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[ Human Trafficking, Country-by-Country ]
SWITZERLAND (Tier 2) – Extracted in
part from the U.S. State Dept
2023 TIP Report
The Government of Switzerland
does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of
trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so. The
government demonstrated overall increasing efforts compared with the
previous reporting period, considering the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic,
if any, on its anti-trafficking capacity; therefore Switzerland remained on
Tier 2. These efforts included adopting its third anti-trafficking
national action plan and allocating increased funding to protection and
prevention efforts, including for Ukrainian refugees. There was a
slight increase in the number of traffickers convicted in the reporting
period. However, the government did not meet the minimum standards in
several key areas. The government lacked consistent and uniform
victim identification and access to adequate care across the country, and
it identified fewer victims in the reporting period. The government
did not report how many victims it assisted or referred to care, and
services for children, male victims, and labor trafficking victims remained
inadequate. Lenient sentencing, resulting
the majority of traffickers receiving fully suspended sentences or
sentences of less than one year imprisonment, continued to undercut efforts
to hold traffickers accountable, weakened deterrence, created potential
security and safety concerns for victims, and was not reflective of the
seriousness of the crime. Law enforcement efforts such as
prosecutions of labor traffickers remained low, although the government
provided disaggregated data on trafficking. Based on the data made
available, the government awarded restitution to one victim during the
reporting period.
Prioritized Recommendations
Vigorously investigate,
prosecute, and convict traffickers, and seek adequate penalties for
convicted traffickers, which should involve significant prison terms.
Improve sentencing practices
by training judges about the severity of trafficking crimes and the
importance of applying the stringent penalties available under the
trafficking law.
Increase victim
identification and training for all front-line officials, with increased
focus on identifying labor trafficking.
Increase access to
specialized services, especially for labor trafficking victims,
asylum-seekers, male, child, and transgender victims.
Increase law enforcement
efforts on labor trafficking and provide sufficient resources, personnel,
and training.
Coordinate and centralize the
collection of trafficking data across the government, including
sufficiently disaggregating data between trafficking and other forms of
exploitation, as well as between sex and labor trafficking.
Amend the anti-trafficking
provision of the criminal code to include force, fraud, or coercion as an
essential element of the crime in accordance with international law and
ensure the criminal code clearly defines labor exploitation.
Provide sufficient personnel
and funding to specialized anti-trafficking police units and the Specialist
Unit Against the Trafficking in Persons and
Smuggling of Migrants (FSMM) to coordinate national anti-trafficking
efforts.
Increase coordination of
anti-trafficking efforts across all cantons.
Increase awareness of and
trafficking survivor access to compensation and increase prosecutors’
efforts to systematically request restitution for survivors during criminal
trials.
Expand authorities for labor
inspectors to identify trafficking victims.
Increase efforts to pursue
financial crime investigations in tandem with human trafficking cases.
Investigate and prosecute
labor trafficking as a trafficking crime and not as an administrative labor
code violation.
Ensure victims are not
inappropriately penalized for unlawful acts committed as a direct result of
being trafficked.
Strengthen international law
enforcement cooperation to prevent and investigate child sex tourism.
Appoint a national rapporteur
to provide independent review of government anti-trafficking efforts.
Increase worker protections
by codifying in law the elimination of recruitment or placement fees that
could potentially be charged to workers by Swiss labor recruiters and
ensure employers pay any recruitment fees.
Increase survivor engagement,
including by establishing accessible mechanisms for receiving and providing
compensation for survivor input when forming policies, programs, and
trainings.
Increase cooperation with
civil society regarding victim identification assistance, especially for
asylum hearings for potential victims.
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