ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - Iraqi authorities on Wednesday announced the rescue of seven foreign nationals who were trafficked and forced to work in a beauty parlor in Baghdad.

The foreign workers were held against their will and forced to work in a beauty parlor in the Zayona area in the Iraqi capital, according to a statement from the Iraqi interior ministry, adding that the operation to rescue them came after the women had appealed to a relevant United Nations (UN) agency.

The women, reportedly three Ukrainians, three Kazakhs, and one Tajik, were rescued in a joint operation of the Baghdad/Rusafa emergency regiment, Rusafa’s anti-human trafficking detachments, and their respective intelligence units, the statement added.

The authorities also arrested a suspect in the case who was in possession of the workers’  passports.

“The specialized investigative judge decided to detain him [suspect] on charges of human trafficking,” the ministry noted.

Despite the difficult conditions in their home countries often forcing them to accept unfavorable working conditions in order to provide for themselves and their families, foreign workers in Iraq are subjected to various forms of mistreatment, including sexual harassment and physical abuse.

Confiscating passports of foreign workers is a common aspect of the trafficking phenomenon in Iraq.

In its 2024 Trafficking in Persons Report on Iraq, the US State Department acknowledged that Baghdad had made “significant efforts” to combat trafficking, including investigating and prosecuting more trafficking crimes, but stressed that the government did not “fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking.”

“Traffickers fraudulently recruit some foreign migrants for work in other countries in the region, but subsequently force or coerce them into working in federal Iraq and the IKR [Iraqi Kurdistan Region],” read the report.

The Iraqi parliament’s labor and social affairs committee previously revealed that there are approximately one million foreign workers in Iraq.