The National Police has arrested five people for the commission of three crimes of trafficking in human beings for the purpose of forced marriages and other similar ones, also related, in addition to giving protection to two minor girls, of Romanian nationality.
The operation - baptized with the name of
Bucharest
- was forged from a complaint from the Educational Inspectorate of the town of
Fuente de Cantos
(
Badajoz
), alerted by the "sudden" school absenteeism of the minors.
From that moment on, a device was organized in which agents from the
Badajoz
,
Ciudad Real
and the
Alcázar de San Juan
Local Police Station participated
.
Due to the origin of the minors, the Police focused the clues from the first moment on the possible motive of the case, that is, "the usual practice among a certain cultural subgroup of Romanian origin of marrying girls at an early age, specifically from the 12 years, arranging for this the marriage between the families of the contracting parties or through intermediaries in exchange for an economic consideration of 6,000 to 7,000 euros, "according to the Police.
A family with three girls
Once married, the minors, as a general rule, leave school and the family environment, moving to the home of their new "in-laws" -in this case in Ciudad Real-, where they contribute with housework until they reach age. legal minimum to be able to obtain an employment contract and thus contribute financially to your new
home
.
As a result of the agents' investigations, it was possible to identify a family with three girls who complied with the
indicated
modus
.
The police officers found out that the two older sisters were married, according to their rituals, at the age of 14.
The youngest of the three sisters, only 12 years old at the time the investigation began, was also being prepared for marriage.
From there, the Police prepared an operation to locate the minors and the families involved, "taking into account the high mobility, temporality and nomadism of those investigated", who tend to change residence continuously as a result of their work activity as
agricultural seasonal workers
.
'Operation Nunta'
In October 2020, the oldest of the sisters was located in
Almendralejo
(
Badajoz
), proving that she had been forced to marry some time ago, at the age of 14.
According to the investigation, the young woman has now reached the age of majority.
For these events, the spouse's parents were arrested and brought to justice.
In the last dates the total resolution of the case was triggered when the Police got to know the possible residence of the second of the sisters and her in-laws in the town of
Herencia
(
Ciudad Real
). Shortly after, it was possible to find out the residence of the third of the sisters and their parents in a nearby town.
This second police operation, called
Nunta
, ended in Alcázar de San Juan (Ciudad Real) on July 7 when both families were arrested, three men and two women between 20 and 48 years of age, who were placed at the disposal of the judge who, given the seriousness of the facts, proceeded to withdraw parental authority from both minors aged
14 and 15 years
.
Both have been under the custody of the protection services of the Castilla-La Mancha Community Board.
According to the UN
The National Police warns that forced marriages are classified by the UN refugee agency (
UNHCR
) as marriages against will or by force and, in addition, are recognized in international conventions as a violation of the right to marry with free and full consent, against the right to human dignity, equality and non-discrimination, mediated by coercion or intense social or family pressure.
It is also a form of child marriage in which at least one of the contracting parties is a child, who as a minor, their consent eventually given cannot be considered sufficiently full and free.
The fight against this type of crime is included in the guidelines of the Strategic Plan of the National Police for the fight against these new forms of slavery, abuse and exploitation of vulnerable groups based on their state of need.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
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