I really think this concern of yours is unwarranted. I live in London and I have never, in the 5 years that I have been here, heard of a tourist being kidnapped and sold into some sort of slave trade. Sure, it may happen, but the actual chances of this happening are beyond ridiculously low - unless you of course do stupid things like go out alone in a seedy area of town and get ripping drunk and lose control of yourself and a kidnapper happens to be sitting there waiting to jump on you.

Seriously, relax and enjoy your holiday. It is highly unlikely as a tourist that you will accidently wander into this kind of situation. If you want to worry about something worry about pickpockets (much more likely in Europe) or getting hit by a car walking across the road in your own hometown.

Human trafficking occurs all over the place.

As a tourist in Croatia you are unlikely to have an awareness of this sort of thing - usually they prey on young, naive girls in villages, who have little to look forward to in life if they stay put.

It is not normally a case of women and girls being kidnapped and sold into slavery. It is done far more subtly than that. Men befriend them and promise them good job in the west, pay for their ticket, make a fuss of them, make them feel special, loved, maybe for the first time in their lives. Only once they are under the spell, and in debt for their ticket and other expenses are they forced into prostitution.

If you wish so show your disgust of such practices don't visit red light districts such as the one in Amsterdam, either as a tourist or a customer.

I wonder what sort of scare stories are circulating in the US about the dangers of travel in Europe. First there was the group of six! teenagers worried about being kidnapped, now this query.

I think there may be a movie out about it...?

We have our own very similar scare stories in the US, entirely home based: drugs in the drinks etc. We even have a web site called Snopes.com to examine these and other urban legends.

That said, real life is often crazier or more obscenely vicious than an ordinary person can imagine, but travelers aren't likely to encounter it if they do not try to buy drugs and go back to their lodgings before the public transportation closes down.

If the OP only wants to avoid seedy areas, the kind where prostitution flourishes, s/he should avoid the outer suburbs of larger cities like Zagreb or Split and the dark alleys of smaller places.

I can honestly say that in Croatia I never felt the slightest qualm, not necessarily true of places I have been in London or Paris or Lisbon.

"I really think this concern of yours is unwarranted."

Human trafficking from Croatia has been a serious problem throughout Western Europe for at least the past 15 years: the issue is high on the "concerns" lists about Croatia of such naive rabble-rousers as the US Dept of Labor and Freedom House.

There are two sorts of problem:
- Croatia is the last country before the contiguous Schengen countries on the main truck route between Turkey/Greece (the main entry points into Europe for economic migrants from Asia). So, irrespective of what happens to illegal immigrants once they're smuggled into Schengen/UK, their last location before arriving in the EU will more often than not be Croatia. Many of these migrants are "trafficked" relatively innocently: they'll have bribed a truck driver for passage, or clandestinely hidden in his wagon, and no-one in Croatia can be blamed for anything except not ripping apart every truckload of shirts from Turkey to stop a single Afghan trying to get a job as a kitchen porter in London. But there IS evidence Croatian gangs take a more proactive (and remunerating) role in this business. To see it, simply hang round the E70 truckstops. Though why anyone would want to is beyond me.

- ALL investigating bodies have expressed concern about weak investigation by Croatia of prostitution-linked trafficking. There's little evidence much of the recruitment goes on in the country: but Croatia consistently emerges as a key transit route into Western Europe - and there's more than a hint in the 2011 Dept of Labor report into trafficking that it's not just administrative priorities that make the Croatian government's reluctant to investigate. Again, the activity should be invisible to any tourist and to almost every visiting businessperson - except those of us who occasionally look at the security of trucks passing through Europe.

The poster is almost certain to see almost no seediness at all, unless he diligently seeks it out. But, from an EU and US perspective, the problem IS more serious in Croatia than in most developed countries (except of course in the sense that the prostitutes are being trafficked for European and American customers). And the standards of ethics among Croatia's police and government aren't quite those you'd find in Sweden or New Zealand. It's simply another example of tourists' rose-tinted glasses to imply Croatia's a vice-free zone on the evidence of a blissful holiday in Rijeka

Human trafficking does NOT involved kidnapping american tourists!!! that is the last thing these people want - since it wold cause a giant brouhaha and bring all sorts of local and international law enforcement down on them.

Human trafficking happens the same way in Croatia as it does in the US (yes, there's also a lot in the US). Some poor misguided teen, usually with family problems, runs away from home and hops a bus to NYC thinking their $100 or whatever will let them live and find a job. They end up hanging around the tatty area of 42nd St or the port authority or whatever and a pimp picks them up and offers them a meal, perhaps a super cheap hotel room to stay in - then makes them dependent and turns them into prostitutes. It is usually young kids - 15/16 or younger that are naive and have few resources.

What happens in parts of europe is the same.

As an adult american tourist it would be practically impossible to get yourself involved in this - unless as someone said - you go into a bar inthe bad part of town, drink yourself insensible and pass out in the alley out back. (And the chances of them wanting you is still essentailly nil.)

to all: Thank you for your thoughts.

@flanneruk & @Ackislander
Thank you for your thoughtful post; I couldn't agree with you more. I don't believe "writing off" the idea is wise-EVER. In the US we have the "American pimp model" whereas a man will woo a young naive girl into loving him in order to brainwash her. Then he will start beating her up, get her hooked on drugs and what not. I have worked with people who are survivors of this and witnessed sex trafficking first hand in San Francisco. So it happens everywhere, no matter how transparent.

The going age used to be 14 and under, now children as young as 9 are trafficked. I am concerned about this atrocity and I believe anyone with reason, candor and empathy should always be aware. Again, I have read accounts about Croatia and the trafficking across borders, but I'm not speaking solely of Croatia.

I will not be getting senselessly drunk by the way and I always watch my drink, even in my own town! Guys try and slip things in drinks all the time here. Be aware ladies, take a martial arts class!

rebelrebel

I really ask my self, how could a tourist visiting Croatia get involved with trafficking...
If you , as per your last post, know so much about it, have worked with people and witnessed trafficking first hand, then most probably you will also know how to avoid it !!

@clausar

Thanks, it's just something that I'm slightly concerned about. Don't we all have our own paranoia?

as for: "If you , as per your last post, know so much about it, have worked with people and witnessed trafficking first hand, then most probably you will also know how to avoid it !!"

So, I don't claim to be an expert anyway.I just wanted to check with the forum as this will be my FIRST TIME there and any insight is valuable. Thanks for your input

Human trafficking occurs everywhere, even in the US. It is sad, but when I visited Croatia in 2009 I was not aware of it anywhere. I would not even give it a thought if I were going back to visit Croatia again as a tourist; this thread is the first time I ever considered that a tourist would be thinking about it in Croatia. There are probably dozens of other things of greater concern, most of them still not much of a worry. Croatia felt like a very safe country, one of the safest I've visited in Europe.

What was more sad and obvious to me in Dubrovnik was the well-known problem of stray cats. I wound up feeding one for the three days I was there - many tourists do, I guess.

Actually, I'd be more concerned about animal trafficking at those zoos the OP wants to visit.

Agree, StCirq, the idea of a zoo in Zagreb makes me feel bad.

From this week's NYTimes:


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/19/opinion/kristof-not-quite-a-teen-yet-sold-for-sex.html?_r=1&ref=nicholasdkristof

I think the question should not be whether Croatia is a hotspot for trafficking but if an innocent tourist from North America can be snatched from a bar and forced to work as a prostitute in a brothel in Vienna or Paris.
While the former is a fact, the latter is more stuff for movies.

In general, trafficking is a "business" going mostly East-West that does not thrive on getting lucky to kidnap a girl from Kansas City in a bar in Dubrovnik once a year.

You rather have more or less established routes from, say Moldova, to West/Central Europe. You have professional "recruiters" in the poorest regions of Eastern and Southeastern Europe with ties to those local communities which promise normal jobs in Western Europe. Their "merchandise" comes from regions where even the perspective of probably having to work as a prostitute in Western Europe sounds better than the daily life where they are.
But then they not only get deep into debt for the passage, but - surprise, surprise - those legal jobs are just not available and the girls have to work off their debts in (not necessarily illegal) brothels. An impressive share (around 1/3) of the "recruiters" back home are women, by the way.
The girls work as prostitutes with the promise and motivation that some day in the near future the real job at a model agency or as waitress will materialize. Which never happens, of course.
But it keeps the girls long enough in a vicious circle for the pimps or brothel owners to make their money.

This business is a far cry from what OP fears. Though I see no reason to visit the seediest neighborhoods in or around any town anyway.