EU’s two poorest member states, Bulgaria and Romania, are also the countries with the bloc’s largest number of people falling prey of human trafficking, according to a European Commission report.

The report has established that a total of 23.632 people were identified or presumed victims of trafficking in the EU over the 2008-2010 period.

The report also highlights that the number of people being trafficked in and to the EU increased by 18% from 2008 to 2010, but less traffickers end up behind bars, since convictions decreased by 13% over the same period.

Despite this worrying background, to date, only 6 out of the 27 EU Member States have fully transposed the EU Anti-Trafficking Directive into their national legislation and three countries have only reported partial transposition of the directive, with the deadline having expired on 6 April 2013.

The majority of the identified and presumed victims over the three reference years are trafficked for sexual exploitation (62%). Trafficking for forced labor (25%) comes second and trafficking in other forms such as trafficking for the removal of organs, for criminal activities or for selling of children follow with much smaller percentages (14%).

The majority of the identified and presumed victims over the three reference years are from EU Member States (61%), followed by victims from Africa (14%), Asia (6%) and Latin America (5%).

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