Beijing: Chinese police have rescued 32 Vietnamese women who were sold as brides to Chinese farmers, authorities said yesterday, in an operation aimed at curbing the practice in the impoverished countryside.
Authorities arrested 75 suspects who were allegedly part of a ring that lured women to southwest China's Yunnan province with promises of tourism and work, Yunnan Public Security Department said.
The victims were kept in large numbers in "captive families" in Yunnan in remote, mountainous areas before being sold to people in six provinces in central and east China, state broadcaster CCTV said.
When one victim tried to escape, "two men caught me and beat me with a steel pipe," she told reporters. "They threatened me when I refused to be their bride."
Bride trafficking is a serious problem in China, where women are sold to men, mostly in rural areas, who cannot find wives at home because of the country's huge gender imbalance.
