GENEROUS members of Suffolk's Bangladeshi restaurant community have made a significant contribution to an appeal launched to break the deadly cycle of drugs and prostitution.

GENEROUS members of Suffolk's Bangladeshi restaurant community have made a significant contribution to an appeal launched to break the deadly cycle of drugs and prostitution.

A collaboration of Walton's Bombay Nite, Woodbridge's Royal Bengal, and The Dhaka, Bekash and Passage to India, all in Ipswich, weighed in with a £900 donation to The Evening Star's Somebody's Daughter Memorial Fund.

Cash raised will be used to fund a safe house where vulnerable young women embroiled in substance misuse and vice can seek refuge, support and advice.

Foez Haque, of The Dhaka, said the restaurateurs were proud to support the appeal.

“The Somebody's Daughter fund is a very good cause and we all thought we should be a part of it,” he said.

“We don't want a community that doesn't have security. What happens in our community affects everyone.”

Mahbub Alam Shamim of The Bombay Nite, added: “I hope this fund will raise awareness of the problems on our streets.

“We are all one community living here.”

Somebody's Daughter was launched in conjunction with Ipswich Borough Council in the wake of the killings of five women in Suffolk.

The bodies of Gemma Adams, Tania Nicol, Anneli Alderton, Annette Nicholls and Paula Clennell were found in remote rural locations last December. All had worked in the sex trade and all had drug habits.

Among the trustees of the Somebody's Daughter appeal, a registered charity, are Ipswich Town chairman David Sheepshanks, borough council leader Liz Harsant and Evening Star editor Nigel Pickover.

Donations to the memorial fund can be made online at www.eveningstar.co.uk, in person at Ipswich Borough Council's customer service centre in the Town Hall, by calling 01473 433777, or by sending a cheque, made payable to Somebody's Daughter Memorial Fund, to PO Box 772, Ipswich Borough Council, Grafton House, 15-17 Russell Road, Ipswich, Suffolk, IP1 2DE.

Tell us what you are doing to support the fund. Contact reporter Josh Warwick by e-mailing josh.warwick@eveningstar.co.uk or by calling 01473 324840.