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To raise awareness of the many forms of trafficking in human beings and to boost efforts to address them, the European Union has set 18 October as EU Anti-trafficking Day. Marking the day is an opportunity to highlight the European Parliament's call to step up action against trafficking for the purpose of labour exploitation, which is now broadly recognised as a significant problem across the EU, affecting both EU and non-EU citizens.

Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and his ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) have governed the country since 2012 with a heavy concentration of power, media control and a weak system of checks and balances. Serbia is marked by deep political polarisation and popular discontent. In December 2023, Serbia held snap parliamentary elections, just 20 months after the previous elections, which brought SNS a larger-than-expected victory: SNS won 46.7 %, far ahead of the newly formed opposition coalition ...

Deepfakes – videos, images and audio created using artificial intelligence (AI) to realistically simulate or fabricate content – are booming on the internet. They are becoming increasingly accessible, as what previously required powerful tools can now be done with free mobile apps and limited digital skills. At the same time, they are becoming increasingly sophisticated and therefore more difficult to detect, especially audio deepfakes. While deepfakes have applications in entertainment and creativity ...

The growth in accessibility of online spaces and digital channels has been remarkable in recent years, providing citizens with many benefits, including enhanced communication, greater learning opportunities and easier access to private and public services. However, this growth has seen a commensurate increase in the associated risks and harms. Cyberbullying, cyber-violence and sexual extortion are just some of the dangers to which people, particularly vulnerable people, are exposed in the digital ...

Drug precursors are substances that may have legitimate commercial or industrial applications but are also used to produce illicit drugs. Criminal organisations seek to divert these substances from licit trade, while governments strive to prevent this without hindering the commercial interests of lawful operators. Faced with challenges in accessing these substances, primarily produced outside the European Union (EU) and subject to stringent regulations, criminal organisations have increasingly turned ...

This briefing has been prepared by the European Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens, Equality and Culture at the request of the FEMM Committee, in the framework of the workshop ‘Consent-based rape legislation in the EU’ (organised on 19 May 2025). It provides a brief overview of literature and guidance as regards understanding consent, and highlights examples of evidence-based consent education and awareness raising initiatives.

Violence against women is a violation of human rights and a serious form of discrimination against women. It takes many forms and, according to survey data, affects one third of women in the EU. Such violence has a major impact on victims and imposes a significant cost burden on society. International documents adopted by the United Nations and Council of Europe, including the latter's 'Istanbul Convention', to which the EU acceded in 2023, set the normative framework for combating violence against ...

The recruitment of minors into serious and organised crime has increasingly become a tactic used by criminal networks to avoid detection, capture and prosecution. By using minors, the criminal networks increase the distance between the criminal activity and the network's core members or leaders, hampering identification. Even though there is a lack of reliable and comparable data on this phenomenon, several EU Member States have reported an increase in the involvement of minors in serious and organised ...

In February 2024, the European Commission submitted a proposal for a recast of Directive 2011/93/EU on combating child sexual abuse. The recast directive would include measures to harmonise definitions of and punishments for crimes, both online and offline, broadening the current scope of the offences, ensuring more effective investigation and prosecution, and strengthening the protection of victims. The European Parliament is set to vote on its negotiating mandate on the legislative proposal during ...

The European Union (EU) has a relatively low imprisonment rate compared to other countries and parts of the world. There are, however, big differences among the EU Member States. Prison occupancy rates also vary considerably, with some countries' detention facilities experiencing overcrowding. This is an important factor having a negative effect on detention conditions. Monitoring shows persistent shortcomings affecting European prisons and degrading detention conditions in many EU Member States. ...