Lee la entrevista en español aqui

Espacios de Mujer is a GAATW member based in Medellín, Colombia. Jennifer Janssen of the GAATW Secretariat conducted this interview with Betty Pedraza Lozano, founder and director of Espacios de Mujer, in December 2022 to better understand the organisation's work, history and context. The interview was in Spanish and was translated into English by Jennifer.

Jennifer Janssen: Thank you so much, Betty, for taking the time to speak with me today. Can you tell me a little about yourself, Espacios de Mujer and the reasons why you founded it?

Betty Pedraza: My name is Betty Pedraza Lozano. I am a feminist and a social worker, trained in human rights and public policy, among others. Espacios de Mujer was born from my work experience with the Medellín Mayor's Office, which had hired me to create a programme to assist women in prostitution in the city. Until then, there was no programme for them and the Municipality thought that something had to be done. They hired me to think about and put together a programme directed at this group. I worked with the Mayor's Office for three years and, during that time, I heard stories from these women that really caught my attention. They told me that they had been to Japan, China, Thailand and other countries in Asia and Europe. This intrigued me: I didn’t understand why a Colombian woman, from Medellín, would go to these countries. At that time, it was not so common and easy to travel around the world and especially to countries so far from South America: practically every country required visas for Colombians and it was difficult to get. They told me how, as soon as they arrived in these countries, they would be locked up, put to work in a bar, or forced to sell sex on the streets; they were exploited. I thought this was not normal.

Prostitution is usually imagined differently, as adults making a free decision to offer sexual services in exchange for money. So I started to inquire about this topic and, along the way, I found a woman who changed the course of my work. This woman was Fanny Polania, one of the founders of GAATW, who after living in the Netherlands and Spain had returned to Colombia. We began talking about the stories that the women had told me and I began to learn about human trafficking.

I continued working in the Medellín Mayor's Office, coordinating the care programme for women in prostitution, but the administration changed and the new mayor launched a policy of repression, street “cleansing”, and even imprisonment of women who sold sex on the street. So I resigned from my position, since the new policy went against everything I believed. How could a human rights defender believe one thing and do another?

A year before I resigned from the Mayor's Office, I had begun to collaborate with an Italian NGO, in an international cooperation agreement that directed its services to this same population. With three friends and colleagues, we decided to continue working with women in prostitution, creating an NGO to support them. This is how the Espacios de Mujer was born, initially financed by Italian cooperation.

The name of the organization came from the meetings we had with the women: each of them wrote on a board the name that they would like to give to the organisation and thus we arrived at Espacios de Mujer (Spaces for Women). The organisation was born in 2000 and registered as an NGO in 2004. It was created as a space for the exercise of rights and empowerment for women. We started working on the subject of prostitution but, since we knew more about trafficking, we ended up specialising in this.

Now, our focus is on human trafficking: we provide care to victims, we develop care methodologies and protocols, we do a lot of research on the subject, and we strive to make it visible in community spaces. For this reason, we participate in different policy spaces - on women, human rights, violence against women, migration…

We are convinced that it is very important to prevent trafficking and that’s why we give visibility to this serious rights violation. Prevention also means deconstructing the cultural and social perceptions that exist around the issue and we do it through workshops and conversations, campaigns and the Atenea Training School, a train-the-trainer process aimed at public officials, LGBTIQ+ people, migrants, faith-based organisations, Afro and indigenous populations, community leaders, and NGOs.

Espacios de Mujer works on four interrelated areas:

1. Prevention: what is trafficking? How can I protect myself? What are the main risks? How do I identify a possible case?
2. Assistance: caring for victims means providing them with comprehensive support – psychosocial, legal, economic, educational – until their rights are restored. We have developed different resources on assistance issues: the Care Protocol (available in Spanish here); the Care Route for victims (available in Spanish here), which combines the services provided by the organisation with those offered by the Colombian State; the Metamorphosis (available in English) methodology, a therapeutic process that uses writing in preparation for healing.
3. Research: observing and analysing work has led us to produce a lot of research on the subject of trafficking, return, and violence experienced by migrant women. Some of that has been carried out within the scope of REDLAC, the Latin American network of GAATW.
4. Policy advocacy: we support the development of public policies and directing them towards full respect for the rights of the people we serve. In this sense, since 2016, Espacios de Mujer publishes the annual Assessment of the implementation of anti-trafficking policies in Colombia, an instrument that analyses the government’s response against trafficking, comparing it with the requirements set by the legal and policy framework.

JJ: This was very interesting. And how do you incorporate the voices and lived experiences of trafficked persons into your work?

BP: For us it is essential to generate trust with them. Our office is organised in a way that generates confidence, like when entering a house: there are magazines, coffee, tea, water, photos, paintings, etc. We’ve always tried to ensure that when women visit us they feel confident, safe, and that we’re available to listen to them for as long as they need. When they first arrive at the office, the psychosocial team talks with them and sometimes there can be 5, 6, 10 interviews before they talk about their experiences. We talk with them about their lives, their children, the daily problems they face. It’s essential for us to generate trust and empathy with them, that they feel they’re in a space for self-care and mental wellbeing.

This is how the recovery process begins and we provide them with social services and psychotherapy if they want it. The basis of any intervention with the victims is psychosocial and the focus is on the person and not on the crime. They are the ones who tell us everything and we are writing and documenting their stories. All this helps us to adapt our assistance processes or research priorities, contextualising from other perspectives. We analyse our work and rethink our actions when necessary.

The knowledge they give us motivates us to create new methodologies, incorporate new analyses, have different discourses - all from their perspectives - what they want, need and request. The restoration of their rights is based on a horizontal and trusting relationship.

JJ: And talking to these women somehow breaks down the stereotypes people have about them.

BP: Of course, deconstructing the preconceptions and stereotypes that exist regarding victims of trafficking is not easy because it is believed that it is only a matter of women, poor women, sexual exploitation. We’ve also served men and LGBTIQ+ people, Afro populations and victims of trafficking for other purposes, not just sexual exploitation.

Providing individualised care is essential: it’s not the same to care for a 19-year-old woman and a 45-year-old woman, a victim of sexual exploitation and a victim of forced labour, a man and a woman, or an LBGTIQ+ person. It’s important to adopt intersectional, family, and community approaches.

All mistakes have taught us something. Every year we modify our interventions because the contexts also change and we improve our work as needed. Five years ago, the vast majority of Colombian victims had been trafficked abroad, mainly Asia and Europe. Now, most are internally trafficked and, when they arrive from abroad, they come mainly from Central and South America. As things change, we adapt and update our work.

JJ: What are the main challenges that women face?

BP: Being recognised as victims is the main thing; re-victimisation as well, which constantly happens, especially in state agencies; the recognition of their rights and the right justice and reparation; finally, the reintegration in their family and social environment and in the reorientation of their life project.

JJ: What makes Espacios de Mujer stand out as an organisation in Colombia?

BP: We are consistent with our mission and methodologies built from direct experience and we create innovative educational tools, such as the Travel Suitcase kit (available in Spanish here), which was developed to prevent and care for victims in a clear and simple way. All our work is based on the voices and perspectives of victims themselves. We sensitise the community, inside and outside Colombia, with a clear and simple language to talk about trafficking, migration and return, structural violence against women. These are the elements that perhaps make us a well-respected organisation in Colombia.

JJ: Thank you for this conversation, Betty. I don’t have any more questions. Is there anything you’d like to add?

BP: I just want to emphasise again that for us, the human rights and needs of victims of trafficking and vulnerable groups come first. The criminal, or law enforcement, aspect of trafficking comes second. We love learning about other organisations’ experiences and sharing ours. All of this is also possible thanks to GAATW, an alliance that has been a teacher, and a dear friend, for us and has supported us in many aspects of our work. We are very proud to be part of it.

JJ: Thank you very much for your time, it was a pleasure learning more about Espacios de Mujer.