[A-List] US imperialism: embedding the market in Kosovo

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Prostitution rise blamed on forces
GARENTINA KRAJA, Pristina
The Herald, May 07 2004

Peacekeeping troops deployed in Kosovo have contributed to a huge rise in
prostitution and human trafficking in the region, a human rights group
claimed yesterday.

An international coalition of soldiers serving in the former Yugoslav
province were accused of sexually exploiting women and girls as young as 11,
in a report by Amnesty.

In some instances, troops from the Nato-led international military force in
Kosovo (K-for) also have allegedly been involved in trafficking the women
themselves. None of those accused was British.

Amnesty International's report found that after the deployment in 1999 of
40,000 K-for troops and hundreds of UN civilian workers to Kosovo, a
"small-scale local market for prostitution was transformed into a
large-scale industry based on trafficking run by organised criminal
networks".

The report found the number of places, such as bars and clubs, where women
were exploited had increased tenfold from 18 in 1999 to more than 200 last
year.
One in five of those using trafficked women were international personnel,
despite making up just 2% of the Kosovan population.

Under an immunity agreement, however, K-for soldiers and UN personnel cannot
be prosecuted in Kosovo, and have escaped any criminal charges in their own
countries.

"It is outrageous that the very same people who are there to protect these
women and girls are using their position and exploiting them instead - and
they are getting away with it," the report said. About 9000 British soldiers
served in K-for in 1999 but that has now dropped to 1000, according to the
Ministry of Defence, which declined to comment on the study.

Many of the exploited women had come from the poorest parts of eastern
Europe - Moldova, Ukraine and rural Kosovo - and were sold in "trading
houses", the report found.

In some instances, they were then drugged and abducted and "broken in"
before being sold from one trafficker to another for prices ranging from 50
to 3500 euros (£33-£2350).

Those trafficked faced torture, ill-treatment, beatings, rape, having their
documents taken away and being locked in flats or cellars.

Kate Allen, UK director of Amnesty International, said: "Women and girls as
young as 11 are being sold into sexual slavery in Kosovo and international
peacekeepers are not only failing to stop it they are actively fuelling this
despicable trade by themselves paying for sex from trafficked women."

Lieutenant Colonel Jim Moran, a Nato spokesman, suggested the report was
outdated because policies had changed, noting peacekeepers were "not
allowed" off base in civilian clothing or to go to bars and nightclubs. He
added: "Each nation is responsible for the conduct of their soldiers, and if
they find a soldier that is breaking the law, it is up to them to bring them
to justice."

The UN mission in charge of Kosovo said the report "misses these essential
points: criminal gangs are exploiting vulnerable people, while law
enforcement authorities in Kosovo are addressing the problem and making some
progress".-AP