Save the Children, with support of the British Embassy, has started a campaign “Save the Children from Human Trafficking”. This is, at the same time, a call for joint action and involvement of all services responsible for the protection of children. The main activity of the campaign, besides TV spots, posters and leaflets, is a survey into the risk factors giving rise to child trafficking, as well as training and educational programs in the Raski and Jablanicki Regions. The idea of the training is to create teams at a municipal level, which would be the leaders of activities, campaign and information exchange. At the beginning of the campaign, attention has been drawn to children up to 5 years of age, while in the later stage it will focus on the most frequent victims of trafficking – girls between 15 and 18.
Of all victims identified through ASTRA SOS Hotline between March 2002 and January 2004, 10% were children. In 2004, this percentage reached very high 56%. Since the beginning of work of ASTRA SOS Hotline service until December 2005, of 186 identified victims, 30% were children. According to the Shelter for trafficked victims, between the beginning of 2002 and December 2005, the Shelter housed 37 children, of whom 22 were the nationals of Serbia and Montenegro. It should be stressed that 14 children were trafficked for the purpose of labor exploitation and forced marriage, while 23 of them were sexually exploited.
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