Trafficked women ‘treated like cattle’ while being held captive on ‘human egg farm’

Human traffickers are keeping at least 100 women on a ‘human egg farm’ in Georgia after luring them under false pretenses, it has been claimed. Three Thai women brought home this week said they had responded to ads on social media for surrogate mums who would be paid the equivalent of £600 a month while living with the client family abroad. They told a press conference they were instead taken to a house with 60 to 70 other Thai women who told them ‘there were no contracts or parents’.

One said the women ‘would be injected to get treatment, anesthetized and their eggs would be extracted with a machine’. ‘After we got this information and it was not the same as the advertisement, we got scared, we tried to contact people back home’, she added. It’s thought the eggs were sold on the black market, internationally, for use in IVF treatments. The gang allegedly confiscated the women’s passports and told them they would be arrested if they returned home.

The women said they pretended to be ill to avoid having their eggs harvested. One of the women, who wore face masks and hat to avoid revealing their identities, said she and around 10 Thai women were taken to Georgia via Dubai and Armenia. She said they were led there by a Thai woman and met by two Chinese nationals in Georgia. A fourth victim was released and returned to Thailand in September but only after paying her captors the equivalent of £1,660, according to Pavena Hongsakula, the founder of the Pavena Foundation, a Thai women and children’s shelter.

Police in Georgia and Thailand said they are investigating. According to the Pavena Foundation, around 100 more trafficked women remained in Georgia. It said 257 Thai people fell victim to human traffickers in 2024, of which 53 were found in Thailand and 204 in other countries. The foundation helped rescue 152 of them. Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk. For more stories like this, check our news page.

Arrow MORE: Chilling images show how 9 major cities could be submerged by water by 2100. Arrow MORE: I thought tampons didn’t work – then I made a startling discovery. Arrow MORE: I was 7 when I was cut – FGM has shaped every part of me. Never miss the biggest stories with breaking news alerts in your inbox. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Your information will be used in line with our Privacy Policy.