The collapse of law and order and the absence of a stable government have
allowed criminal gangs, alongside terrorists, to run amok, Time magazine
reports.
Meanwhile, some aid workers say, bureaucrats in the ministries have either
paralyzed with red tape or frozen the assets of charities that might have
provided refuge for the girls.
The US State Department's June 2005 trafficking report says the extent of the
problem in Iraq is "difficult to appropriately gauge" but cites an unknown
number of Iraqi women and girls being sent to Yemen, Syria, Jordan and Persian
Gulf countries for sexual exploitation.
Families are usually so shamed by the disappearance of a daughter that they do
not report kidnappings. The resulting stigma of compromised chastity is such
that even if the girl should resurface, she may never be taken back by her
relations, the magazine said.
A visit to the Khadamiyah Women's Prison in the northern part of Baghdad
produces several tales of abduction and abandonment.
