Officials from the Benin government and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) boarded the ship but found no clear sign of the suspected slave children shortly after the ship docked at the port of the West African country, the report said.

The suspected ship Etireno, which set sail from Benin two weeks ago, has been at the focus of an international attention after reports claimed that it carried about 250 children allegedly sold by their parents for slavery laborers.

However, the suspected ship was found carrying passengers including some 23 children and about 20 adolescents instead of the child slaves. Those passengers were later disembarked and expected to be looked after by relief organizations.

Meanwhile, Benin's Social Protection Minister Ramatou Baba Moussa said there has been a mix-up and that another unidentified vessel is the slave ship.

The second ship arrived in Gabon at about the same time with about 250 passengers on board, possibly accounting for the reports of between 100-250 victims of child traffickers, Moussa said.

But U.N. officials called for caution, saying a government investigation is necessary to discover the truth.

A UNICEF coordinator in Benin said the organization was "really very frustrated" and increasingly worried about the missing children. "When we heard that (the captain) has a criminal past, we imagined the worst, and the worst is that they could have been thrown overboard," the official said.

Lawrence Onome, the vessel's 40-year-old Nigerian captain, said no child slaves had been on the ship.

"I have not committed any offense that will warrant my arrest," he said. "I am not into child slavery, they cannot prove it. It is one thing to say and one thing to prove."

Earlier last Thursday, the Etireno was refused port in Douala, Cameroon, according to the U.N. and Benin officials.

On the other hand, Benin's police Monday said they had issued an international arrest warrants for the Etireno's Nigerian owner, captain and crew as well as for three Benin businessmen allegedly trading in African children on the west African coast.

According to UNICEF, the estimated 250 suspected child slaves were strongly believed to be Nigerian children destined for slave labor.

(Xinhua 04/17/2001)