The police have broken up a sex trafficking ring, which used voodoo rituals – including animal sacrifice – to force Nigerian women to work for them in Spain.
Reports have it that six traffickers were arrested and four of the victims freed.
Having been recruited in Nigeria with false promises of employment, the girls came to Europe on dangerous, makeshift boats.
However, on arrival they are housed in places like the Spanish holiday island of Mallorca where they were forced into prostitution.
Authorities said the traffickers attempted to keep the women submissive by performing ‘tribal rituals’ in Nigeria that sometimes involved ‘animal sacrifice’.
They used the women’s nail clippings and locks of hair to convince them that they had been placed under a spell ‘so they would do everything asked of them, under the threat of death to them or their family’, according to police.
The women had travelled across northern Africa to get to Spain illegally, making the arduous journey on foot and then by boat.
It was reported the women take on a debt up to €50,000 ($56,000), and swear obedience to a “madam” and traffickers’.
