Gothenburg-based volunteer organisation Agape has identified at least 20 cases, where the care of unaccompanied underage migrants has turned into a full-fledged sexual relationship, with young people being used for sexual services.
Agape's Matilda Brinck-Larsen explained to the local newspaper Göteborgs-Posten that the newcomers receive food and shelter in exchange for their sexual services. Others had to perform unpaid work. The number of unreported cases is much greater, she ventured, as it it hard for youngsters to reveal what they have been going through.
Sara Edvardson Ehernborg of the activist network Vi står inte ut ("We can't stand it") confirmed a number of cases where migrants end up in sexual relations in exchange for help.
"Women have used them to get pregnant. Some have even given birth", Edvardson Ehernborg pointed out.
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The Salvation Army's Gothenburg-based accommodation Lilla Bommen also confirmed that migrants get abused by older people.
"It's more common than you think", deputy head of operations Ingela Sagman admitted.
"It may have started when they had nightmares and had to sleep beside their foster mother — or father", Brinck-Larsen explained.
Brinck-Larsen also ventured that how foster families communicate with migrants is problematic. The use of affectionate words and diminutives not only belittles migrants, but adds ambiguity, she suggested.
Marina Johansson, a board member of Gothenburg's social resource committee, largely agreed with the picture that the volunteer organisations painted.
"First and foremost, it is terrible that people make use of those who are in a difficult and vulnerable position. I've heard about this before, that unaccompanied migrants pay with their bodies to have somewhere to live. It's just rotten", Johansson told Göteborgs-Posten.
READ MORE: 'Shameless' Swedish Women Reported to Police for Sexually Abusing Refugees
Writer, columnist and doctor of ethics Ann Heberlein, said she was not surprised.
"It's really not surprising. The boys and men who have been exploited have been hit the hardest", she told the news outlet Nyheter Idag.
She tried to shine a spotlight on this problem in 2017, but was accused of everything from "alarmism" and "racism" and "throwing dirt at committed women".
Last year, several cases of staff at reception homes and members of voluntary support organisations allegedly embarking on a sexual relationships with "unaccompanied migrants" in various places across Sweden set off the alarms.
Following the peak of the migrant crisis in 2015, Sweden took in tens of thousands of "unaccompanied children".
READ MORE: Dangerous Liaisons: Sex Scandal Involving Migrant Children Rocks Sweden
