Eastern European women are being smuggled across the Border to work in Belfast brothels, it was claimed today.
Police raids discovered suspected illegal immigrants used to meet rising demands for sex in one of the city's most upmarket districts, a senior Ulster Unionist representative said.
Assembly member Mr Esmond Birnie claimed dozens of brothels run by paramilitaries and organised crime gangs have been set up in the area. "Residents believe there have been Eastern European women working there. This is nothing other than white slavery," he said.
"It is highly likely that such women are being trafficked into Northern Ireland. I wonder if what we are seeing is illegal immigration into the Republic of Ireland, and then movement of these females across the border?"
Security sources confirmed raids were carried out on a house close to Tates Avenue late last year.
"There was strong suspicion it was being used as a brothel and the people living there were evicted," one figure close to the investigation said.
"An English woman had been using the house, but there was nothing to suggest people from Eastern Europe were involved."
In south Belfast detectives believe loyalist terrorists hold a tight grip on the sex trade.