ICELAND--2009 TIP REPORT: PRESS GUIDANCE AND

UNCLAS STATE 060608

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: ELAB KCRM KWMN PGOV PHUM PREL SMIG KPAO KTIP IC
SUBJECT: ICELAND--2009 TIP REPORT: PRESS GUIDANCE AND
DEMARCHE

REF: A. 2009 STATE 59732

B. 2009 STATE 5577


1. This is an action cable; see paras 5 through 7 and 10.


2. On June 16, 2009, at 10:00 a.m. EDT, the Secretary will
release the 2009 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report at a
press conference in the Department's press briefing room.
This release will receive substantial coverage in domestic
and foreign news outlets. Until the time of the Secretary's
June 16 press conference, any public release of the Report or
country narratives contained therein is prohibited.


3. The Department is hereby providing Post with advance press
guidance to be used on June 16 or thereafter. Also provided
is demarche language to be used in informing the Government
of Iceland of its tier ranking and the TIP Report's imminent
release. The text of the TIP Report country narrative is
provided, both for use in informing the Government of Iceland
and in any local media release by Post's public affairs
section on June 16 or thereafter. Drawing on information
provided below in paras 8 and 9, Post may provide the host
government with the text of the TIP Report narrative no
earlier than 1200 noon local time Monday June 15 for WHA, AF,
EUR, and NEA countries and OOB local time Tuesday June 16 for
SCA and EAP posts. Please note, however, that any public
release of the Report's information should not/not precede
the Secretary's release at 10:00 am EDT on June 16.


4. The entire TIP Report will be available on-line at
www.state.gov/g/tip shortly after the Secretary's June 16
release. Hard copies of the Report will be pouched to posts
in all countries appearing on the Report. The Secretary's
statement at the June 16 press event, and the statement of
and fielding of media questions by G/TIP's Director and
Senior Advisor to the Secretary, Ambassador-at-Large Luis
CdeBaca, will be available on the Department's website
shortly after the June 16 event. Ambassador de Baca will
also hold a general briefing for officials of foreign
embassies in Washington DC on June 17 at 3:30 pm EDT.


5. Action Request: No earlier than 12 noon local time on
Monday June 15 for WHA, AF, EUR, and NEA posts and OOB local
time on Tuesday June 16 for SCA and EAP posts, please inform
the appropriate official in the Government of Iceland of the
June 16 release of the 2009 TIP Report, drawing on the points
in para 9 (at Post's discretion) and including the text of
the country narrative provided in para 8. For countries
where the State Department has lowered the tier ranking, it
is particularly important to advise governments prior to the
Report being released in Washington on June 16.


6. Action Request continued: Please note that, for those
countries which will not receive an "action plan" with
specific recommendations for improvement, posts should draw
host governments' attention to the areas for improvement
identified in the 2009 Report, especially highlighted in the
"Recommendations" section of the second paragraph of the
narrative text. This engagement is important to establishing
the framework in which the government's performance will be
judged for the 2010 Report. If posts have questions about
which governments will receive an action plan, or how they
may follow up on the recommendations in the 2009 Report,
please contact G/TIP and the appropriate regional bureau.


7. Action Request continued: On June 16, please be prepared
to answer media inquiries on the Report's release using the
press guidance provided in para 11. If Post wishes, a local
press statement may be released on or after 10:30 am EDT June
16, drawing on the press guidance and the text of the TIP
Report's country narrative provided in para 8.


8. Begin Final Text of Iceland's country narrative in the
2009 TIP Report:

--------------
Iceland (TIER 2)
--------------

Iceland is primarily a destination country and, to a lesser
extent, a transit country for men and women from the Baltic
states, Poland, Russia, Bulgaria, Equatorial Guinea, Brazil,
and China trafficked to and through Iceland to Western
European states for the purposes of commercial sexual
exploitation and forced labor in the restaurant and
construction industries.

The Government of Iceland does not fully comply with the
minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking;
however, it is making significant efforts to do so. In 2008,
the Government of Iceland drafted a national action plan to
fight trafficking. However, the government did not
demonstrate significant law enforcement efforts during the
reporting period. Victim identification and victim
assistance was a challenge; some victims of trafficking may
have been deported without any effort to determine whether
they were victims. The government also did not conduct any
anti-trafficking awareness campaigns.

Recommendations for Iceland: Amend the criminal code to
ensure penalties prescribed for sex trafficking are
commensurate with penalties prescribed for other grave
crimes, such as rape; increase efforts to investigate and
prosecute trafficking offenses and convict and punish
trafficking offenders; provide training for law enforcement
investigators and prosecutors on trafficking cases; develop
legal alternatives to the removal of foreign victims to
countries where they face retribution or hardship; develop a
victim identification and referral mechanism; consider
opening a trafficking-specific shelter to ensure that victims
are adequately assisted; ensure that victims are not
penalized for acts committed as a direct result of being
trafficked, including immigration violations; and conduct an
awareness and prevention campaign focused on both sex and
labor trafficking and the demand for both forms of
trafficking.

Prosecution
--------------

The Government of Iceland demonstrated modest law enforcement
efforts over the reporting period. Iceland prohibits
trafficking for both sexual exploitation and forced labor
through Section 227 of its criminal code, although
prosecutors have never used Section 227 and have instead
relied on alien smuggling and document forgery statutes to
prosecute trafficking cases. Punishments prescribed for
trafficking under section 227 extend up to eight years'
imprisonment, which are sufficiently stringent, though not
commensurate with penalties prescribed for other grave
crimes, such as rape. Police conducted one sex trafficking
investigation and one labor trafficking investigation during
the reporting period, compared to no investigations in 2007.
Authorities prosecuted and convicted no traffickers in 2008,
the same as in 2007.

Protection
--------------

Iceland demonstrated limited efforts to assist and protect
trafficking victims over the last year. Local governments
and NGOs identified 20 probable victims of trafficking and
less than 10 victims received assistance from
government-funded programs. Iceland did not provide
trafficking-specific shelters; instead victims were
accommodated at a domestic violence shelter. In 2008, the
care available under this structure was limited because the
government did not provide trafficking-specific assistance
that adequately addressed the unique needs of victims of
trafficking. Icelandic authorities did not employ procedures
to proactively identify victims of trafficking; the lack of
such procedures increased the risk that victims were
detained, prosecuted, jailed, and deported for immigration
violations. Iceland did not employ a victim referral
process, though NGOs reported that some law enforcement
officers referred victims for assistance on an ad hoc basis.
Victims were encouraged to assist in the investigation and
prosecution of trafficking offenders; two victims assisted
law enforcement in 2008.

Prevention
--------------

Iceland conducted no substantive trafficking prevention
efforts, including measures to increase public awareness of
trafficking, during the reporting period. The government
did, however, draft a national action plan to address
trafficking. Border police at the country's only
international airport provided potential trafficking victims
with information about assistance if they find themselves in
a future trafficking scenario. The government adequately
monitored immigration patterns for evidence of trafficking.
Iceland has not ratified the 2000 UN TIP Protocol.

--------------


9. Post may wish to deliver the following points, which offer
technical and legal background on the TIP Report process, to
the host government as a non-paper with the above TIP Report
country narrative:

(begin non-paper)

-- The U.S. Congress, through its passage of the 2000
Trafficking Victims Protection Act, as amended (TVPA),
requires the Secretary of State to submit an annual Report to
Congress. The goal of this Report is to stimulate action and
create partnerships around the world in the fight against
modern-day slavery. The USG approach to combating human
trafficking follows the TVPA and the standards set forth in
the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in
Persons, Especially Women and Children, supplementing the
United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized
Crime (commonly known as the "Palermo Protocol"). The TVPA
and the Palermo Protocol recognize that this is a crime in
which the victims' labor or services (including in the "sex
industry") are obtained or maintained through force, fraud,
or coercion, whether overt or through psychological
manipulation. While much attention has focused on
international flows, both the TVPA and the Palermo Protocol
focus on the exploitation of the victim, and do not require a
showing that the victim was moved.

-- Recent amendments to the TVPA removed the requirement that
only countries with a "significant number" of trafficking
victims be included in the Report. Beginning with the 2009
TIP Report, countries determined to be a country of origin,
transit, or destination for victims of severe forms of
trafficking are included in the Report and assigned to one of
three tiers. Countries assessed as meeting the "minimum
standards for the elimination of severe forms of trafficking"
set forth in the TVPA are classified as Tier 1. Countries
assessed as not fully complying with the minimum standards,
but making significant efforts to meet those minimum
standards are classified as Tier 2. Countries assessed as
neither complying with the minimum standards nor making
significant efforts to do so are classified as Tier 3.

-- The TVPA also requires the Secretary of State to provide a
"Special Watch List" to Congress later in the year.
Anti-trafficking efforts of the countries on this list are to
be evaluated again in an Interim Assessment that the
Secretary of State must provide to Congress by February 1 of
each year. Countries are included on the "Special Watch
List" if they move up in "tier" rankings in the annual TIP
Report -- from 3 to 2 or from 2 to 1 -- or if they have been
placed on the Tier 2 Watch List.

-- Tier 2 Watch List consists of Tier 2 countries determined:
(1) not to have made "increasing efforts" to combat human
trafficking over the past year; (2) to be making significant
efforts based on commitments of anti-trafficking reforms over
the next year, or (3) to have a very significant number of
trafficking victims or a significantly increasing victim
population. As indicated in reftel B, the TVPRA of 2008
contains a provision requiring that a country that has been
included on Tier 2 Watch List for two consecutive years after
the date of enactment of the TVPRA of 2008 be ranked as Tier

3. Thus, any automatic downgrade to Tier 3 pursuant to this
provision would take place, at the earliest, in the 2011 TIP
Report (i.e., a country would have to be ranked Tier 2 Watch
List in the 2009 and 2010 Reports before being subject to
Tier 3 in the 2011 Report). The new law allows for a waiver
of this provision for up to two additional years upon a
determination by the President that the country has developed
and devoted sufficient resources to a written plan to make
significant efforts to bring itself into compliance with the
minimum standards.

-- Countries classified as Tier 3 may be subject to statutory
restrictions for the subsequent fiscal year on
non-humanitarian and non-trade-related foreign assistance
and, in some circumstances, withholding of funding for
participation by government officials or employees in
educational and cultural exchange programs. In addition,
the President could instruct the U.S. executive directors to
international financial institutions to oppose loans or other
utilization of funds (other than for humanitarian,
trade-related or certain types of development assistance)
with respect to countries on Tier 3. Countries classified as
Tier 3 that take strong action within 90 days of the Report's
release to show significant efforts against trafficking in
persons, and thereby warrant a reassessment of their Tier
classification, would avoid such sanctions. Guidelines for
such actions are in the DOS-crafted action plans to be shared
by Posts with host governments.

-- The 2009 TIP Report, issuing as it does in the midst of
the global financial crisis, highlights high levels of
trafficking for forced labor in many parts of the world and
systemic contributing factors to this phenomenon: fraudulent
recruitment practices and excessive recruiting fees in
workers' home countries; the lack of adequate labor
protections in both sending and receiving countries; and the
flawed design of some destination countries' "sponsorship
systems" that do not give foreign workers adequate legal
recourse when faced with conditions of forced labor. As the
May 2009 ILO Global Report on Forced Labor concluded, forced
labor victims suffer approximately $20 billion in losses, and
traffickers' profits are estimated at $31 billion. The
current global financial crisis threatens to increase the
number of victims of forced labor and increase the associated
"cost of coercion."

-- The text of the TVPA and amendments can be found on
website www.state.gov/g/tip.

-- On June 16, 2009, the Secretary of State will release the
ninth annual TIP Report in a public event at the State
Department. We are providing you an advance copy of your
country's narrative in that report. Please keep this
information embargoed until 10:00 am Washington DC time June

16. The State Department will also hold a general briefing
for officials of foreign embassies in Washington DC on June
17 at 3:30 pm EDT.

(end non-paper)


10. Posts should make sure that the relevant country
narrative is readily available on or though the Mission's web
page in English and appropriate local language(s) as soon as
possible after the TIP Report is released. Funding for
translation costs will be handled as it was for the Human
Rights Report. Posts needing financial assistance for
translation costs should contact their regional bureau's EX
office.


11. The following is press guidance provided for Post to use
with local media.

Q1: Why was Iceland placed on the Report for the first time
in 2009?

A: Iceland was placed on the TIP Report this year because
there was reliable information that Iceland is a country of
origin, transit, or destination for victims of severe forms
of trafficking in persons.

Q2: What types of trafficking exist in Iceland?

A: Iceland is primarily a destination country and, to a
lesser extent, a transit country for men and women from
Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America for the purposes of
commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor in the
restaurant and construction industries.

Q3: Why is Iceland placed on Tier 2?

A: The Government of Iceland does not fully comply with the
minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking;
however, it is making significant efforts to do so. The
Government of Iceland drafted a national action plan to fight
trafficking and local governments and NGOs identified 20
probable victims of trafficking. However, the government did
not demonstrate significant law enforcement efforts and
victim identification and assistance was a challenge; some
victims of trafficking may have been deported without any
effort to determine whether they were victims. The
government also did not conduct any anti-trafficking
awareness campaigns.

Q4: What could the Government of Iceland do to improve its
anti-trafficking efforts in the coming year?

A: The Government of Iceland could: increase efforts to
investigate and prosecute trafficking offenses and convict
and punish trafficking offenders; provide training for law
enforcement investigators and prosecutors on trafficking
cases; develop legal alternatives to the removal of foreign
victims to countries where they face retribution or hardship;
develop a victim identification and referral mechanism;
consider opening a trafficking-specific shelter to ensure
that victims are adequately assisted; and conduct an
awareness and prevention campaign focused on both sex and
labor trafficking and the demand for both forms of
trafficking.


12. The Department appreciates posts' assistance with the
preceding action requests.
CLINTON