RIGA, Jan. 26 (Xinhuanet) -- A project to prevent human trafficking between 2006 and 2009 was approved on Thursday in Estonia, a significant source country of women and girls traded for sex exploitation.

    The project defines the strategic goal and the major measures of counter-trafficking of human beings, Estonia's Minister of Justice Rein Lang told the local media.

    According to reports reaching here from Estonian capital of Tallin, Lang expressed his worry that human trafficking, closely related to the smuggling of drugs and AIDS, would turn into the nation's primary social problem unless the government enhances its capability to control it.

    The trafficking speculators are likely to increase their illegal activities if the East European member state of the European Union (EU) joins the Schengen open-borders agreement in 2007, Lang said.

    The Schengen agreement is a system in which travelers arriving at one of the EU's outer borders are checked only once, and thereafter have freedom to cross all the other national borders inthe Schengen states.

    Estonia will strengthen border checks, reinforce the monitor over government departments and respond severely to human trafficking activities. Enditem