Former victim jailed for trafficking six Vietnamese to China for prostitution

Vo Thi Quyen, 34, a resident of Song Doc Town in the Mekong Delta province of Ca Mau was charged with trafficking women.

In 2002, Quyen herself was tricked and sold by a neighbor to China's Yunnan. A Vietnamese man bought her and forced her to work in prostitution. A year later, he sent her to Vietnam to trick more women into the ring.

All victims were told they would be involved in trade activities once in China, though each was forced into prostitution on arrival.

Quyen managed to traffick six women to China and got paid VND9 million ($387.84), the indictment said.

Police stepped in to probe the incident following reports from the victims' families; however, Quyen escaped. In 2019, she was arrested in central Vietnam.

Vietnam reported 60 human trafficking cases in the first half of 2020, with 90 victims, mainly women and children, sold to foreign countries.

Traffickers typically trick their victims with promises of a better life with high-income jobs, instead subjecting them to forced labor and/or prostitution, according to a report by Vietnam Women's Union released last July.