Human Trafficking in Europe

Walk Free estimates place 6.4 million people in modern slavery across Europe and Central Asia on any given day in 2021. The latest Eurostat data recorded 9,678 registered victims in the EU in 2024, with 63% women and girls and 37% trafficked for forced labour, showing how labour exploitation now sits alongside sexual exploitation as a core trafficking pattern across Europe.

UNODC's 2024 regional overviews show a split picture across the continent: Western and Southern Europe is a major destination where forced labour and forced criminality have grown, Central and South-Eastern Europe still records large shares of sexual exploitation and intra-European trafficking, and Eastern Europe remains heavily shaped by women-and-girls victimisation and outward trafficking flows. On the policy side, the revised EU Anti-Trafficking Directive entered into force on 14 July 2024, and the Commission launched a Call for Evidence for a new 2026 strategy on 3 December 2025.