At least 268 Myanmar women were kidnapped in 2009 and forcibly sold as brides to men in Yunnan Province for a minimum price of 38,000 yuan ($5,560) each, police in the border province said.
The estimated figure is a big jump over 2008, when just 87 cases of missing women were reported, police said.
Police believe the actual number is much higher since they keep records of cases only if Myanmar officials received missing reports and turn to China for help.
"Many parents have no idea their daughters are kidnapped and sold in China, instead they think they are having a better life; therefore they don't call the police," Lin Huiming, head of criminal police in Yunnan's Ruili, told the China Economic Weekly.
The magazine wrote about a 20-year-old woman who dreamt of going to live in China's Anhui Province to "make big money" but got sold as a bride to a villager in Sichuan Province last October.
Her husband made her a prisoner in his house and repeatedly humiliated and beat her for two months before she escaped and called police.
The police said about 489 Myanmar women aged between 11 and 57 have been rescued and sent back to their country since 2008.
Li Shunqiong, team leader of the anti-human trafficking brigade, told the magazine that kidnappings of foreign women from poorer neighboring countries are on the rise as there is a huge market.
"The neighboring countries admire China's economic boom; while in China, there is a growing population of men in poorer areas in several provinces including Anhui, Hubei and Sichuan who are desperate to have a wife," Li said.
In China, the 2005 male to female ratio is estimated to be 120 men to 100 women. Experts estimate that about 24 million young men would not be able to find a wife by 2020.
The price of a smuggled foreign wife has been going up over the years.
In 2008, a pretty and fit woman from Myanmar were sold for 20,000 to 30,000 yuan. Last year, even those considered unattractive went for a minimum of 38,000 yuan, Fu Fayun, a police officer in Yunnan, who handles such cases, was quoted as saying.
"No money, no talk," he said. "Buying a wife has become a trend in some places."
Gu Wen, an officer with Shanghai exit-entry administration bureau, told the Global Times yesterday that some wealthy rural residents with physical defects prefer to buy women from Myanmar or Viet-nam.
"They more or less are aware that these women were kidnapped, yet they understand the chance of marrying a local woman is slim," Gu said.
Shanghai police rescued about five Myanmar women and four Vietnamese women since 2008.
Gu said under normal circumstances, those women would be sent back, but if they have children and want to stay with the family, the police would take her wishes into consideration.
Source :http://china.globaltimes.cn/society/2010-02/503141.html
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