Sicilian authorities have made a series of arrests after a suspected sex trafficking ring was believed to have forced at least 15 Nigerian girls into prostitution in Italy.
Among those arrested were two Nigerian women, Rita Ihama, 38, and Monica Onaigfohe, aged 20, who police believe organised the trafficking of the women from Libya to Italy. An Italian national, Giovanni Buscemi, was also arrested on suspicion of helping facilitate the trafficking and exploitation of the girls.
Prosecutors believe the group of young women were lured from Nigeria with the promise of work in Italy. They say before they left their homes they were made to undergo traditional oath-taking ceremonies involving complicated and frightening rituals. The use of “juju” ceremonies in the trafficking of women from Nigeria to Europe are widespread and have been found to have a profound psychological impact on victims.
“On arrival in Italy, the women [say they] were forced into prostitution and told they must pay back the cost of their travel to Italy,” said Giovannella Scaminaci, deputy chief prosecutor in Messina, who led the operation. She said that sex trafficking operations between Nigeria, Libya and Italy are highly organised and continue despite recent attempts to stem the flow of migration from north Africa to Europe.
“There is an industry in the exploitation of girls from the age of 14 who have all become terrorised and controlled through the use of these juju ceremonies,” she says.
Yesterday, Sicilian prosecutors in Catania also arrested 19 Nigerians suspected of belonging to the Supreme Vikings Confraternity, an organised crime group operational across Sicily. The men are accused of drug smuggling and the rape and sexual assault of Nigerian women in Cara di Mineo, one of Italy’s largest reception centres for refugees. Prosecutors told the Guardian that they were considering the possibility that the men arrested were raping women at the centre “with the aim of subjugating them and preparing them for prostitution’’.
About 16,000 Nigerian women arrived in Italy from Libya between 2016-2017. According to the UN’s International Office for Migration (IOM) more than 80% of them were victims of trafficking, destined for a life of forced prostitution on street corners and in brothels across Italy and Europe.
In recent weeks hundreds of people have been removed from reception centres across Italy as part of the populist government’s hardline immigration measures.
The moves come as a part of a concerted push to implement the “Salvini decree” – named after Italy’s interior minister Matteo Salvini. It abolishes humanitarian protection for those not eligible for refugee status, and was passed by the Italian government last year.
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As a result hundreds of asylum seekers are now at risk of homelessness. NGOs and aid agencies, including the Red Cross, have warned that victims of sex trafficking are among those evicted.
“If this is true then the decree has been misinterpreted by local authorities,” says Scaminaci. “Nigerian women victims of sex trafficking must always be granted a humanitarian permit or a refugee status because of the consequences they could face if deported back in Nigeria.”
Last December, Blessing, a 31-year-old Nigerian woman who was trafficked into prostitution in Italy, said she had been removed from a reception centre in Isola di Capo Rizzuto, in Calabria.
“When the police came to tell us that we couldn’t stay there any more, I couldn’t believe my ears,” she said. “They took all of our belongings and escorted us out. There was a young girl in our group. This is outrageous. I have a legal permit to stay. And soon I may not have a roof over my head. I’m really frightened.”
Father Enzo Volpe, a Salesian priest in Palermo who has been providing assistance to Nigerian women for seven years, says that the clearing of reception centres is likely to increase the risk of further trafficking and exploitation.
“Leaving these girls in the street, victims of sex trafficking, is not only inhumane, it also means facilitating the work of criminal organisations,” he said. “With no protection, these girls risk becoming easy prey.”
The Guardian
Related stories: 20,000 Nigerian girls trafficked to Mali for prostitution
The illegal sex trafficking trail between Nigeria and Europe
Video - Nigerian women trafficked to Europe for prostitution at 'crisis level'
Showing posts with label trafficking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label trafficking. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 29, 2019
Wednesday, January 23, 2019
20,000 Nigerian girls trafficked to Mali for prostitution
Nigeria's anti-trafficking agency says it has received concrete intelligence that around 20,000 Nigerian girls have been forced into prostitution in Mali.
Many of the girls are working in hotels and nightclubs after being sold to prostitution rings by human traffickers, according to a fact-finding mission carried out by the agency in collaboration with Malian authorities in December.
NAPTIP's Arinze Osakwe told CNN most of the girls said they were lured by human traffickers who promised them employment in Malaysia.
"The new trend is that they told them they were taking them to Malaysia and they found themselves in Mali. They told them they would be working in five-star restaurants where they would be paid $700 per month," Osakwe, who was part of an earlier NAPTIP rescue mission, said.
Some of the girls had been sold as sex slaves in gold mining camps in northern parts of Mali, he said.
Officials from the agency under Operation Timbuktu rescued 104 Nigerian girls from three brothels in Bamako, Mali's capital in 2011.
They were forced to become sex workers in mining communities in northern Mali.
"We brought back 104 girls just from three ramshackle brothels, and those were the ones that were even willing to come. They were mostly between the age of 13 and 25, and they had been trapped in the country for many years," Osakwe said.
"Since then, we have been working with local authorities and receiving reports from the Nigerian embassy in Bamako that the number of Nigerian girls trafficked to Mali has spiked tremendously," he said.
The agency said it is working with Malian authorities, the International Organization for Migration and National Emergency Management Agency to send the girls back to Nigeria.
Every year, tens of thousands of Nigerians are trafficked illegally to destinations abroad especially Europe.
Around 97 percent of victims are women, and 77 percent have been sexually exploited by their traffickers, according to IOM estimates.
CNN
Related stories: The illegal sex trafficking trail between Nigeria and Europe
Video - Nigerian women trafficked to Europe for prostitution at 'crisis level'
Many of the girls are working in hotels and nightclubs after being sold to prostitution rings by human traffickers, according to a fact-finding mission carried out by the agency in collaboration with Malian authorities in December.
NAPTIP's Arinze Osakwe told CNN most of the girls said they were lured by human traffickers who promised them employment in Malaysia.
"The new trend is that they told them they were taking them to Malaysia and they found themselves in Mali. They told them they would be working in five-star restaurants where they would be paid $700 per month," Osakwe, who was part of an earlier NAPTIP rescue mission, said.
Some of the girls had been sold as sex slaves in gold mining camps in northern parts of Mali, he said.
Officials from the agency under Operation Timbuktu rescued 104 Nigerian girls from three brothels in Bamako, Mali's capital in 2011.
They were forced to become sex workers in mining communities in northern Mali.
"We brought back 104 girls just from three ramshackle brothels, and those were the ones that were even willing to come. They were mostly between the age of 13 and 25, and they had been trapped in the country for many years," Osakwe said.
"Since then, we have been working with local authorities and receiving reports from the Nigerian embassy in Bamako that the number of Nigerian girls trafficked to Mali has spiked tremendously," he said.
The agency said it is working with Malian authorities, the International Organization for Migration and National Emergency Management Agency to send the girls back to Nigeria.
Every year, tens of thousands of Nigerians are trafficked illegally to destinations abroad especially Europe.
Around 97 percent of victims are women, and 77 percent have been sexually exploited by their traffickers, according to IOM estimates.
CNN
Related stories: The illegal sex trafficking trail between Nigeria and Europe
Video - Nigerian women trafficked to Europe for prostitution at 'crisis level'
Monday, August 13, 2018
Video - Nigerians seek to end treacherous illegal immigration route from Libya to Europe
Nigeria is reported to have the highest number of illegal Migrants in Libya -- who are seeking to cross the Mediterranean Sea into Europe. Most of them are young people hoping to get a better life in Europe. Although many of those who have been repatriated tell of harrowing experiences, there are still a number of Nigerians who are ready to take the risky journey. CGTN's Deji Badmus has been speaking to a returnee who is now one of those trying to put an end to the trend of irregular migration in Nigeria.
Monday, June 18, 2018
Nigerian Human traffickers operating at 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia
Weeks before the 2018 FIFA World Cup was due to kick off in Russia, a woman met Blessing and Mfon at the Godswill Akpabio Stadium in the southern Nigeria city of Uyo. The two young sisters had gone there to watch Nigeria play Spain’s Atletico Madrid in a warmup match ahead of the global soccer fiesta in which this West African nation is proud to participate, and the woman, in her 40s, seemed to be a devoted fan.
“We sat beside her during the match, and we were all analyzing the performance of the [Nigerian] team together,” Blessing, who is 19 and the older of the two siblings, told The Daily Beast. “After the match, she asked us if we would like to go watch the World Cup in Russia and work there after the tournament.”
Russia is open to foreigners with just a single match ticket and a FAN ID, which is available online to confirmed ticket holders. Once you’re in, you can stay legally until July 25, which is 10 days after the end of the competition.
While this is good news for soccer fans visiting the country, it is equally an opportunity for traffickers to do big business.
Blessing and Mfon were told their travel to Russia would be taken care of and that they would get jobs in Moscow as social workers for a nongovernmental organization dealing with traumatized athletes once the World Cup was over. The girls were told it would take about six months to pay back the cost of the journey to Russia, put at $20,000 each, after which they could keep all the money they made.
“We took her to our parents, and she told them the same thing,” Blessing said. “She said she had slots for 20 Nigerian girls and was looking to take girls from all regions of Nigeria with a passion for sports.”
No one suspected the woman was a human trafficker because she showed documents appearing to link her to a number of humanitarian organizations in Russia, and she hailed from the same wider community as the family of Blessing and Mfon, which gave the parents of the girls the impression that she wouldn’t hurt her kindred.
“We sat beside her during the match, and we were all analyzing the performance of the [Nigerian] team together,” Blessing, who is 19 and the older of the two siblings, told The Daily Beast. “After the match, she asked us if we would like to go watch the World Cup in Russia and work there after the tournament.”
Russia is open to foreigners with just a single match ticket and a FAN ID, which is available online to confirmed ticket holders. Once you’re in, you can stay legally until July 25, which is 10 days after the end of the competition.
While this is good news for soccer fans visiting the country, it is equally an opportunity for traffickers to do big business.
Blessing and Mfon were told their travel to Russia would be taken care of and that they would get jobs in Moscow as social workers for a nongovernmental organization dealing with traumatized athletes once the World Cup was over. The girls were told it would take about six months to pay back the cost of the journey to Russia, put at $20,000 each, after which they could keep all the money they made.
“We took her to our parents, and she told them the same thing,” Blessing said. “She said she had slots for 20 Nigerian girls and was looking to take girls from all regions of Nigeria with a passion for sports.”
No one suspected the woman was a human trafficker because she showed documents appearing to link her to a number of humanitarian organizations in Russia, and she hailed from the same wider community as the family of Blessing and Mfon, which gave the parents of the girls the impression that she wouldn’t hurt her kindred.
Tuesday, June 12, 2018
World Cup child trafficking bid caught by Nigerian authorities
Nigerian authorities say they have rescued nine young girls and one boy who were being trafficked to Russia.
Five suspects, including a policeman and a quarantine officer, were arrested for allegedly facilitating their travel, the government agency fighting trafficking says.
The victims were found while trying to board a plane from Lagos to Moscow.
They had football supporter ID cards in order to look as though they were fans heading to the World Cup in Russia.
The children, who were unaccompanied, are now in a shelter for victims of trafficking which run by the National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (Naptip).
Five other potential victims, also children, were stopped from boarding a flight to Russia when staff noticed they had one-way tickets.
Criminals have been pressurising young Nigerians and their parents to take advantage of the World Cup to get Russian visas, Naptip says.
It warns that, once out of the country, the victims would be exploited by traffickers.
Many victims of trafficking from Africa to Europe come from Nigeria.
According to the UN's agency for migration, most of the potential sex trafficking victims arriving in Italy by sea are Nigerian.
Five suspects, including a policeman and a quarantine officer, were arrested for allegedly facilitating their travel, the government agency fighting trafficking says.
The victims were found while trying to board a plane from Lagos to Moscow.
They had football supporter ID cards in order to look as though they were fans heading to the World Cup in Russia.
The children, who were unaccompanied, are now in a shelter for victims of trafficking which run by the National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (Naptip).
Five other potential victims, also children, were stopped from boarding a flight to Russia when staff noticed they had one-way tickets.
Criminals have been pressurising young Nigerians and their parents to take advantage of the World Cup to get Russian visas, Naptip says.
It warns that, once out of the country, the victims would be exploited by traffickers.
Many victims of trafficking from Africa to Europe come from Nigeria.
According to the UN's agency for migration, most of the potential sex trafficking victims arriving in Italy by sea are Nigerian.
Thursday, May 31, 2018
Human traffickers plan to sell Nigerian women for sex at World Cup in Russia
Human traffickers are planning to exploit relaxed Russian visa controls for next month’s World Cup to sell Nigerian women into sex work, state officials and anti-slavery activists said.
Officials in Nigeria said they had intelligence showing plans were well underway to traffic local women into Russia for the football tournament, exploiting a move by Moscow to let spectators enter the country with just a ticket and a fan pass.
“This is a real present for traffickers,” said Julia Siluyanova of Russian anti-slavery group Alternativa.
She said Russia’s strict visa process had typically made trafficking people into the nation time-consuming and costly and the eased visa rules had now left the system open to abuse.
Many women and girls have been lured from Nigeria in recent years with promises of work and good wages only to end up trapped in debt bondage, and the World Cup could see the number of victims arriving in Russia soar, according to Alternativa.
“We discovered that about 30 victims (Nigerian women) were brought to the Confederations Cup in Moscow last year ... we expect to face the same problem during the World Cup this year,” Siluyanova told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email.
Visa-free entry was trailed at the Confederations Cup and will apply to the entire World Cup, which runs in 11 Russian cities from June 14 to July 15, and the ten days either side.
Officials in Nigeria said they had intelligence showing plans were well underway to traffic local women into Russia for the football tournament, exploiting a move by Moscow to let spectators enter the country with just a ticket and a fan pass.
“This is a real present for traffickers,” said Julia Siluyanova of Russian anti-slavery group Alternativa.
She said Russia’s strict visa process had typically made trafficking people into the nation time-consuming and costly and the eased visa rules had now left the system open to abuse.
Many women and girls have been lured from Nigeria in recent years with promises of work and good wages only to end up trapped in debt bondage, and the World Cup could see the number of victims arriving in Russia soar, according to Alternativa.
“We discovered that about 30 victims (Nigerian women) were brought to the Confederations Cup in Moscow last year ... we expect to face the same problem during the World Cup this year,” Siluyanova told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email.
Visa-free entry was trailed at the Confederations Cup and will apply to the entire World Cup, which runs in 11 Russian cities from June 14 to July 15, and the ten days either side.
PLANS AFOOT
Nigeria’s anti-trafficking agency NAPTIP said it had received intelligence that human traffickers were planning to take advantage of the tournament, and that it was working with the Russian embassy in the capital of Abuja to tackle the issue.
“If we alert Nigerians, we disrupt them (traffickers) ... and let them know that these plans are in the works,” said Arinze Orakwu, head of public enlightenment at NAPTIP.
NAPTIP was unable to say how many women were trafficked into Russia, but an official in Nigeria’s Edo state said it was sizeable.
“Women are being trafficked to Russia, and we get returnees back from Russia,” said Yinka Omorogbe, head of Edo’s anti-trafficking task force. “It is not a frequent destination in the same way as Italy is, but we do get a pretty large number.”
Thousands of Nigerian women and girls are lured to Europe each year, making the treacherous sea crossing from Libya to Italy, and trafficked into sex work, the United Nations says.
The number of female Nigerians arriving in Italy by boat surged to more than 11,000 in 2016 from 1,500 in 2014, with at least four in five of them forced into prostitution, according to data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
A spokesman for football’s governing body FIFA said it was committed to ensuring human rights were respected, but that crimes such as human trafficking were the responsibility of local and international authorities.
The Russian government could not be reached for comment.
From the Olympics to the Super Bowl, big sporting events regularly trigger warnings over an influx of sex workers, many of whom are victims of modern slavery, yet experts are split on whether such spectacles actively fuel trafficking.
Nigeria’s anti-trafficking agency NAPTIP said it had received intelligence that human traffickers were planning to take advantage of the tournament, and that it was working with the Russian embassy in the capital of Abuja to tackle the issue.
“If we alert Nigerians, we disrupt them (traffickers) ... and let them know that these plans are in the works,” said Arinze Orakwu, head of public enlightenment at NAPTIP.
NAPTIP was unable to say how many women were trafficked into Russia, but an official in Nigeria’s Edo state said it was sizeable.
“Women are being trafficked to Russia, and we get returnees back from Russia,” said Yinka Omorogbe, head of Edo’s anti-trafficking task force. “It is not a frequent destination in the same way as Italy is, but we do get a pretty large number.”
Thousands of Nigerian women and girls are lured to Europe each year, making the treacherous sea crossing from Libya to Italy, and trafficked into sex work, the United Nations says.
The number of female Nigerians arriving in Italy by boat surged to more than 11,000 in 2016 from 1,500 in 2014, with at least four in five of them forced into prostitution, according to data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
A spokesman for football’s governing body FIFA said it was committed to ensuring human rights were respected, but that crimes such as human trafficking were the responsibility of local and international authorities.
The Russian government could not be reached for comment.
From the Olympics to the Super Bowl, big sporting events regularly trigger warnings over an influx of sex workers, many of whom are victims of modern slavery, yet experts are split on whether such spectacles actively fuel trafficking.
Thursday, December 7, 2017
Video - Hundreds more Nigerians flown home from Libya
The process of deporting migrants from Libya continues.Four hundred and one Nigerian migrants have been flown back home from Libya. They are the latest Nigerian returnees from Libya - where they had been in various detention camps for months.
Monday, December 4, 2017
Nigerian narrates how he became a slave in Libya
The Edo State indigene, whose emotion-laden interview with CNN’s Nima Elbagir in a Libyan deportation camp, was viewed by millions worldwide, shared his life-experiences in T.B. Joshua’s church on Sunday.
The young barber explained that his father died when he was just 11, adding that he struggled to sponsor himself through school along with his five siblings.
“When I was cutting the hair of one of my customer’s, he advised me to go to Europe where he promised I could earn a lot of money,” Mr. Imasuen recounted.
“I asked the man how much it would cost me. He said N350,000 but I said I only had N140,000 with me,” he said.
Mr. Imasuen had been determinedly saving N10,000 monthly for over one year.
The man promised to ‘help’, not knowing that Mr. Imasuen was naively about to use his own hard-earned cash to sell himself into slavery.
Travelling by road on a tortuous journey through Niger, the young Nigerian explained how one of the vehicles in his convoy had a “terrible accident” in the Sahara Desert, killing 30 people instantly.
“Upon arriving in Libya, the driver said he had not been paid his money and we were sold into the slave trade in Sabha.”
Mr. Imasuen said he and ten other Nigerians were ‘sold’ and then “locked up in one small room.”
More than 200 slaves were kept inside that inhumane cell.
“They started beating me to call my mother to send money. That was when my mother learned I was not in Nigeria – because I did not tell her before I left,” he admitted.
The ransom they demanded – N200,000 – was simply too much for Mr. Imasuen’s poverty-stricken mother to raise.
“For months, I did not hear from her. They kept on beating me everyday and I fell sick. If I went to the toilet, I was shitting blood.”
Mr. Imasuen said he was beaten three times daily for eight gruelling months. That was his fate as a male.
For the ladies sold into slavery, “they would send them out to do prostitution before selling them to another person; I know of a girl there who was sold three times.”
According to him, most of the enslaved females fell pregnant “without even knowing the father of the child.”
When a picture of Mr. Imasuen’s emaciated condition was circulated in his local community, they managed to come together to raise the money to secure his freedom in March 2017.
After gaining his freedom, he attempted to travel to Tripoli, hoping to join the thousands of illegal migrants who would brave the sea to try and reach Italy by boat.
“I didn’t even get to Tripoli before I was caught and taken to prison. I met more than 10,000 Nigerians there. We only eat once a day there – one piece of bread. I would drink salt water.”
While suffering the horrific prison conditions, Mr. Imasuen hatched a plan to reach the deportation camp.
He slipped a note into the female section of the prison, pleading that any of the ladies who was being taken for deportation claim he was their husband.
The ruse worked and Mr. Imasuen was taken to Tripoli’s main deportation camp – one step closer to being repatriated to Nigeria.
It was there he granted an interview to CNN, he said.
“I decided to speak to them, hoping to get help but at the end, nothing came out of it,” he bemoaned.
Through the intervention of the International Organisation for Migration, IOM, Mr. Imasuen was finally deported to Nigeria – with nothing but the clothes on his back to show for his “journey through hell”.
“Upon getting to Nigeria, I decided to come to T.B. Joshua because even before I left, I heard of the help he renders to others. I need prayer.”
Osazee Aghimie, another deportee, equally shared his own sorrowful tale, explaining how over 100 migrants died in the boat he was in after it capsized en route to Italy. He narrowly survived only to be thrown into prison and eventually deported.
T.B. Joshua, who had just turned from the Dominican Republic, gave the two men each N200,000. Mr. Imasuen could not hold back tears as he received the gift.
Mr. Joshua’s support to the duo is not an isolated instance. This week alone, the cleric gave over N4.4 million to Nigerians returning from Libya, and well over N100 million ($277,000) has been provided to them by The SCOAN since 2016.
The young barber explained that his father died when he was just 11, adding that he struggled to sponsor himself through school along with his five siblings.
“When I was cutting the hair of one of my customer’s, he advised me to go to Europe where he promised I could earn a lot of money,” Mr. Imasuen recounted.
“I asked the man how much it would cost me. He said N350,000 but I said I only had N140,000 with me,” he said.
Mr. Imasuen had been determinedly saving N10,000 monthly for over one year.
The man promised to ‘help’, not knowing that Mr. Imasuen was naively about to use his own hard-earned cash to sell himself into slavery.
Travelling by road on a tortuous journey through Niger, the young Nigerian explained how one of the vehicles in his convoy had a “terrible accident” in the Sahara Desert, killing 30 people instantly.
“Upon arriving in Libya, the driver said he had not been paid his money and we were sold into the slave trade in Sabha.”
Mr. Imasuen said he and ten other Nigerians were ‘sold’ and then “locked up in one small room.”
More than 200 slaves were kept inside that inhumane cell.
“They started beating me to call my mother to send money. That was when my mother learned I was not in Nigeria – because I did not tell her before I left,” he admitted.
The ransom they demanded – N200,000 – was simply too much for Mr. Imasuen’s poverty-stricken mother to raise.
“For months, I did not hear from her. They kept on beating me everyday and I fell sick. If I went to the toilet, I was shitting blood.”
Mr. Imasuen said he was beaten three times daily for eight gruelling months. That was his fate as a male.
For the ladies sold into slavery, “they would send them out to do prostitution before selling them to another person; I know of a girl there who was sold three times.”
According to him, most of the enslaved females fell pregnant “without even knowing the father of the child.”
When a picture of Mr. Imasuen’s emaciated condition was circulated in his local community, they managed to come together to raise the money to secure his freedom in March 2017.
After gaining his freedom, he attempted to travel to Tripoli, hoping to join the thousands of illegal migrants who would brave the sea to try and reach Italy by boat.
“I didn’t even get to Tripoli before I was caught and taken to prison. I met more than 10,000 Nigerians there. We only eat once a day there – one piece of bread. I would drink salt water.”
While suffering the horrific prison conditions, Mr. Imasuen hatched a plan to reach the deportation camp.
He slipped a note into the female section of the prison, pleading that any of the ladies who was being taken for deportation claim he was their husband.
The ruse worked and Mr. Imasuen was taken to Tripoli’s main deportation camp – one step closer to being repatriated to Nigeria.
It was there he granted an interview to CNN, he said.
“I decided to speak to them, hoping to get help but at the end, nothing came out of it,” he bemoaned.
Through the intervention of the International Organisation for Migration, IOM, Mr. Imasuen was finally deported to Nigeria – with nothing but the clothes on his back to show for his “journey through hell”.
“Upon getting to Nigeria, I decided to come to T.B. Joshua because even before I left, I heard of the help he renders to others. I need prayer.”
Osazee Aghimie, another deportee, equally shared his own sorrowful tale, explaining how over 100 migrants died in the boat he was in after it capsized en route to Italy. He narrowly survived only to be thrown into prison and eventually deported.
T.B. Joshua, who had just turned from the Dominican Republic, gave the two men each N200,000. Mr. Imasuen could not hold back tears as he received the gift.
Mr. Joshua’s support to the duo is not an isolated instance. This week alone, the cleric gave over N4.4 million to Nigerians returning from Libya, and well over N100 million ($277,000) has been provided to them by The SCOAN since 2016.
The illegal sex trafficking trail between Nigeria and Europe
Sandra knew there was always a chance that her clients would kill her.
For three years, she was forced to work as a prostitute on the streets of Moscow, repaying a $45,000 debt to the trafficker who brought her from Nigeria.
"There were five of them," she recalls of one occasion. "They were brutal, they beat me up, they brought out a knife and tried to stab me."
Instead, they pushed her out of the two-story window for not submitting.
Often times, there were more men -- 10, 15, 20 per call.
Sandra, not her real name, is one of tens of thousands of Nigerian women who have been trafficked into Europe for sexual exploitation. And many of those women come from a single city.
For decades, Benin City, the capital of Edo State in southern Nigeria, has been tied to trafficking to Europe. Here, a potent mix of poverty and spiritualism drives thousands of young women to make the dangerous journey.
Along its often unpaved, mud-ridden streets there are houses with wide gates and high walls. These belong to the families with a relation who has "made it," says Roland Nwoha, a local NGO worker who has devoted his career to stopping the trade. "Almost every family has a contact in Europe."
Organizations like Nwoha's help educate people about the risks. But he says these few stories of success continue to be a powerful motivator in a city where so many live in desperate conditions.
And in Benin City, the push to leave comes from every direction.
Trapped by fear
Sandra says she was convinced to go by a man she met at church, who said he was an assistant pastor.
She says he told her he had a vision from God that she traveled overseas, that his sister in Russia could get a job in a hair salon. For added insurance, the man had given the items she left behind to a traditional priest.
"We always have had this belief that your future lies in the hand of God," says Nwoha. "Religious leaders, both the traditional and the Christian, are capitalizing on this."
Like so many, Sandra feared the juju -- traditional witchcraft -- as much as she trusted her friend.
Her trafficker took much more than just her passport. "My pants, my bra, the hair from my head, the armpit and my private parts," she says.
The items were for a juju oath, so powerful, a local priest said, that no one dares break it.
For Sandra, it bound her to her home thousands of miles away in Benin City, and the assistant pastor that convinced her to go.
"I saw it with my own eyes. It's like a danger to weak girls, especially when it has to do with sensitive parts of your body."
She believed that her passage to Europe would cost her no more than $2,000. She ended up owing her trafficker $45,000.
The average debt for girls trafficked from Nigeria is around $25,000, but it can be as much as $60,000. None of them have any idea that they will owe these extortionate amounts. The debt, and the fear of juju, keeps them trapped.
Sea of misery
Sandra's journey took her through Lagos and then an onward flight to Europe.
But increasingly the trafficking trade is flowing through the lawlessness of Libya and across the Mediterranean where, according to the UN's International Organization for Migration (IOM), over the past three years there has been a 600 percent rise in the number of potential sex trafficking victims arriving into Italy by sea.
The IOM estimates 80 percent are from Nigeria. The majority are from Benin City.
"When the Europeans started their search and rescue operations, many people in Benin said, 'the road has opened, once you get on the boats you will be rescued," says Nwoha.
But just last month, the bodies of 26 Nigerian women were recovered from the Mediterranean in a single day, bringing this year's total number of migrant deaths in that sea to at least 3,000.
Often, the journey ends in tragedy. More often, the tragedy happens in Libya.
Ede's story
Physically, 28-year-old Ede is finally free, but the pain of what she endured is still raw.
"He used to hurt me, apart from work," she says of the man who purchased her. She was sold into sexual slavery in Libya as she tried to make her way to Europe.
"That is how they do there," says Ede, "When you finish paying your money [to your captor], if you are staying with a wicked somebody, they will sell you to another people so you start all over again."
She was freed after a police raid and eventually deported to Nigeria.
Now, back in Benin City, she sits next to 18-year-old Jennifer, who is too traumatized to talk. They are recent rescues, kept in a safe house run by the National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP).
"Especially they hate us, we Nigerians ... they don't even want to hear anything concerning Nigerians," Ede remembers. "They treated us like a slave, as if we are nothing. So we went through a lot there."
Outside, the house is a non-descript, high walled compound, just like the others in the neighborhood.
Inside, the young women sit in a dark living room, where the hum of an overhead fan, and the Nigerian soap opera on TV are the few comforts in this temporary home as they wait for their cases to be investigated and to be reunited with their families.
Reducing demand
But few cases end up in court. Fewer still end in convictions.
According the US State Department's latest Trafficking In Persons report, last year NAPTIP reported 654 investigations, with 23 convictions for trafficking offenses.
"We're prosecuting the small fries in Nigeria," says Julie Okah-Donli, director general of NAPTIP. "Absolutely the number one problem is the inability of destination countries to clamp down on their own criminal networks.
"We've looked at the root causes in Nigeria without addressing the root causes in the destination countries," she says. "What is being done to reduce the demand for this crime?"
Sandra's case is one of the rare prosecutions. Her trafficker was arrested, as was his sister, who was Sandra's "madam" in Russia, pimping her out to clients. They are both awaiting trial.
"When I was in Russia I said to myself, if I get back to Nigeria alive I will expose her," says Sandra. "She is not going to go unpunished. The wicked don't have any place here, they have to face the law."
Her former church admits her trafficker was a member of the congregation but denies that he was an assistant pastor.
The betrayal that stretched across two continents is now even closer to Sandra.
"Even my own father he said I am not his daughter," she says.
The trafficking is not Nigeria's problem to solve alone, says Okah-Donli, but it is Nigeria's tragedy.
"It's our young boys and girls who are trafficked. Many are not making it back alive and the ones that do are battered and bruised."
Nigeria's international sex-trafficking ring
For three years, she was forced to work as a prostitute on the streets of Moscow, repaying a $45,000 debt to the trafficker who brought her from Nigeria.
"There were five of them," she recalls of one occasion. "They were brutal, they beat me up, they brought out a knife and tried to stab me."
Instead, they pushed her out of the two-story window for not submitting.
Often times, there were more men -- 10, 15, 20 per call.
"They might even kill you if you try to defend yourself," she says. "That's the reason why it is very horrible. And in that process most Nigerian girls lose their life, because not every girl can withstand the pressure of 10 men."
Sandra, not her real name, is one of tens of thousands of Nigerian women who have been trafficked into Europe for sexual exploitation. And many of those women come from a single city.
For decades, Benin City, the capital of Edo State in southern Nigeria, has been tied to trafficking to Europe. Here, a potent mix of poverty and spiritualism drives thousands of young women to make the dangerous journey.
Along its often unpaved, mud-ridden streets there are houses with wide gates and high walls. These belong to the families with a relation who has "made it," says Roland Nwoha, a local NGO worker who has devoted his career to stopping the trade. "Almost every family has a contact in Europe."
Organizations like Nwoha's help educate people about the risks. But he says these few stories of success continue to be a powerful motivator in a city where so many live in desperate conditions.
And in Benin City, the push to leave comes from every direction.
Trapped by fear
Sandra says she was convinced to go by a man she met at church, who said he was an assistant pastor.
She says he told her he had a vision from God that she traveled overseas, that his sister in Russia could get a job in a hair salon. For added insurance, the man had given the items she left behind to a traditional priest.
"We always have had this belief that your future lies in the hand of God," says Nwoha. "Religious leaders, both the traditional and the Christian, are capitalizing on this."
Like so many, Sandra feared the juju -- traditional witchcraft -- as much as she trusted her friend.
Her trafficker took much more than just her passport. "My pants, my bra, the hair from my head, the armpit and my private parts," she says.
The items were for a juju oath, so powerful, a local priest said, that no one dares break it.
For Sandra, it bound her to her home thousands of miles away in Benin City, and the assistant pastor that convinced her to go.
"I saw it with my own eyes. It's like a danger to weak girls, especially when it has to do with sensitive parts of your body."
She believed that her passage to Europe would cost her no more than $2,000. She ended up owing her trafficker $45,000.
The average debt for girls trafficked from Nigeria is around $25,000, but it can be as much as $60,000. None of them have any idea that they will owe these extortionate amounts. The debt, and the fear of juju, keeps them trapped.
Sea of misery
Sandra's journey took her through Lagos and then an onward flight to Europe.
But increasingly the trafficking trade is flowing through the lawlessness of Libya and across the Mediterranean where, according to the UN's International Organization for Migration (IOM), over the past three years there has been a 600 percent rise in the number of potential sex trafficking victims arriving into Italy by sea.
The IOM estimates 80 percent are from Nigeria. The majority are from Benin City.
"When the Europeans started their search and rescue operations, many people in Benin said, 'the road has opened, once you get on the boats you will be rescued," says Nwoha.
But just last month, the bodies of 26 Nigerian women were recovered from the Mediterranean in a single day, bringing this year's total number of migrant deaths in that sea to at least 3,000.
Often, the journey ends in tragedy. More often, the tragedy happens in Libya.
Ede's story
Physically, 28-year-old Ede is finally free, but the pain of what she endured is still raw.
"He used to hurt me, apart from work," she says of the man who purchased her. She was sold into sexual slavery in Libya as she tried to make her way to Europe.
"That is how they do there," says Ede, "When you finish paying your money [to your captor], if you are staying with a wicked somebody, they will sell you to another people so you start all over again."
She was freed after a police raid and eventually deported to Nigeria.
Now, back in Benin City, she sits next to 18-year-old Jennifer, who is too traumatized to talk. They are recent rescues, kept in a safe house run by the National Agency for Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP).
"Especially they hate us, we Nigerians ... they don't even want to hear anything concerning Nigerians," Ede remembers. "They treated us like a slave, as if we are nothing. So we went through a lot there."
Outside, the house is a non-descript, high walled compound, just like the others in the neighborhood.
Inside, the young women sit in a dark living room, where the hum of an overhead fan, and the Nigerian soap opera on TV are the few comforts in this temporary home as they wait for their cases to be investigated and to be reunited with their families.
Reducing demand
But few cases end up in court. Fewer still end in convictions.
According the US State Department's latest Trafficking In Persons report, last year NAPTIP reported 654 investigations, with 23 convictions for trafficking offenses.
"We're prosecuting the small fries in Nigeria," says Julie Okah-Donli, director general of NAPTIP. "Absolutely the number one problem is the inability of destination countries to clamp down on their own criminal networks.
"We've looked at the root causes in Nigeria without addressing the root causes in the destination countries," she says. "What is being done to reduce the demand for this crime?"
Sandra's case is one of the rare prosecutions. Her trafficker was arrested, as was his sister, who was Sandra's "madam" in Russia, pimping her out to clients. They are both awaiting trial.
"When I was in Russia I said to myself, if I get back to Nigeria alive I will expose her," says Sandra. "She is not going to go unpunished. The wicked don't have any place here, they have to face the law."
Her former church admits her trafficker was a member of the congregation but denies that he was an assistant pastor.
The betrayal that stretched across two continents is now even closer to Sandra.
"Even my own father he said I am not his daughter," she says.
The trafficking is not Nigeria's problem to solve alone, says Okah-Donli, but it is Nigeria's tragedy.
"It's our young boys and girls who are trafficked. Many are not making it back alive and the ones that do are battered and bruised."
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