RITA’S eyes opened wide as she described the voodoo ceremony intended to condemn her to a life of prostitution.

“The witch doctor took some of my nails, and hair. He cut the heart of a chicken into small pieces and mixed it all into a potion with a local gin brew. I had to drink it,” she whispered. “I was so frightened. I knew death would come if I betrayed the oath.”

Rita, then 15, was told that she must never run away from her “sponsors” or go to the police. “If I did, the Gods would take advantage of me, or my parents,” she said.

Her mother had taken Rita to the ceremony. After paying for her daughter to be taken to Europe for a “better life”, she wanted to safeguard her investment.

About 200,000 children such as Rita are taken from their homes in West Africa each year and are sold into domestic slavery, prostitution or worse, according to Unicef UK.

It is thought that some children have been procured for sacrifice in black magic rituals in the West. Anti-trafficking activists believe that this was the fate of “Adam”, the boy whose headless torso was found floating in the Thames in September 2001.

Unicef says that Nigeria is the centre of this regional child-trafficking market. And the children of Benin City, in the east of the country, are its raw material. Ninety per cent of the Nigerian prostitutes deported from Europe come from Benin City. Like Rita, many of them had left with the help of poverty-stricken parents eager to benefit from European incomes.

“They think only of flashy new cars or building a house with the money,” said Sarah Egbon, who was deported recently from Italy, where she had been a prostitute. “They know neighbours with children in Europe live better. When you return with money, you are treated like a hero and many girls like that.”

It does not always work out that way. Sarah, now 31, spent three harrowing years touting for business on the main roads outside Rome to repay her sponsors the £15,000 that they said it had cost to bring her from Nigeria. Now she is trying to build a new life with the help of a local counselling centre in Benin City.

Trafficking in people is lucrative. A child bought for as little as £10 can be sold for about £200. Statistics are hard to compile, but Unicef estimates that the market is worth more than £5 billion annually.

Traffickers promise parents that their girls will receive an education and good careers. It is traditional in Nigeria for offspring to be sent away to distant relatives for a better life, which makes the process seem to be more acceptable. Then the traffickers use the practices of black magic to control the children.

Last week Lynne Chitty opened Britain’s first safe house for women trafficked from West Africa to Britain. She said: “These girls are petrified of breaking the oath, they are frightened they will die or terrible things will happen to their family. Girls from Eastern Europe are often beaten into submission. The Nigerians are psychologically tortured into compliance .

“Britain has an enormous problem. The United Kingdom is both a transit and destination country.

Explore World News

• World Agenda

• Iraq News

• US & Americas News

• Europe News

• Middle East News

• Asia News

• Africa News

• Ireland News

Times Recommends

• Michael Jackson: Not the final chapter
• Indian Army spends10m rupees on golf buggies
• Brüno toned down for 15 rating