05/22/2019 China (International Christian Concern) – There has been a major problem involving poor Pakistani women, Christian and Muslim, sold as brides to Chinese husbands and then forced into prostitution and became victims of organ trafficking.
Under the pretense of marriage, these Pakistani women thought they were going to wed Chinese men to lift their families out of poverty. Little did they know, they were sold into a life of sexual servitude in China.
Saleem Iqbal, a Christian human rights activist who has been tracking such marriages, said he believed at least 700 women, mostly Christian, had wed Chinese men in just over a year. Christian women in Pakistan – who come from a mostly poor and marginalized community – are seen to be particularly targeted by traffickers, who pay their parents hundreds or thousands of dollars.
Asia News reports, according to Pakistan’s Federal Investigative Agency (FIA), would-be Chinese husbands often obtain fake religious certificates in order to convince Pakistani families to give away their daughters as brides. Several fake marriage registration certificates were also generated in concerned Union Councils (UCs) of Christian girls who had married to the Chinese men.
In the last weeks, more than two dozen Chinese nationals and local Pakistani middlemen, including at least one Catholic priest, were arrested in connection with alleged fake marriages.
For interviews, please contact Olivia Miller, Communications Coordinator: press@persecution.org.
