100 women freed from sex traffickers in Mexico

MEXICO CITY: Some 100 women from across Latin America and eastern Europe were freed from sex traffickers Friday by Mexican police, who arrested 18 men on human trafficking charges, authorities said.

The women were found in a dawn raid on a brothel in central Mexico City, a statement from the capital's security ministry said.

The group included women from Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay and Venezuela, in Latin America, and from Hungary, Ukraine and Russia, in eastern Europe.

Mexican authorities have broken up numerous sex trafficking rings in recent months. The women are generally promised jobs such as modeling, then kidnapped and forced into prostitution.

There have been several recent cases of such women, especially Venezuelans, being murdered in Mexico.