Prostitution in Armenia

In Armenia prostitution and erotic tourism are legal, but running a brothel is forbidden and engaging in other ways of pimping are punishable by up to 10 years in prison. According to media information, there were less than 5,000 women involved in prostitution in Armenia, roughly 1,500 of them were in Yerevan. Police and other safety forces reportedly tolerate prostitution. The country is a base and transit point for women and girls trafficked primarily for sexual and, to a lesser extent, labor misuse to the United Arab Emirates and Turkey... Traffickers, using developed networks in source and target countries, recruit victims who are already engaged in prostitution. The greater part, but not all, of the known losses were aware that they would end up in the sex industry in other countries, however, they were uninformed of the traffickers' aim or the exploitative situation they would face abroad. Ladies engaged in prostitution, orphans who had outgrown their institutions, homeless or widows, and girls in hard economic conditions were at maximum risk of being trafficked. There were various reported incidents of bodily aggression against trafficking victims.