Visiting Switzerland

There is currently a large influx of young Nigerian girls, who arrive at the Geneva airport, register a request for asylum, and then vanish into the Swiss underground, working in the sex industry. The girls are on average between 15 and 20 years old.

Arriving at Cointrin airport from Africa they file a request for asylum and declare themselves to be Nigerian (they usually have no identity papers). They always happen to be traveling alone.

As a rule, they disappear rapidly from view, sometimes even before their request is even treated by the government.

Over the summer several dozen young girls arrived in Geneva in that manner, undoubtedly feeding the countless massage parlors, night clubs, sex centers, strip joints, and bordellos dotting the landscape of Romandie.

The repeated identical modus operandi indicates a well-oiled criminal network, as does the price Africa of an airline ticket and the fact that the young arrivals speak no French yet manage to dissolve so easily into the local landscape.

The assistance the young girls are doubtless receiving to live clandestinely is obviously not disinterested and authorities are trying to figure out where these girls are vanishing to.

Prostitution is legal in Switzerland and anyone with a legal right to live in Switzerland can practice it, as long as the person is of legal majority. Authorities are therefore wondering whether the girls are being taken into the sex industry against their will.

Asylum requesters, once processed at the airport, are usually transported to Vallorbe subsequent to processing by the ODM. Once ‘processed’ the authorities have no idea whether they are subsequently recruited by criminal organizations.

The ODM argues that its job is to process asylum requests and they have no way to know which such requests are coming from individuals who intend to prostitute themselves. While special provisions exist for minors under the age of 15, there are no special procedures for asylum seekers older than 15 years.