The GRETA Recommendation
Following the third evaluation visit, the Council of Europe’s Group of Experts on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings (GRETA), the independent monitoring body established under the Council of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings, offered a series of observations regarding human trafficking of children in Poland. They urged the authorities to train a larger range of professionals who may meet children to increase capacity to detect child victims. On the specific question of legal capacity, GRETA was direct:
GRETA considers that the Polish authorities should take steps to facilitate the training of lawyers assisting and representing victims of trafficking, including by providing sufficient fundings to that effect and by encouraging the Supreme Bar Council and the National Council of Legal Advisors to offer specialised training and to draw up a list of lawyers qualified to provide assistance to victims of THB.
These findings carry a clear implication: legal professionals who may encounter trafficking victims, including child victims, require not only awareness, but structured, specialised training. It was against this backdrop that the Krajowa Izba Radców Prawnych (KIRP), which is Poland’s National Bar Council of Attorneys-at-Law, with more than 54,000 members and responsibility for the continuous professional education of attorneys-at-law across 19 Regional Bars, engaged Kids in Need of Defense (KIND) to develop and record a dedicated series of online training modules on child human trafficking for the Polish legal profession.
KIND’s Role and Expertise
KIND’s work in Poland is directly embedded within a regional response to the protection of children at risk. Since 2022, KIND has worked in Poland alongside local partners to provide legal and psychosocial support to unaccompanied and separated children and youth as well as strengthen the capacity of key stakeholders working with this group of children. KIND’s involvement in Poland also forms part of its broader Suzir’ya project, which aims to improve the knowledge and skills of civil society organisations, governments, and key stakeholders responding to children displaced from Ukraine. In our work in Poland, we have also worked with our partners to raise awareness of the risks of child trafficking and exploitation for unaccompanied and separated children and youth, including those displaced from Ukraine. As part of our work, KIND was proud to be asked to deliver training to KIRP, alongside La Strada Poland.
The Training Curriculum: Substance and Structure
The training was launched in March 2026. The five-themed online training series was designed to be doctrinally rigorous and practically actionable, covering the full arc of a legal professional’s engagement with child trafficking — from conceptual grounding to child-centred practice. KIND staff covered:
- Defining Child Trafficking — Legal Dimensions and Typology
- International Law and Child Trafficking in the Polish Legal Context
- Standards for the Protection of Child Trafficking Victims
- The Lawyer’s Role in Supporting a Child Through Legal Proceedings
- Working with Child Victims — Procedural Practice from a Child Rights Perspective
Why This Matters
By partnering with KIRP to deliver this training series, KIND placed expert child trafficking knowledge directly within the structures of continuing professional education for Poland’s attorneys-at-law. This is a structural response to a systemic gap identified at the highest level of international monitoring. Between April and mid-May, the trainings had been streamed at least 50 times, with numbers growing every week.
As human trafficking risks in Poland continue to evolve, intensified by the scale of displacement caused by the war in Ukraine, increased at scale and modified by the use of technologies, the capacity of legal professionals to identify, understand, and effectively represent child victims is not a peripheral specialism but a core professional competency. This training series is a meaningful step towards making it so.
“The training course “Support and Protection of Victims of Human Trafficking” is one of the most important training programmes that every attorney-at-law should undertake. It covered not only the legal framework for the protection of victims, but also the practical aspects of identifying cases of human trafficking and responding appropriately to such situations.
What I found particularly valuable was the emphasis placed on the importance of correctly identifying when a particular event or situation may constitute human trafficking, first and foremost, the child. In practice, this is not always obvious, and an incorrect assessment of the facts may result in a victim being deprived of the protection and support to which they are entitled. Proper identification of the indicators of human trafficking is therefore the first and most crucial step in providing effective assistance to victims, especially given that human trafficking cases may arise in the practice of any attorney-at-law, regardless of their area of specialisation or the type of matters they deal with on a daily basis.
The training enabled me to gain a deeper understanding of this area of law and equipped me with practical knowledge that may prove invaluable in my professional practice and in providing assistance to individuals in particularly vulnerable situations, especially unaccompanied children.”
-Konrad Drezno, attorney-at-law
Beyond training
Alongside the training programme delivered in cooperation with KIRP, work is underway to develop a nationwide list of attorneys-at-law ready to provide legal assistance to victims of human trafficking, including children. The list is a vital step in turning training into practice. It also responds directly to GRETA’s recommendations and reflects a broader systemic approach. The training and the list are designed to reinforce one another: KIND’s training builds the necessary competencies, while the list ensures those competencies can be mobilised in real cases.
KIND views this work as an important starting point. Continued investment in advanced, practice-oriented training will be essential to ensure that lawyers on the list are equipped to respond to increasingly complex trafficking cases. Drawing on its experience with child victims of trafficking and migration, KIND will continue to support the development of further training content and its adaptation to emerging challenges. Over time, this integrated model will strengthen Poland’s system of legal support for victims of trafficking. Training is not a one-off intervention, but part of a sustained effort to build capacity, support the effective operation of the list, and improve protection for children.
