TheGuardian.com: Children missing from Home Office hotels likely to have been trafficked, report finds
Scores of asylum-seeking children are still missing from the UK’s Home Office hotels as a new report reveals that many are likely to have been trafficked.
The most recent figures show that 118 unaccompanied children remain unaccounted for, some as young as 12. The study, released on Wednesday, is the first to conclude that children placed inside the hotels were at “increased risk of trafficking”, contradicting Home Office claims that the youngsters were not exploited.
Experts said the findings reinforced demands for an official inquiry into the “national scandal”.
The report, by the University College London (UCL) and Ecpat UK, was commissioned after it was revealed last year that dozens of asylum-seeking children were kidnapped by criminal gangs from hotels run by the Home Office. Basic checks to keep youngsters safe were not carried out in a scandal regarded among the most shameful of the last government.
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