Group of men jailed for forcing minors to work as prostitutes in Dubai

Prostitution rings have been busted numerous times in the past in Dubai. Two years ago, police rescued a 14-year-old girl from what was described as the cruelest human trafficking case of 2017. Months ago, authorities arrested three men for forcing a 17-year-old to work as a prostitute. 

Despite the ongoing arrests against individuals involved in such exploits, human trafficking prostitution cases are still quite common in the emirate. Most recently, five men were sentenced to jail by the Dubai Court of First Instance for trafficking a group of minor girls and forcing them into prostitution. 

The Bangladeshi nationals, aged between 20 to 39, allegedly flew out four teens from their home country to work as dancers and prostitutes at a night club in Al Muraqqabat area, a locality in the eastern part of the emirate. Police in Dubai had received a tip a few months ago regarding one of the teens working as a dancer in the nightclub, which is owned by one of the defendants, according to Gulf News.

Police eventually raided the nightclub and found 19 women and busted the five men involved in the ring. 

"All the women were working as dancers and prostitutes. Four of them were under the age of 18," an Emirati policeman said, according to Gulf News.

"We raided the place and rescued the victims who were referred to a women's children's shelter in Dubai. The defendants brought the victims using passports with fake ages." 

One of the victims, a 17-year-old Bangladeshi national, testified that she had agreed to come to Dubai to work as a dancer to financially support her family back home. 

"After four days of arriving in the country, they took us to the nightclub and told us that we will work as dancers. They asked me to have illegal affairs with three customers per month. The first defendant is the manager of the nightclub and he was running the business," she said.

The five defendants have been charged with human trafficking and will be deported after having served time in prison. 

In 2017, a human trafficking and prostitution ring - involving a 27-year-old Bangladeshi security guard and other unknown persons - was busted after one woman sent her brother a message via WhatsApp. 

The woman, identified as a Kyrgyz national, was one of two who were lured to Dubai after the security guard offered them jobs as domestic helpers and forced them into prostitution shortly after being picked up from the airport. They were only able to escape after the police busted the ring with the help of the message one of the women was able to send to her brother in her home country, Khaleej Times reported.

Emirati law stipulates a minimum fine of 100,000 dirhams ($27,223) and a minimum of five years in prison for human trafficking. The penalty could reach a life sentence if the victim is a child or a person with special needs.

According to the law, "human trafficking includes all forms of sexual exploitation, engaging others in prostitution, servitude, forced labor, organ-trafficking, coerced service, enslavement, begging and quasi-slavery practices."

The UAE has been working to combat human trafficking through legislative amendments as well as awareness programs. In 2015, the Dubai Judicial Institute and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime launched an anti-trafficking diploma, which teaches employees investigative skills, along with methods to protect and rehabilitate victims. As a result, the number of human trafficking cases in the country dropped from 25 to 16 between 2016 and 2017, according to The National.