Vietnam-Laos sex ring smashed, girls sent home
Vietnamese and Laos police recently smashed a ring that cajoled Vietnamese girls into entering the sex trade in Laos, rescuing 2, sending 11 back from a brothel in Laos, and arresting two others.
Soldiers in central Quang Tri province Monday said late last month, they caught two suspicious young girls about to leave the province for Laos. From this, they questioned Tong Hoang Mai, who was waiting for the two nearby.
Mai admitted she worked for Chu Tuan Hoa, 30 a Vietnamese owner of a massage parlor in Pakse, Champassak province in Laos. She said she was initially a victim enticed by Hoa to visit Lao for fun but on arriving, Hoa took her passport and other documents and forced her to become a prostitute.
On information from the Vietnam Consulate General in Pakse, Laos police raided Hoa’s massage palace, and found 11 Vietnamese girls there in the sex trade. They were promptly returned home.
Hoa and his close aide Hoang Dinh Toan were arrested. Hoa said he paid Toan 500,000 kips (US$52) for each girl sent by him and would pay 10,000 kips to each girl after sex with customers.
They usually approached girls in Ho Chi Minh City and Long An province in the south; Thua Thien Hue and Quang Tri provinces in the central region.
By Bui Ngoc Long - Thanh Nien - May 14, 2007.
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