Four 'tried to sell woman to undercover police for Dh5,000'

Bangladeshi men arrested in sting operation as they allegedly tried to sell a woman they had forced into prostitution.

DUBAI // Four men have been charged with human trafficking and illegal incarceration after they allegedly tried to sell a woman they forced into prostitution to undercover police for Dh5,000 (US$1,360). The Bangladesh nationals NM, age 31, and AS, MS and MJ, all age 30, denied the charges in the Dubai Criminal Court of First Instance yesterday. The defendants, who face 15 years in prison each if convicted, were arrested in a sting operation on January 5. The Indonesian woman WT, 26, told prosecutors that she previously worked as a maid for an Emirati family in the Mirdiff area for Dh700 a month with another Indonesian female. WT claimed that she and her colleague were offered jobs at a restaurant for higher wages and escaped from their employer to work there.

When they went to a house in Dubai, WT said NM locked them up after informing the women that they would be working as prostitutes, court records showed. WT told prosecutors that they were beaten, starved and forced to have sex six days a week with Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi men for Dh30 each. In her testimony she also claimed that her former colleague was sold to a Bangladeshi man for Dh5,500. The defendants were arrested after the Dubai police's anti-human trafficking division received a tip about a man trying to sell an Indonesian woman, court records showed. They were apprehended at Dubai's al Baraha district. [e-mail]