Azerbaijan, Lankaran / Trend corr. P.Aliyeva / The number of human trafficking cases increased in Azerbaijan, Fuad Aliyev, the representative of the Department to Combat Human Trafficking, said during the events in the Masalli region of Azerbaijan. Victims of human trafficking are mainly young adults between the ages of twenty and thirty years old. Annually, some 600,000 to 900,000 people become victims of human trafficking, international experts revealed. Some 211 crimes linked with human trafficking were registered in Azerbaijan in 2006. Criminal proceedings were instituted against 107 people.
Within the first six months in 2006, 187 crimes were registered, forty-four on human trafficking, 116 on brothels, and twenty-two for luring people into prostitution.
So far for 2007, criminal cases were filed against 112 people, with seventy-two of them connected to human trafficking.