New Delhi, September 25:

At least 10,000 to 15,000 girls are being trafficked from Nepal to India, the data revealed by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Regional Office for South Asia, said.

They are allured to India of good job and sold there, Representative of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Regional Office for South Asia, Gary Lewis, told this daily today. He said illiteracy, poverty and Nepal’s long armed conflict and other economic and social causes are behind it. The office, which stands as guardian of the UN protocol against the trafficking, has continued to provide training to the police who are working to check the human trafficking and other human crimes, he said.

“We are actively involved in the programmes like implementation of the laws, capacity building, rehabilitation of the victims in South Asia, including Nepal,” he said.

According to the project coordinator of the office Ajit Roy, the number of displaced has surged in Nepal, problem of internal migration has worsened and Kathmandu has prospered as a centre of trafficking of women and children due to the long armed conflict.

“The women and teenage girls who come to Kathmandu in search of the jobs become soft targets for the pimps,” Roy added. Saying that AIDS and other sexual transmitted diseases were on the rise due to the trafficking, he said the recent study conducted by a US institution showed that 40 per cent of the sexual workers returning to Nepal from different Indian cities carried HIV/AIDS. Our office is working with some NGOs in Nepal for rehabilitation of those returning to Nepal, he said.

In this context, a South Asia-level conference will be held in New Delhi from October 9 to October 11, he said.