USSR (RUSSIAN) GIRLS TURN TO PROSTITUTION OVERSEAS

MILLIONS OF ERSTWHILE USSR (RUSSIAN & OTHER STATES) GIRLS TURN TO  PROSTITUTION OVERSEAS

Garden of Marxist ideology now brings forth Forbidden Fruits

' Many more are vying to Jump into the trade

This article was written in 1998. The above is an
advertisement of Russian brides today.
In fact the internet is full of such advertisements.
May be from brothels the Russian beauty
is reaching western homes.
Thank God if she is saved from prostitution.

Beauty and leg shows in India are the warning signals 15 to 10 centuries ago when sex reached the very 'garb grah' sanctum sanctorum of the temples, decline of Hindu : society commenced in the sub-continent.  lt had induced the powerful invaders sitting thousands of miles away to march on and occupy  "the golden sparrow". History is witness to it that thousands of 'sparrows 'were' auctioned in the bazaars of lran, Turkmanistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Arab etc, Three centuries ago then rose the army of motivated and spirited people who struck at the dead of night or the peak of day to free those helpless 'sisters' before they ever crossed Chenab. Today the coal is being carried to new castle' Thanks ,to the Marxist ideology which advocate that sex is a natural urge like thirst and hunger and need not be suppressed. Thus the soci'al outlook of the subjects of the erstwhile U.S.S.R has completely "revolutionised" and the whole 'bourgeoisie' values abandoned. B.S.Goraya edits the report that have appeared in the Western press (most probably in New York Times of Jan/Feb 1998. We copied it from a secondary source) and tells how ‘proletariat’ dames are being auctioned in the flesh market of the globe. It perhaps serves as an eye opener for the Punjabi marxists whose ladies participate in beauty pageants and leg shows unabashedly.

Entered in Moscow and Ukrainian :capital, Kiev, the network’s trafficking women run east to Japan and Thailand, where thousands of young Slavic women now work against their will as prostitutes, and west to the Adriatic Coast and beyond. The routes are controlled by Russian crime gangs based in Moscow. Even when they do not specifically move the women overseas, they provide; security, logistical support, liaison with brothel owners in many countries and, usually, on false documents.

Women often start their hellish  journey by choice, Seeking a better life, they are lured by local advertisements for good jobs in foreign countries at  wages they could never 'imagine at –home. ln Ukraine alone the number  of women, who leave is staggering. As many as 400,000 women under 30 have gone in the past decade, according to their country's Interior  Ministry. The Thai embassy in Moscow, which processes visa applications from Russia and Ukraine, says it receives nearly 1,000 visa applications a day, most of these from women.

Israel is a fairly typical destination. Prostitution is not illegal here, although brothels are, and with 250,000 foreign male workers 'most of whom are single or here without their wives, the demand is great. Police officials estimate that there are 25O00 paid sexual transactions every day. Brothels are ubiquitous.

None of the women seem to realize the risks they run until it is too late. Once they cross the border their passports will be confiscated, their freedoms curtailed and whatever little money they have is taken from them at once.

"You want to tell these kids that if some thing seems too good to be true it usually is," said Lyudmilla Biryuk, a Ukrainian psychologist who has counseled women who have escaped or been released from bondage 'But you can't imagine what fear and real iqnorance can do to a person."

 The women are smuggled by car, bus, boat and plane. Handed off in the dead of night, many are told they will pick oranges, work as dancers or as waitresses. Others have decided to try their luck at prostitution, usually for what they assume will be a few, lucrative months. They have no idea of the violence that awaits them.

Women are held in apartments, bars and makeshift brothels; there they serve, by-their own count, as many as 15 clients a day. Often they sleep in shifts, "four to a bed. The best that most hope for is to be deported after the police finally catch up with their captors.

Few ever testify. Those who do risk death, Last year in lstanbul, Turkey, according to Ukrainian police investigators, two women were thrown to their deaths from a balcony while six of their Russian friends watched. ln Serbia, also last year, said a young Ukrainian woman who escaped in October, a woman who refused to work as a prostitute was beheaded in public.

ln Milan a week before ,Christmas the police broke up a ring that was holding auctions in which women abducted from the countries of the, former soviet Union were put on blocks,- partially naked, and sold at an average price of just under $1,000.

"This is happening wher ever you look now," said Michael Platzer, the Vienna based head of operations for the united Nations 'Center for lnternational Crime Prevention. "The mafia is not stupid. There is less law enforcement since the Soviet Union fell apart and more freedom of movement. The earnings are incredible. The overhead is low -you don't have to buy cars and guns. Drugs you sell once and they are gone, Women can earn money for a long time."

"Also," he added," the laws help the gangsters, Prostitution is semi-legal in many places and that  makes enforcement tricky. ln most cases punishment is very light."

ln some countries, lsrael among them, there is not even a specific law against the sale of human beings.

Mr. Platier said," lf you want to use numbers, think about this. Two hundred million people are victims of contemporary forms of slavery. Most are not prostitutes, of course, but children in sweet shops, domestic workers, migrants. During four centuries, 12' million people were believed to be involved in the slave trade between Africa and the New World. The 200 million  and many of course are women who are trafficked for sex  is a current figure. lt's happening now. Today."

A distress call came from Donetsk, the bleak centre of coal production. in southern Ukraine. A woman was screaming on the telephone line. Her sister and a friend were prisoners in a bar somewhere near Rome. They spoke no Italian and had no way out,' but had managed, briefly; to get hold of a man's cell phone

"Do: you have any idea where they are, exactly?" asked 'Olga Shved, who runs to Lstrada in i(iev, Ukraine's new centre dedicated to, fighting'rthe trafficking of women in eastern Europe and the countries of the former Soviet Union.

 Ms, Shved began searchirig for'files and telephone numbers of the local consul, the police, anybody who could  help. "Do they know how far from Rome they are?" she asked, her voice tightening with, each word.  'What about the name of the street or the bar?

Anything will help," she said, jotting notes furiously as she spoke, "We can get the police on this, but we need something. lf they call back, tell them to give us a clue. The street number. The number of a bus that runs past, One thing; is all we need."

Ms. Shved hung up and called officials at Ukrainei’s lnterior Ministry and the Foreign Ministry. Her conversations were short, direct and obviously a routine part of her job.

'That is because Ukraine   and 'to a lesser degree its Slavic neighbours Russia and Belarus  has replaced.’

Thailand and the Philippines as the epicenter of the global business in  trafficking women. The Ukrainian i problem has been worsened by its ravaged economy, an atrophied system  of law enforcement, and criminal gangs  that grow more brazen each year.  Young European women are in , demand, and Ukraine, a country of 51 million people, has a seemingly endless supply. lt is not that hard to see why.

Neither Russia nor Ukraine reports accurate unemployment statistics. But even partial numbers present a clear, story of chaos and economic dislocation. Federal employment statistics in Ukraine indicate that, more than two thirds of the unemployed are women. The Government also keeps another statistic, employed but not, working." Those are people who, technically have jobs,  and can use company amenities like day care centres and hospitals. But they do not, work or get paid. Three quarters, are women. And of those who have, lost their jobs since the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991, more than 80 percent are. women.

 The average salary in Ukraine today is slightly less than $30 a month, but, it is half that in the small towns that  criminal gangs favour for recruiting women to work abroad. On average, there are 30 applicants for every job in most 'Ukrainian cities. There is no real hope; but there is freedom.

In that climlate, looking for work in foreign' countries has increasingly become a matter of survival.

"lt's no secret that the highest prices now go for the white women," said Marco Buffo, executive director of ‘On the Road’, an anti-trafficking organization in northern ltaly. "They are the novelty item now. lt used to be Nigerians and Asians at the top of the market. Now it's the Ukrainians."

Economics is not the only factor causing women to flee their homelands. There is also social reality. For the first time, young women in Ukraine and Russia have the right, the ability and the will power to walk away from their parents and their hometowns. Village life is disintegrating throughout much of the former Soviet world, and youngsters are grabbing any chance they can find to save themselves. .

"After the wall fell down, the Ukrainian people tried to live in the new circumstances," said Ms. Shved. "lt was very hard".

'Pretty Woman.' or a thousand movies and ads with same point, that somebody who is rich can save them. The glory and ease of wealth is almost the basic point of the Western advertising that we see. Here the towns are dying. What jobs there are go to men. So they leave."

First, however, they answer ads from employment agencies promising to find them work in a foreign country. Here again, Russian crime gangs play a central role. They often recruit people through seemingly innocuous "mail order bride" meetings. Even when they do not, few such organizations can operate without paying off one gang or another. Sometimes want ads are almost honest, suggesting that the women can earn up to $1,000 a month as "escorts" abroad. Often they are vague or blatantly untrue.

Recruiting Methods:

One typical ad used by traffickers in Kiev last year read: "Girls: Must be single and very pretty. Young and tall. We invite you for work as models, secretaries, dancers, choreographers, gumhasts. Housing is supplied. Foreign posts available. Must apply in person."

One young woman who did, and made it back alive, described a harrowing journey, "l met with these guys and they asked if l would work at a strip bar, she said. “Why not, I thought?” They said We would, have to leave at once. We went by car to the Slovak Republic, where they grabbed my passport. I thought they, would get me new papers there, but they, threatened me if I spoke out, l would face grave consequences. We made it to Vienna, then to Turkey. l was kept in a bar and I was told I owed $5,000 for my travel. I worked for three days, and on the fourth l was arrested."

Lately, the ads have started to disappear from the main cities - where the realities of such offers are known now. These days the appeals are made in the provinces, where their success is undiminished.

Most of the thousands of Ukrainian women who go abroad each year are illegal immigrants who do not work in the sex business. Often they apply for a legal visa - to dance, or work in a bar - and then say after it expires.

Many go to Turkey and Germany, where Russian crime groups. are particularly powerful. lsraeli leaders say that Russian women - they tend to refer to all women from the former Soviet Union as Russian - disappear off tour boats every day.

Officials in ltaly estimate that at least 30,000 Ukrainian women are employed illegally there now, Most are domestic workers, but a growing number are prostitutes, some of them having been promised work as domestics only to find out their jobs were a lie. Part of the problem became clear in a two-year study recently concluded by the Washington-based nonprofit group Global Survival Network: police officials in many countries just don't care. The network, after undercover interviews with gangsters, pimps and corrupt officials, found that local police forces- often those best able to prevent trafficking - are least interested in helping. Gillian Caldwelt of Global Survival Network has been deeply involved in the study "ln Tokyo," she said, " a sympathetic senator arranged a meeting for us with senior police officials to discuss the growing prevalence of trafficking from Russia into Japan. The police insisted it wasn't a problem, and they didn't even want the concrete information we could have provided. That didn't surprise local relief agencies, who cited instances in which police had actually sold trafficked women back to the criminal networks which had enslaved them."

Official Reactions:

'Complacency- among police agencies is uncommon. 'Women's groups 'want to blow this all out of proportion." 'said Gennadi 'V.' Lepenko, chief of Kiev branch  of lnterpol, the international police agency. "Perhaps this was a problem a few years ago. But it's under control now."

That is not the view at, Ukaraine's Parliament- which is trying  to pass new laws to protect young  women- or at the lnterior Ministry.

"We have a very serious  problem here and we are simply not  equipped to solve it by ourselves," said Mikhail Lebed, chief of ccriminal investigations for the Ukrainian lnterior Ministry. "lt is a human tragedy but also, frankly, a national crisis.  Gangsters make more from these- women in a week than we have in our law enforcement budget for the whole year. To be honest, unless we get some help we are not going to stop it."

 But solutions will not be simple. Criminal gangs risk little by ferrying women out of the country: lndeed" many of the women go voluntarily.: Laws are vague, cooperation between countries rare and punishment of traffickers almost nonexistent. Without work or much hope of a future at home, an eager teen-ager will find it hard to believe that the promise of a job in Italy, Turkey or lsrael is almost certain to be worthless.

"l answered an ad to be a waitress," said Tamara, 19, a Ukrainian prostitute in a massage parlour near Tel Aviv's old Central Bus station, a Russian-language 'ghetto' for the cheapest brothels." l'm not sure l would do there. Stand on a bread line or work in a factory for no wages?".

Tamara, like all other such women interviewed for this article, asked that her full name not be published. She turned several potential customers away so that she could speak at length with the reporter. She was willing to talk as long as her boss was out, She said she was not watched closely while she remained within the garish confines of the "health club".

"l didn't plan to do this, "she said, looking sourly at the rich red walls and 'leopard prints around her., "They took my, passport. So I didn’t had much choice. But they do give me money. It is better than any thing I could get at home.” (clipped for want of space.)