The Russian invasion of Ukraine has triggered a mass exodus of civilians scrambling to escape what is the first major armed conflict in Europe since the Second World War.

The United Nations reported that more than 1.5 million refugees have crossed from Ukraine into neighbouring countries in just the past eleven days amid bitter urban fighting and Russian bombing campaigns against major cities.

But many of the women and children desperately trying to flee the wrath of Russian President Vladimir Putin are now facing another horrific threat. Police and aid workers in Poland have warned that sex traffickers are attempting to snatch up vulnerable girls weary from their perilous journeys away from the frontlines of their war-torn homeland.

Sex trafficking. Read more here.