Three suspected trafficking victims have been stopped from leaving the country by the Bureau of Immigration (BI) inspectors at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA).

According to Immigration Commissioner Norman Tansingco, the passengers were intercepted at NAIA’s Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 as they were about to board their outbound flights to the Middle East last June 9 and 10.

Tansingco said members of the BI’s travel control and enforcement unit (TCEU) decided to offload the passengers from their flights during secondary inspection after they admitted the real purpose of their travel.

“They all initially alleged they were traveling as tourists and one of them even pretended to be a nanny for the 16-year-old boy who is her supposed companion in her trip,” he said.

The woman pretending to be a fake nanny later confessed that she is traveling to Syria to work as a domestic helper.

While the other passenger claimed that she came from a vacation in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia but later revealed plans to go back to Lebanon where she previously worked as a helper.

The last passenger presented a fake Saudi Arabian visa but eventually surrendered her United Arab Emirates (UAE) visa and said she was going to Dubai to work as a maid.

“In all these cases, the victims recounted that they were recruited via the social media by illegal recruiters who processed all their travel documents,” Tansingco said.

“It is clear that they are all victims of human trafficking, thus we could not allow them to leave,” he added.

The three victims were turned over to the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT) for investigation, as of this writing.

Written By Ailah Francisco, DZRH News Online Intern