Two 15-year-old boys were arrested in Taiwan on the suspicion that they had pimped at least a dozen girls, some of them as young as 12, police said on May 18.

Police believe the boys recruited the girls using the Internet and arranged for them to work in tea houses and hotels in New Taipei City.

"The girls wanted to buy designer products and they wanted to enjoy their lives," said a police spokesman. "They used various excuses to hide this from their parents, and some parents even provided excuses for them when they missed school."

The Liberty Times newspaper deemed the boys the youngest pimps to ever work in Taiwan .

"We didn't steal, we didn't rob. We were merely helping girls in trouble," one of them said, according to the paper.

If found guilty of pimping, the boys will face a maximum sentence of seven years in detention. They are most likely to spend that time in a juvenile correctional facility. The girls will be sent to a special school for teenagers forced into sex work, or they will be put into foster care if necessary.

(AFP)