Police in Athens said yesterday they had broken a trafficking ring that had been recruiting young Romanian women from poor neighborhoods in their homeland and luring them to Greece to work in brothels.

Officers arrested a 36-year-old Polish man and a 38-year-old Romanian woman, believed to be key members of the ring, after being tipped off by a 17-year-old Romanian girl who escaped the apartment where she was being held.

The girl, who approached police at Athens International Airport to appeal for help, had been issued with a forged identification card granting her adult status. She and several other foreign girls are believed to have been forced into working in various brothels across the capital.

A subsequent raid by police on a central Athens apartment led to the release of another two suspected victims and the confiscation of several forged documents and bank deposit books.