Vietnam-China human trafficking a growing malady

Xiang Xiang came to China three years ago to seek a decent life, only to find that her destination was a brothel.

"I have no option but to stay. I don't have a passport since I was smuggled here, and they are watching me," said the 20-year-old Vietnamese woman who declined to reveal her real name.

By "they," Xiang Xiang means the pimps she was sold to at the end of 2010 in Dongxing in south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

She has been working as a prostitute in Dongxing, which borders Vietnam, since being trafficked and sold by her older female cousin, who is married to a Chinese man and living in the city.

Xiang Xiang started considering a move to China after her cousin returned home to visit relatives, flaunting her own "affluent and easy" life in China in front of the then-17-year-old village girl.

"She kept talking about her life -- a life I had always dreamed of -- and persuaded me to go with her. Her account sounded credible to me at the time, since she was dressed in Chinese top brands from head to foot and wore dazzling gold jewelry," Xiang Xiang recalled.

Soon after, she followed her cousin to Dongxing, joining a vast number of Vietnamese women who are trafficked to China for prostitution or to be sold as brides to unwed men.

The plight of the vulnerable women came into the spotlight earlier this month as China's Ministry of Public Security (MPS) vowed a crackdown on the purchase of Vietnamese brides, a trade that is not unusual in the country's rural areas, saying the practice may involve abduction or marriage fraud.