New York Times reports Turkey's sex trade is "growing"

An article appeared in the New York Times on Sunday titled "Turkey's growing Sex Trade Snares Many Slavic Women". The article talks about women who arrive by ferry across the black sea who end up working in "the country's growing sex trade, sometimes against their will." The article says that these women are known in Turkey as Natashas regardless of their real names, and claims that Turkey is quickly becoming the world's largest market for Slavic women due to it's booming economy and lax visa laws.Allan Freedman, who coordinates counter-trafficking at the Ankara bureau of the International Organization for Migration, an independent body that works closely with the United Nations (UN) is quoted as saying: "Think of many rivers flowing into one sea. That sea is Turkey." The article also says: "Most of the women come of their own free will but many end up as virtual slaves, sold from pimp to pimp through a loosely organized criminal network that stretches from Moscow to Istanbul and beyond." The article explains: "Prostitution is legal in strictly secular Turkey, where the government licenses brothels, known as "general houses," and issues prostitutes identity cards that give them rights to some free medical care and other social services. But women working in general houses - there is usually one in each large city - tend to be older, and the demand for young, slender women has outstripped supply as Turkey's economy has improved. Slavic women are meeting that need." The article claims that although Turkey has been working over the last 20 years to stop trafficking and get off the United States black list, because of it's lax visa laws, it has become a worry for Europe. In fact the article claims that Turkey is a huge worry for Europe due to this problem, as Turkey has become an "increasingly migrant hub". "It is possible for a Moldova woman to be in Istanbul within a day of paying $15 for a month long visa." The article also states that: "The new Turkish penal code has listed trafficking as a crime and a $600,000 United States grant is being used to train police to recognize trafficked women. And to set up a hotline to help women who get caught in a trafficker's grip. A campaign to publicize the phone number includes billboards in the country's international airport." "Trabzon is the centre for trafficking in Turkey," the article says. The article talks about hotel Seranda in Aksaray, where "Russian women are crowded into booths and dance on a small dance floor, they beckon for men to join them, once a customer is found they lead him up to the hotel above." "The hotels are periodically raided and open under new names," the article says. Â