Victim support
01 Comprehensive support
For victims, arriving at PAG-ASA marks the beginning of a new chapter.
It is a chapter that they courageously embark on; a journey that will allow them to free themselves from trauma and regain control of their lives. Each victim receives holistic and tailor-made support:
- HOLISTIC because it includes different components (administrative, legal and psychosocial) and can address all areas of a person's life.
- TAILOR-MADE because it is adapted to the needs, skills, personality and background of each individual.
At PAG-ASA we work WITH the individuals : each makes their own choices, each is responsible for their present and future, but we are there to support them along the way.
02 Collective Shelter
Our shelter is a place of calm and safety, where victims can begin to rebuild their lives.
It serves as a kind of stop-over where victims, at their own pace, can recover and take the first steps towards a new life. The shared areas (kitchen, living room and dining room) and the 16 individual bedrooms (with private bathrooms) allow us to shelter women, men and small families.
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3 to 9Months Length of a typical stay -
21Individual bedrooms -
5,200Cumulative overnight stays (per year)
I have left the shelter house and I have my own apartment and a job. But I still keep in my heart all the good moments I spent there.
03 Legal assistance
The legal advisors provide assistance to victims in accessing justice and ensuring that their rights are respected.
This assistance is particularly focused on the investigative and judicial procedure : it involves supporting the victim when they make statements or file a complaint; the provision of information on the status of the investigation and facilitating contact with lawyers. Close collaboration with the police and labour inspectorate, as well as prosecutors' office, enable us to best defend the interests of victims.
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600referrals (per year) -
30Sentences against perpertrators (per year) -
210Individuals supported (per year)
04 Administrative assistance
PAG-ASA supports victims in all administrative aspects to relieve some of the heavy burden on their road to recovery.
This administration is important because it allows victims to gain access to services essential for their integration, such as healthcare, health insurance, social security, professional training, language courses and the labour market.
When a victim does not have a formal residency status, PAG-ASA supports them in all necessary steps to obtain a residence permit (temporary) and a work permit.
05 Psychosocial assistance
Social workers support the victims with the small and large challenges of daily life and help them to become autonomous.
It is not easy for victims to disengage from the hold of exploitation. The objective of our assistance is to support them in their journey towards freedom and autonomy.
The rebuilding process is never linear: our support therefore is adapted to the natural progression of each person’s journey. We help victims to develop and pursue their future plans, whether these lie in Belgium or elsewhere.
We regularly call upon other organisations, whether to request specialised help that goes beyond our own expertise (psychological problems, alcohol dependence etc) or to seek out services offered that are complementary to our own. Victims also have the opportunity to develop their own social networks for when the day comes that they are ready to leave PAG-ASA.
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300hours of individual support per month -
3 to 5years Typical duration of support
06 Housing assistance
When the victims are strong and independent enough to leave the shelter house, we help them to find suitable housing. Housing is an essential springboard towards integration, but it is often difficult to find on the rental market. PAG-ASA therefore has three projects in place:
Transition apartments
A project which offers victims the opportunity to experience (often for the first time) an autonomous life with hands-on assistance, over maximum 18 months.
Housing coach
A project which supports victims in their house hunt. With workshops and individual coaching, it teaches them to understand adverts and to analyse rental contracts.
Rental deposit fund
A project which offers interest-free loans to victims who do not have sufficient resources to provide a rental deposit and who have no recourse to alternative solutions.
07 Group activities
Recovering after exploitation also involves building a social life and experiencing the joy of sharing: creating new connections in order to emerge from isolation.
We regularly organise group activities, inside and outside our shelter house: talking spaces, yoga sessions, language courses, workshops on varying and diverse themes and cultural and sporting excursions.
I really enjoyed participating in the PAG-ASA cafe. It has allowed me to forget my worries for a few hours.
08 Special projects
Next to our regular support programme for victims of human trafficking, we regularly activate new projects to better support them, whenever this is possible thanks to the financial support of private donors and other organisations. These are a few of our recent projects:
OUTREACH
Our OUTREACH project, supported by Safe.Brussels since 2019, allows us to go ‘towards’ presumed victims in the field more regularly: either by accompanying police and labour inspection services during their checks or by remaining 'stand-by' during their actions in order to come on site when they have found presumed victims. The project allows us to meet other frontline services, to better understand their work and to establish closer collaboration.
VONA
VONA is an EU-funded project designed to enhance gender-sensitive and trauma-informed care for survivors of human trafficking from non-EU countries. It’s implemented by the three specialized centers for victims of human trafficking in Belgium: PAG-ASA, Payoke, and Sürya. The project has a double approach: 1) direct assistance to victims of human trafficking through payment of costs for psychological support, 2) training on trauma-informed and gender-sensitive care.
BABYSITTER
Our BABYSITTER project is financed by a private donor to respond to the challenge that we regularly support single mothers with small children who cannot afford a babysitter or do not have a social network to leave their children. This new project allows mothers to focus on the content of their important appointments with their assistant at PAG-ASA or with an external service in the frame of the victim protection procedure while their children are taken care of by a babysitter in a safe and pleasant environment.
