NSWP member oranisation PION have reported on the use of pandemic regulations by Norwegian police to unfairly arrest, detain, heavily fine and deport foreign sex workers. Read the article below or on PION's website.
Regional updates: Europe
Our members are listed on the left or you can click the red umbrellas on the map.
Regional Board Members
Nataliia Isaieva (Legalife-Ukraine), Ukraine.
Dinah de Riquet-Bons (STRASS), France.
Regional Networks
The International Committee for the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe (ICRSE) is a European network of sex workers and allies across Europe and Central Asia. It was formed in 2004 to organise the 2005 European Conference on Sex Work, Human Rights, Labour and Migration and is based in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
The Sex Workers’ Rights Advocacy Network for Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia (SWAN) is a network of sex workers' groups and civil society. SWAN started in 2006 as a project within Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU/TASZ) and became an independent organisation in 2012 and is based in Budapest, Hungary.
News articles from Europe region are listed below.
NSWP member organisation Trans United Europe – founded to unite the networks of European operating Trans BPOC NGOs and individual BPOC trans activists living and working in Europe – have reported on how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting Trans BPOC people in Europe through NSWP’s COVID-19 Impact Survey.
24th September 2020 by NSWP
New Generation Humanitarian NGO, an NSWP member organisation based in Armenia, have been providing temporary shelter, food packages, and legal support for sex workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.
13th August 2020 by NSWP
The Russian Forum of Sex Workers, an NSWP member organisation, have shared a video of a police officer addressing a sex worker at a police station in Russia.
5th August 2020 by NSWP
30th July is World Day Against Trafficking in Persons. Sex Workers Alliance Ireland circulated this press release illustrating that Ireland is not utilising its best weapon against sex trafficking: sex workers themselves. You can read the full release on SWAI's website.
30th July 2020 by NSWP
A new law criminalising clients has come into effect in Israel. The law, which was approved a year and a half ago by the Knesset, punishes those caught seeking the services of sex workers, as well as those apprehended in a location chiefly used for sex work.
14th July 2020 by NSWP
In April 2020, NSWP launched a global survey to understand the impact of COVID-19 on sex workers. The survey received, thus far, a total of 156 responses from 55 different countries out of which 43 responses were from 17 countries – Armenia, Austria, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, North Macedonia, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom – in the Europe region.
6th July 2020 by NSWP
Today Human Rights Watch reported on the International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe's (ICRSWE) statement calling for emergency support to sex workers amid the COVID-19 crisis.
4th May 2020 by NSWP
We are sharing five articles focussing on the impact of the current health crisis on the five NSWP regions, based on responses to our COVID-19 Impact Survey. These snapshots provide an insight into what governments are doing – and not doing – to support sex workers and sex worker organisations and how the sex worker community are responding to the crisis.
22nd April 2020 by NSWP
The murders of sex workers in France are met by government indifference.
We are told that "prostitution" is violence, and that there were murders of sex workers before the criminalization of clients. But no. Not so many, not so often, not to this level. In 18 years of selling sex, I have never attended so many ceremonies and commemorations of deceased colleagues. In 15 years of whore activism and unionism, I’ve never seen so many STRASS members assaulted and raped, including one of our spokespersons and our General Secretary.
25th February 2020 by NSWP