Her Excellency Mrs. Nouf Abdul Rahman Jamsheer, CEO of the Labour Market Regulatory Authority (LMRA) attended the ceremony honoring the participants in the Training of Trainers Program 2023, organized by the Labour Market Regulatory Authority’s Regional Centre of Excellence and Capacity Building for Combatting Trafficking in Persons, in cooperation with the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

The program was held over 5 working days (12-16 March 2023), and included representatives from 6 different sectors: criminal justice, public security, medical care, media, airport and ports, and inspection officers at various ministries and relevant government agencies.

The program, which was supervised by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), is the first basic course organized by the center in Arabic, and 27 trainees were trained to identify and respond to cases of trafficking in persons, key concepts and prevailing patterns, legal frameworks, trauma, abuse and victims of trafficking, identification and screening of victims, first aid, as well as working with interpreters.

During the ceremony, Jamsheer underscored the Kingdom of Bahrain’s commitment to developing national cadres and raising their capabilities and skills in the field of identifying the crime of trafficking in persons, mechanisms to assist victims and prevent individuals from becoming potential victims, in addition to supporting the efforts of the international community to address this cross-border crime.

Her Excellency indicated that the crime of trafficking in persons is one of the most sensitive and major global issues, whose mechanisms and forms are constantly evolving, and require addressing with exceptional effort and high skills.

She added that the Kingdom of Bahrain has strengthened the infrastructure of the work environment and efforts aimed at combating all forms of trafficking in persons and exploitation.
Outlining the wide-ranging efforts taken in this direction, Jamsheer outlined that the Kingdom has been keen to build an integrated system of prevention and protection, which includes enhancing the skills of first responders to identify victims of trafficking in persons or potential victims and hone their skills, through the implementation of multiple training programs organized by LMRA’s Regional Centre of Excellence and Capacity Building for Combatting Trafficking in Persons in cooperation with international and UN organizations, most notably the International Organization for Migration.

In this regard, the LMRA CEO pointed out that qualifying trainers to become supporters of the government’s efforts and ambassadors to spread the culture of combating trafficking in persons is an integral part of these effort.

It is noteworthy that the Regional Center for Excellence – which is the first regional house of expertise and training in the field of combating trafficking in persons in the region, works to provide a pool of certified trainers from practitioners and frontline workers in the field of training in combating trafficking in persons, during procedures are provided that take into account the psychology of the victim, appropriate interventions, in addition to working to build the capacity of target groups from different fields of the first responders who may deal with victims of trafficking in persons or potential victims, in cooperation with a number of experts, specialists and practitioners in this field.

The Training of Trainers program is one of the Center’s specialized programs, which aims to develop and provide training programs that are commensurate with the demographic, economic and social composition in the field of combating trafficking in persons in the region according to a regional vision and perspective, in addition to preparing studies and scientific research, developing guidelines for dealing with cases of trafficking in persons and victims, studying new phenomena of the crime of trafficking in persons, and proposing recommendations on mechanisms of action.