The latest commodity being trafficked out of Southeast Asia and on to lucrative markets in China is neither wildlife nor drugs or arms but rather brides, according to a new report by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC).
“The number of women and girls traveling from Cambodia to China for forced or arranged marriages has surged since 2016, and experienced a further spike since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in the first quarter of 2020,” GI-TOC explained.
Though some of the women may have gone consensually, an increasing amount reported finding themselves in abusive or dangerous environments once in China, the report found.
In full: https://www.occrp.org/en/daily/16332-report-brides-are-cambodia-s-latest-illicit-export-to-china