A human trafficking victim who was supposed to fly to the United Arab Emirates was intercepted at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 3 on April 30, the Bureau of Immigration (BI) said on Friday.
Officers of the BI Travel Control and Enforcement Unit (TCEU) said the victim attempted to leave the country via a Cebu Pacific flight to Dubai.
Upon secondary inspection, the victim admitted that she was invited by her cousin who allegedly processed all her documents, and that she gave her passport and boarding pass to an unknown woman riding a taxi outside the airport.
According to the victim, the woman came back 15 minutes after, handing her an already stamped passport prior to going to the immigration departure area.
The passport was then sent to the BI’s forensic documents laboratory later confirming that the border stamp is counterfeit.
BI Commissioner Norman Tansingco then warned human traffickers who will attempt to employ said schemes. “Our officers have wide-ranging measures to detect and deter fraud,” he said. “We will continue to safeguard the public against trafficking and aid in bringing these perpetrators to justice,” the BI chief added.
The TCEU officers then sought the assistance of the Inter-Agency Council Against Trafficking (IACAT) assigned at NAIA for standard turnover procedure.
