Trafficking in Human Beings in Southeast Europe During the Concurrent Crises

The phenomenon of trafficking in human beings has taken on another dimension, since the development of a new criminal environment in Southeast Europe arising from bringing with it multiple concurrent crises. The current paper focuses on the specific issues raised by this phenomenon in Southeast Europe amid the pandemic, war, illegal immigration, and financial crises. These circumstances are analysed using a jurisprudential approach, under the conceptual presentation and investigation of the de facto situation as it exists in practice. The research activity was improved through analysing case-law solutions in criminal matters, from relevant criminal cases in which the law courts pronounced judicial decisions before and during the relevant concurrent crises. The results concluded that the law enforcement agencies should analyse the phenomenon in this context and make significant efforts in order to prevent and combat this criminal activity through legal instruments gathered from judicial tools.