BEIJING: According to a state media report, an increasing number of women from Southeast Asia are being smuggled into China and sold into marriage or forced to work as prostitutes.

Director of the office for combating human trafficking in the Ministry of Public Security said, “The number of foreign women trafficked to China is definitely rising.”. Without giving figures, he said that many trafficked women come from poor rural areas of Vietnam, Myanmar or Laos and are lured by transnational criminal gangs with promises of good jobs or marriage with rich Chinese men.

He said that on their arrival in China, the victims are often sold to villagers as brides or forced to become sex workers in underground brothels in coastal or border areas such as Guangdong and Yunnan provinces.

Sex selection combined with China's population control rules has led to a gender imbalance in the country, with 118.1 boys currently born for every 100 girls against a natural ratio of 105 boys for every 100 girls, according to UN figures.