Albania has lifted a speedboat ban that helped curb human trafficking. An abandoned boat in Vlore.

By DAN BILEFSKY


VLORE, Albania - It was only after her trafficker sealed her mouth with electrical tape, drugged her and threatened to kill her family that the woman, now 27, says she realized that the man she had planned to marry had seduced her with a terrible lie.

Her journey at age 18 from an Albanian village to a London brothel, where she said she spent five years working as a prostitute, began with a gold engagement ring, the promise of a better life abroad and - like many before her - a speedboat trip to Italy under the cover of night.

So many women, men and children had been trafficked abroad to work as prostitutes, forced laborers or beggars that the Albanian government three years ago barred all Albanian citizens from using speedboats, the favored transportation of traffickers.

This measure, coupled with stricter border controls and revenge killings of traffickers by victims’ families, reduced trafficking by more than half and all but ended Albania’s role as a major transit point for people trafficked to Western Europe, say experts who follow trafficking.

But the ban prompted loud protests from fishermen and people in the tourism industry, and in May it was reversed. Law enforcement and human rights officials are concerned that as a result, human trafficking may explode anew - at an especially difficult time.

The financial crisis, many experts said, could increase human trafficking around the world. A United States State Department report in June warned of the potential risk, saying that the crisis is causing “a shrinking demand for labor and a growing supply of workers willing to take ever greater risks for economic opportunities.”

In the case of Albania, a poor, southern Balkan country that joined NATO in April and seeks to join the European Union, the government’s ability to fight trafficking is viewed as a critical test. Even with the speedboat ban in effect last year, the State Department said in its June report that in 2008, Albania did not comply with “the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking,” although it made “significant efforts to do so.” The report said corruption remained pervasive.

In June 2007, the Ministry of Interior arrested 12 police officers accused of human trafficking in three cases, including six officers with direct responsibility for antitrafficking enforcement.

Albanian law enforcement officials say help from other countries in getting evidence to convict traffickers is often lacking. Last year, 22 trafficking cases were prosecuted, according to the State Department report, fewer than half the number prosecuted in 2007.

Brikena Puka, the executive director of Vatra, an outreach group that has helped trafficking victims, said prosecutions were scarce partly because many victims were being tried for prostitution. In some cases, women are jailed after having been deported from other countries.

“Trafficked women are being victimized twice, she said. “First by the traffickers, then by the Albanian justice system.

Iva Zajmi, the antitrafficking coordinator at the Ministry of Interior, stressed that as a result of legal or tolerated prostitution in countries like Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands, many trafficked women were not identified as victims in those countries.

“The legalization of prostitution has created a wall behind which traffickers can hide and repress victims,” she said.

Human rights experts say prosecutions are too rare, partly because many victims are afraid to testify. Trafficked women who were interviewed say it is difficult to escape from their captors, who are part of an organized international network. The woman who shared her tale, who would not provide her name for fear of retribution, was referred to a shelter for trafficking victims by the Albanian police after a long struggle to escape her trafficker. The shelter persuaded her to file charges against him.

The former prostitute is forced to live under constant police surveillance in the maximum-security shelter, which she has not left in three years. Her trafficker spent only a month in jail. “You expect your own country to protect its citizens,” the woman said.

“You expect the laws not to make a victim into a criminal. Outside Albania, I was on my own, but here I am in my own country, and I am still being abused.”