Teenage girl trafficked, forced into prostitution, court hears

Eight people are charged with bringing her to Dubai and running a brothel.

DUBAI // Six men and two women were charged this morning with trafficking a minor and forcing her into prostitution.

MH, 30; MN, 24; MA, 28; AA, 27; AS, 22; and MS, 25, all from Bangladesh, were charged with locking up the minor against her will and forcing her into the sex industry. They are also accused of running a brothel where two women, KJ, 25, from Ethiopia, and MP, 27, Indonesian, had sex with men for money.

MP confessed, while all the others denied the charges.

MH specifically denied raping the 17-year-old victim, from Bangladesh, and threatening to kill her if she did not stop crying.

MN and MS were also accused of forging photocopies of labour cards, court records show.

The victim told prosecutors she arrived to Dubai on October 10, 2010, last year and MH took her from the airport to a one-bedroom flat, where he raped her five times.

She said she was sent to a different apartment to have sex with men. While there, she asked one of the men to use his mobile and called her brother in Bangladesh, who gave her a number of a woman in Dubai who could help her, records show.

MM called the woman and told her what had happened, prosecutors said. That woman contacted the girl's captors and arranged to meet them on the pretext of buying her for Dh2,500. She told police about the set-up, and they

arrested one of the gang members, who led them to the rest.

The next hearing will be on april 17.