since 2007 the association has provided 113 persons with social rehabilitation services of which 59 were victims of sham marriages. From 2010 to 2014 the specialists of the association prepared 27 applications for submission to the court for declaring the marriage not valid from the moment of its conclusion of which 9 are litigated cases. On average, the proceedings lasted for 14-16 months. Last year the telephone operators of the twenty-four hours Trustline – 28612120 – provided 220 consultations for reducing the trafficking in human beings, of which 63 have been cases of sham marriages. This means that people are already interested in prevention of trafficking in human beings and in measures to protect themselves from it. There is still a lot of work that we together with partners invest in informing the society, and also in education of specialists. Our awareness campaigns in recent years have acquired recognition at the international level, and Latvia can be proud of gaining good experience in providing prevention activities, being an example, sharing knowledge with other countries. For prevention efforts to be effective, a continuous work of all involved parties is necessary, so it is a gratification that issues of sham marriages in the framework of this project will be addressed at the international level between both countries of origin of victims and countries of destination,” says Sandra Zalcmane, the Head of the NGO “Shelter “Safe House””.
NGO “Caritas Lithuania” (Lithuania) informs that in 2014 16 pre-trial investigations were initiated, provided assistance to 20 victims of trafficking in human beings.18 persons have been recognized as suspects. The main forms of trafficking in human beings – forced prostitution and involvement in criminal activities.
Presented data by Estonian NGO “Mittetulundusühing” “Living for Tomorrow”” show that during last year 2 people in Estonia were formally identified as victims of trafficking in human beings and one case has been adjudicated in connection with sham marriage.
European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control of the United Nations (HEUNI) reported that Finland has very little information on trafficking in human beings with the purpose of forced marriages or sham marriages. Three of the four identified victims were victims of labour exploitation.
Provided data by the Ministry of the Interior of Slovak Republic show that in 2014 30 victims of trafficking in human beings have been identified, 13 of them are victims of sexual exploitation, 9 of sham marriages, 4 of forced labour, 2 of forced begging, 1 of involvement in criminal activities, 1 of other form of trafficking in human beings . In the case of sham marriages in Slovakia there is a tendency of this form of trafficking in human beings to increase: 2 victims were registered in 2011, 2 victims in 2012, 7 victims in 2013, 9 victims in 2014. In many cases of sham marriages women were forced into prostitution.
An implementation of HESTIA project was launched on 1 January 2015 and would last for 24 months. From 5 to 6 February the first meeting of the representatives of the project’s Member States is organized in Riga in order to discuss HESTIA future activities and plans. The total project budget is 640,000 Euros.
* Project “Preventing human trafficking and sham marriages: A multidisciplinary solution” (HESTIA) is being implemented by Directorate General of Home finance of European Commission (EC) “Prevention of and Fight against Crime Programme”. Grant Agreement Nr. HOME/2013/ISEC/AG/THB/4000005845.