DUBAI // A woman who forced a 16-year-old girl into the sex industry after getting her a fake passport that said she was her daughter will spend three years in jail.
The teenager was abducted in Pakistan and raped by a man who lent her uncle money before she was handed to the human trafficking gang that brought her to the UAE.
The defendant, a 35-year-old Pakistani, got the girl the new passport then brought her to the UAE and forced her into prostitution.
The girl told prosecutors that she had been working in a flat with other women for about 18 months and that she entered and left the country three times during that period, purportedly as the woman’s daughter.
“The last time we exited the country, we stayed with a number of women in Pakistan. One of them told me that I have to find a way to reach police and tell them my story and they will help me as they have strict laws against human trafficking here [in the UAE],” said the girl.
A few months after coming back to the UAE for a third time, through Dubai International Airport, she met a Pakistani man and told him about the woman who was forcing her to work as a prostitute and he helped her reach out to Sharjah Police.
Police arrested the woman and she was referred to court on charges of human trafficking, running a brothel and facilitating prostitution work for a number of women.
She denied all charges in court last November.
Women were arrested at the brothel and were found to be working willingly in prostitution.
The defendant was found guilty of all charges and sentenced to three years in jail, to be followed by deportation.
salamir@thenational.ae
