Aicha was forced into prostitution after her claim for asylum was rejected by the UK authorities and her financial support was stopped. She lived in constant fear that she would be sent back to her native Guinea.
"They told me I had to go back home, but it's not safe for me there, and because I said I wouldn't go back, they cut my support. So I ran away," she says. "Sometimes I would have to sleep outside. People started using me as well; men made me sleep with them."
Aicha, 28, has been in the UK for three years and now has a nine-month-old daughter. They are among an estimated 20,000 destitute asylum-seeking households in the UK. As Aicha is no longer with her child's father and is receiving only emergency support, she is unable to meet the most basic living costs.
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