Trinidad: Venezuelan women forced into prostitution at gunpoint

women trafficked
women trafficked

(Trinidad Express) Seeking to arouse the consciences of senators, National Security Minister Stuart Young yesterday spoke of the harrowing experiences of young Venezuelan women forced into prostitution by their captors, whom he described as “animals”.

Speaking on the Firearms Amendment Bill in the Senate, Young said he sat in a meeting with police officers who described statements taken from young Venezuelan women and the beatings they endured.

 
He said the “animals”, the human traffickers, were able to keep the women in check because they had illegal firearms.

“One of the scourges we are dealing with right now is prostitution and young girls from Venezuela being forced in prostitution and human trafficking, and whatever is the most derogatory of terms you could use to describe a human being, use that term and think of these men because I use colourful language but I can’t use it here (in Parliament).

“Over the weekend, based on intelligence, we picked up some of them and I am determined and I have told persons under my responsibility, I don’t want the women because they are the victims—we must help them—I want the heads and that is what we are building out right now because they use illegal firearms,” Young said.

He said firearms were the single worst tool being used in criminality.