Ashgabat, 15-16 January 2025. Turkmenistan’s law enforcement practitioners and specialists from the Ministry of Interior, the Prosecutor General’s Office, the Ministry of National Security, The State Migration Service, the State Border Service as well as national civil society organizations learned the best practices from Europe and Asia of gender and age-sensitive identification of victims of human trafficking (VoT) and protection of their rights at a two-day workshop organized by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Turkmenistan. The workshop was facilitated by the international expert Oleksandr Kyrylenko.

The workshop combined learning and practice, allowing the participants to interact and engage in group discussions, diving into the aspects of gender and age-sensitive identification of VoTs and protection of victims’ rights, an investigation approach centered on victims' interests, the importance of considering victims' post-traumatic conditions and application of gender-sensitive and trauma-informed practices in the context of implementing the recently adopted National Action Plan of Turkmenistan on Combatting Trafficking in Persons (CTIP NAP) for 2025-2029.

Moreover, in the course of the workshop, the participants discussed the concept of vulnerability, access of VoTs to a National Referral Mechanism, the importance of continuous security and support to VoTs and adaptation of services to the specific needs of survivors of human trafficking with special attention to gender and age aspects, referrals to specialized services and the crucial role of monitoring and quality assurance.

In the final day of the workshop, the participants discussed interagency cooperation and ways to promote greater engagement of civil society stakeholders in combatting human trafficking. They also modelled an integrated, gender- and age-sensitive interagency response mechanism through a survivor-centered approach.