Trafficking in women and prostitution have shot up in Lebanon in the last years due to the difficult social and economic situation and the influx of refugees, including many vulnerable women and girls. Thus, the country has become a hub, a place of passage, residence and export of prostitutes by individuals and networks from Lebanon and elsewhere. The Lebanese League of Women’s Rights - LLWR is conducting a participatory study on prostitution and trafficking in women in the eastern suburbs of Beirut. The study’s objective is to analyze the existing legislation against the perpetrators and to identify measures and tools which could reduce this phenomenon and prevent it.

To do so, the LLWR is mobilizing the relevant institutions involved in the field such as the Parliamentary Commission for Human Rights, the Ministries of Education and Teaching, of Women’s Affairs and of Social Affairs, the security forces and the officials of the municipalities of Sin el-Fil and Jounieh in order to examine effective measures to combat trafficking. The LLWR also met researchers, journalists and associations which provide support and assistance to the victims of prostitution and trafficking in human beings in order to have their vision of the situation and explore ideas to raise the general public’s awareness on women’s exploitation.

The LLWR was selected following a call for proposals promoted by the Foundation in 2016, to coordinate a local cluster of gender equality actors© in 2017. Its mission is to get the gender equality actors of a specific territory (the Eastern suburbs of Beirut) involved in combating trafficking on women through consultations and exchange of experiences. As a result, the LLWR will produce a diagnosis of the situation that will be published in the platform’s Documentation Center and widely disseminated across the Euro-Mediterranean region. The LLWR will also design a collaborative and replicable field project aimed at lowering trafficking which they will execute later with the support of the Foundation.

The LLWR action corresponds to the pilot mobilization actions for 2016 (Cycle 2). It is framed within the Axis 1 “Strengthening the capacities of actors working for gender equality” of the project "Women of the Future in the Mediterranean" funded by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development (MAEDI).

For more information about local clusters of gender equality actors set up by the Foundation, click here.