The European Court of Human Rights : "Migrants who were subjected to forced labour and human trafficking did not receive effective protection from the Greek State"

In today’s Chamber judgment1 in the case of Chowdury and Others v. Greece (application no. 21884/15) the European Court of Human Rights held, unanimously, that there had been:

a violation of Article 4 § 2 (prohibition of forced labour) of the European Convention on Human Rights.

The case concerned 42 Bangladeshi nationals who did not have work permits and were subjected to forced labour. Their employers had recruited them to pick strawberries on a farm in Manolada (Greece) but failed to pay the applicants’ wages and obliged them to work in difficult physical conditions under the supervision of armed guards.

The Court found, firstly, that the applicants’ situation was one of human trafficking and forced labour, and specified that exploitation through labour was one aspect of trafficking in human beings2 .

The Court then held that the State had failed in its obligations to prevent the situation of human trafficking, to protect the victims, to conduct an effective investigation into the offences committed and to punish those responsible for the trafficking.

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Read here too : Chowdury and Others v. Greece