Dozens escape from suspected human trafficking in Johannesburg

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Dozens of young adults and children who were allegedly held captive in a suburban house in Johannesburg escaped on Wednesday, police said, in a suspected case of human trafficking.

Police have found 32 of the escapees, all of whom are Ethiopian nationals, spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Mavela Masondo told journalists.

Streams of migrants

The case echoes others around Johannesburg in recent months, with industrialised South Africa drawing streams of migrants, many of them undocumented, from countries such as Malawi, Lesotho and further afield.

Videos shared on social media showed people, some of them barefoot, running in the streets in Johannesburg’s suburb of Lombardy East.

“Most of them are minors,” Masondo said, putting their ages at between 13 and 24 years.

“It is alleged they were kept against their will,” he said, adding some were found half naked.

“There is a possibility that it is human trafficking.”

In January, Johannesburg police rescued 26 undocumented Ethiopian nationals, who were being held captive without clothes or documents by suspected human traffickers.

In August last year, police found more than 80 undocumented Ethiopians locked in a house in inhumane conditions in another suburb of the city.

Three other Ethiopian nationals were arrested on suspicion of human trafficking and the illegal possession of a pistol.

“It is a concern for us that people are being brought to our country… and kept in houses here against their own will,” Masondo said.