How The Sun presented the story on an inside spread in yesterday's issue

The Sun's presentation of story yesterday about a woman trafficked from the Czech Republic to Britain and forced to work as a prostitute has outraged women's groups.

They accuse the paper of sensationalising the case, conflating the terms "sex" and "rape", and placing the story close to a "titillating" Page 3 picture of a topless woman.

The story, splashed on the front page under the headline "I was sex slave in Fred West's old house", turned inside to a spread on pages 4 and 5, headlined: "Slave gang forced me to have sex with 5 men at a time."

The Page 1 splash headline

It told of the ordeal of a 24-year-old woman called Nikola who, when aged 18, was lured to Britain by the promise of a better life. But she had been tricked by a gang, four members of which were later jailed for trafficking for sexual exploitation.

But End Violence Against Women (EVAW), the coalition of organisations and individuals that campaigns to end all forms of violence against women, criticised the way it was presented.

An EVAW spokeswoman said: "This kind of sensationalised reporting causes real harm by minimising and eroticising sexual violence against women.

The fact is that stories of abuse which are placed next to soft porn on the next page are designed to titillate. It is deeply discriminatory and underlines the need for Page 3 to go and for more responsible reporting of abuse."

And a second organisation that acts as a watchdog on media coverage of violence against women, Ending Victimisation & Blame (EVB), also took issue with The Sun's story.

"Use of the term 'sex slave' is dehumanising to women and incredibly damaging to women who have experienced sexual violence," said its spokeswoman, Jo Costello.

"Conflating rape with sex, as in this case, shows a clear misunderstanding of sexual violence and shows the depths The Sun newspaper will go to in order to sensationalise sexual violence.

"There are clear guidelines on reporting sexual violence, supported by the National Union of Journalists, and we believe The Sun editor, and his reporting team, should refer to these report guidelines in order to ensure they are reporting responsibly."

And the group, No More Page 3, which has called on The Sun to stop publishing daily pictures of topless women, said on its website that it was "united in anger and sadness" with the two organisations.

One of its spokeswomen also pointed out that the use of the personal pronoun in the headlines implied that it was a direct quote from Nikola. But these did not feature in the article. "It hardly seems likely that she would have said such a thing," she said. "It was dreadful."

She added: "We are appalled by the coverage of this story in The Sun and feel it should be addressed by regulators of the media."

A Sun spokesperson said: "We respect the rights of free expression for campaigners to make whatever points they choose.

"However, we must not lose sight of the original story here. It was a well-researched report by a (female) campaigning journalist, seeking to expose the horror of sexual slavery in modern Britain... and highlighting the terrible plight of some women in order that action could be taken.

"This is an example of journalism clearly in the public interest. The fact that No More Page 3 - due to the zealotry of its dislike for The Sun - should offer criticism rather than support says more about its moral and intellectual values than it does about ours."