As millions of women and children flee across Ukraine's borders in the face of Russian aggression, concerns are growing over how to protect the most vulnerable refugees from being targeted by human traffickers or becoming victims of other forms of exploitation.
The UN refugee agency says more than 2.5 million people, including more than a million children, have already fled war-torn Ukraine in what has become an unprecedented humanitarian crisis in Europe and its fastest exodus since World War II.
In countries throughout Europe, including the border nations of Romania, Poland, Hungary, Moldova and Slovakia, private citizens and volunteers have been greeting and offering help to those whose lives have been shattered by war.
From free shelter to free transport to work opportunities and other forms of assistance — help isn't far away.
But neither are the risks.
Police in Wrocław, Poland, said Thursday they detained a 49-year-old suspect on rape charges after he allegedly assaulted a 19-year-old Ukrainian refugee he lured with offers of help over the internet.
The suspect could face up to 12 years in prison for the "brutal crime," authorities said.
Police in Berlin warned women and children in a post on social media in Russian and Ukrainian against accepting offers of overnight stays, and urged them to report anything suspicious.
At Romania's Siret border after a five-day car journey from the bombed historical city of Chernihiv, 44-year-old Iryna Pypypenko waited inside a tent with her two children, sheltering from the cold.
She said a friend in Berlin who is looking for accommodation for her has warned her to beware of possibly nefarious offers.
Pypypenko said people were offering help — but she wasn't sure who she could trust.
"There are many, very dangerous propositions," said Pypypenko, whose husband and parents stayed behind in Ukraine.
"She told me that I have to communicate only with official people."
A number of officials and non-governmental organizations have been raising the alarm about the increased risks of human trafficking.
"The risk for these things to happen is very high," said Andreea Bujor, communications advocacy director for World Vision Romania.
"In times like this when people mobilize, as you see here a lot of Romanians mobilized and I'm very proud, but the risks for other people that can capitalize on the pain of these families is very high."
Security officials in Romania and Poland told The Associated Press that plain-clothed intelligence officers were on the lookout for criminal elements.
In the Romanian border town of Siret, authorities said men offering free rides to women have been sent away.
Ionut Epureanu, the chief police commissioner of Suceava county, told the AP at the Siret border that police are working closely with the country's national agency against human trafficking and other law enforcement to try to prevent crime.
Advice to women was being given at the border by both police, he said, including making sure they kept their phone batteries charged and that they write down the number plates of cars they get into.
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The Migration Data Portal notes that humanitarian crises such as those associated with conflicts "can exacerbate pre-existing trafficking trends and give rise to new ones" and that traffickers can thrive on "the inability of families and communities to protect themselves and their children."
Human trafficking is a grave human rights violation and can involve a wide range of exploitative roles. From sexual exploitation — such as prostitution — to forced labor, from domestic slavery to organ removal, and forced criminality, it is often inflicted by traffickers through coercion and abuse of power.
A 2020 human trafficking report by the European Commission, the EU's executive branch, estimates the annual global profit from the crime is 29.4 billion euros ($32 billion).
it says that sexual exploitation is the most common form of human trafficking in the 27-nation bloc and that nearly three-quarters of all victims are female, with almost every fourth victim a child.
A large proportion of the refugees arriving in the border countries want to move on to friends or family elsewhere in Europe and many are relying on strangers to reach their destinations.
At Poland's Medyka border, seven former members of the French Foreign Legion, an elite military force, are voluntarily providing their own security to refugees and are on the lookout for traffickers.
"This morning we found three men who were trying to get a bunch of women into a van," said one of the former legionnaires, a South African who gave only his first name, Mornay.
"I can't 100 per cent say they were trying to recruit them for sex trafficking, but when we started talking to them and approached them — they got nervous and just left immediately."
"We just want to try and get women and kids to safety," he added.
"The risk is very high because there are so many people you just don't know who is doing what."
At the train station in the Hungarian border town of Zahony, 25-year-old Dayrina Kneziva arrived from Kyiv with her childhood friend.
Fleeing a war zone, Kneziva said, left them little time to consider other potential dangers.
"When you compare ... you just choose what will be less dangerous," said Kneziva, who hopes to make it to Slovakia's capital of Bratislava with her friend.
"When you leave in a hurry, you just don't think about other things."
