Trafficked women face high HIV infection risk - study

By Tan Ee Lyn

BALI, Indonesia (Reuters) - Up to a quarter of a million women and girls in Southeast Asia, mostly adolescents, are forced into prostitution each year and face violence and the prospect of contracting HIV/AIDS, researchers said on Wednesday.

The researchers, in a report documenting criminal activity in Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia, predicted circumstances would worsen as the financial crisis prompts women in the region to migrate in search of work.

Trafficking victims, many of them aged 12 to 16, are raped, locked up, denied food, water and medical care or forced to take narcotics and alcohol, they said.

"Victims of trafficking suffer horrendous, horrendous violations of human rights, deprivations of the most basic human dignity. It's a form of enslavement," said Jay Silverman, an associate professor at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Narcotics and alcohol were used in Indonesia and Cambodia "to keep these people in bondage," he said. A premium was paid for young girls, prompting traffickers "to continually bring them in to maintain the supply".

Caitlin Wiesen, an HIV expert at the U.N. Development Programme, said most victims were lured away by promises of jobs as domestic workers or in restaurants to end up in brothels where they faced "extreme situations of violence and exploitation.

"Asia is both the source and the destination," she added.

The study, entitled "Sex trafficking and STI/HIV in Southeast Asia: Connections between sexual exploitation, violence and sexual risk", was undertaken by the UNDP and the Harvard School of Public Health.