The 2007 report says that Croatia is primarily a country of transit, and increasingly source and destination, for women and girls trafficked from Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and other parts of Eastern Europe for the purpose of sexual exploitation. Victims transiting Croatia are trafficked into Western Europe for commercial sexual exploitation, given Croatia's land and maritime borders with three EU countries.
The Annual Trafficking in Persons Report is intended to raise global awareness, to highlight efforts of the international community, and to encourage foreign governments to take effective actions to counter all forms of trafficking in persons.
As was the case in the previous years, Croatia is placed in a group of all former Yugoslav republics, with an exception of Slovenia, as well as with several EU member states - Portugal, Greece, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia, Malta, Bulgaria and Romania.
"The Government of Croatia does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so," the report said. "The government continued to improve its cooperation with NGOs to identify and assist victims of trafficking, increased its efforts to investigate and prosecute trafficking crimes, and increased training of government officials, particularly police and border control officers. The government should vigorously prosecute trafficking cases and impose adequate sentences for traffickers. It should also ensure that the institutionalized victim identification process already in place reaches all potential victims transiting Croatia, including illegal migrants and migrants who transit the country legally," the report said.
"The Government of Croatia, in cooperation with civil society, continued to provide identified victims with shelter, legal, medical, and psychological services as well as educational and vocational training," the report said, adding that the government continued the implementation of a national referral system that employs mobile teams assisting NGOs in victim identification. Last year the government provided approximately $100,000 to NGOs that assist victims of trafficking and promote anti-trafficking efforts.
The State Department also underlined that the Croatian Government increased its efforts to prevent trafficking in persons in 2006 and continued two public awareness campaigns begun in 2005, including the Interior Ministry's anti-trafficking fliers and posters in Croatian, Macedonian, Romanian, and Ukrainian on roads and at maritime border crossings, airports, and police departments.