Dubai: A woman and her daughter have been accused of forging passports to fly in young girls to Dubai and force them into prostitution, a court heard on Tuesday.
A 16-year-old Iraqi girl was said to have absconded from a villa, where she was reportedly being forced to have sex with strangers, and then took shelter at a Sharjah mosque for three days in May.
The girl met up with a Palestinian woman at the mosque and told her, according to records, about her ordeal before the woman drove her to a police station where she reported what had happened to her.
In her statement before the anti-human trafficking police officers, the 16-year-old Iraqi girl alleged that a 64-year-old Iraqi woman incited her to run away from her parents’ house in Baghdad, provided her with a forged passport, flew her to Dubai and made her work in prostitution with her 31-year-old daughter.
Police then raided the villa where the 31-year-old had been keeping girls under her supervision and coercing them to have sex with strangers for amounts that varied between Dh1,500 and Dh6,000 per client.
An anti-human trafficking police squad raided the villa in Al Khawaneej area at 3am, seized Dh104,000 in cash and a marriage contract and freed a number of girls, who were allegedly being forced into prostitution. Police apprehended the 31-year-old Iraqi woman.
Prosecutors accused her and her 64-year-old mother of committing a human trafficking crime by flying young girls [aged between 15 and 17] in to Dubai and coercing them to work in the sex trade. The mother remains at large, said records.
According to the charge sheet, prosecutors said the mother and her daughter forged the ages and names of the girls on travel documents to be able to fly them in and forced them into prostitution against their will.
The 32-year-old suspect was solely charged with sexually exploiting another female suspect [who has been deported] by making her work in prostitution and pocketing the profits.
The 32-year-old suspect pleaded not guilty before the Dubai Court of First Instance on Tuesday.
One of the allegedly trafficked girls testified to prosecutors that she was flown in to the UAE along with her younger sister with forged passports.
“We were coerced to work in prostitution … they made us stay in a villa. One day, they took us to a villa in Abu Dhabi where there was a party and too many men were present. One man made me dance for him while my younger sister was taken to a side room where she was forced to have sex with a stranger. When I saw her plight, she and I cried. The suspect made us to have sex with men for Dh1,500 and Dh6,000 that she took for herself,” she claimed.
Another girl testified to prosecutors that the suspect used to make them dress in sexy outfits and promote their photos to clients via WhatsApp.
The trial continues.
