The police yesterday claimed to have rescued and deported three Myanmar women who, though lured to the country with promises of decent jobs, were forced to become surrogate mothers.

Police officials from Ruili, Yunnan province, said two 26-year-old women, who hail from a small village in Banmo, the northern tip of Myanmar's Kachin state, were deported from China yesterday afternoon.

Both the women were pregnant, officials said.

The third woman, police said, managed to contact the authorities after escaping from the clutches of the people who brought her to China in January, and was deported back then.

The women were smuggled into China illegally through Myanmar's border with Yunnan province on Dec 8 and were sold off in Taihe county, Anhui province, for 24,000 yuan ($3,500), Anhui police said.

Soon after one of the three women escaped in January, another managed to make a phone call to her family in Myanmar, who then informed the Consulate General of the Union of Myanmar in Kunming, Yunnan province.

Anhui police, together with their counterparts in Yunnan, found the two women - both pregnant - in Niqiu, Taihe county, on Feb 3 and Feb 5 respectively.

Police claimed to have arrested the woman who lured them illegally to China. Her identity, however, was not disclosed.

"She was part of a multinational gang," an official told China Daily, but declined to release more details, saying the case was still under investigation.

The women told the cops that the accused had promised them decent jobs in China that would fetch them 100,000 Myanmar kyats ($83) per month.

However, once they were in China, they were told they should forget about the job and become surrogate mothers, for which they would get 300,000 Myanmar kyats.

The women were assured they could go back home after they give birth, police said, adding that both of them received the amount promised to them.

(China Daily March 25, 2009)