THE police have effectively clamped down on the trading of exotic dancers in Culloden, where young girls and women gathered weekly to be auctioned off to club owners, according to Superintendent Devon Watkiss, head of the Organised Crime Investigative Division.

The activities at Culloden, a small community in the eastern section of Westmoreland, remained an open secret up to the point where the United States cited Jamaica for human trafficking, pointing to the weekly auction.

The local authorities moved to investigate on threat of development aid sanctions.

“Human traffickers are targeting young women and children and Culloden has been a major centre of influence,” said Watkiss.

“We have disrupted and eliminated that place,” the policeman said Tuesday night at a public forum and mini exposition on human trafficking held at Emancipation Park in New Kingston. The forum was organised by the Cabinet Office.

National security minister Dr Peter Phillips, guest speaker at the forum, announced that 70 arrests have been made so far by the newly created Trafficking in Persons (TIP) task force, and that several establishments were under surveillance.

He also announced that the government would be reviewing the work permit system and establishments in the sex industry to ascertain whether they had underage exotic dancers.

Jamaica was in June cited by the US State Department as one of 14 countries it deemed to be ignoring trafficking from within their borders, saying they could face sanctions.

The report said Jamaica was used as a transit country for illegal migrants moving to the United States and Canada and as a feeder country for children trafficked locally for the purpose of sexual exploitation.

In response, Jamaica set up a police TIP task force to tackle the problem.

According to United States Embassy Charge d’ Affaires, Thomas Tighe, his country would be granting US$250,000, ($15.25 million) to help tackle human trafficking locally.

The problem is said to affect an estimated 50,000 women and children in the Caribbean region.

“We are encouraged by the activity of the TIP task force,” said Tighe.