Reacting to the news of PSNI raids on a brothel in Belfast last night, Amnesty International Northern Ireland Programme Director Patrick Corrigan said:

"Amnesty welcomes the police crackdown on traffickers and their vicious trade in Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights who are often held prisoner and forced to work as prostitutes. For the last two years Amnesty has been saying publicly that we feared sex trafficking was taking place in and through Northern Ireland. This raid would appear to confirm those fears.

"But the Government needs to protect these Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights victims of this brutal industry as well as catching the traffickers.

"At the moment these Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights have no guaranteed protection in Northern Ireland. The law treats them as illegal immigrants and people here would be appalled to know that many of them are just deported. They are then at serious risk of re-trafficking.

"The UK government must ratify the European Convention Against Trafficking which guarantees emergency housing and medical care for victims and gives them a month to recover from the trauma and make some decisions about what they need to do next.

"Victims of trafficking have had all of their very basic human rights violated - we must turn the system around so that they are recognised as the victims and not the perpetrators of crime."