Thanh was promised a better life when she was trafficked to Vietnam (Picture: Getty)

A woman who was promised a better life as she was trafficked out of Vietnam with her family as a child was held captive as a slave for 30 years and sold for sex in Europe, including London.

Thanh is now able to tell her story after escaping her captors in the English capital but only came to the attention of authorities when she found a lump in her breast that turned out to be cancer.

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She is now finally facing the prospect of a life free from captivity and is finding her feet with the help of the charity Refuge.



Her journey began in Vietnam when aged five she was trafficked to China with her family on the promise of her better life.


But in reality, it was the start of a life in modern slavery. After China she was transported to Russia to pick fruit and then to France to work as a sex worker in a forest encampment.

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From there she was separated from her 11-year-old son when she was thrown into a refrigerated lorry to be smuggled to England.

In London, she was kept in a darkened basement with seven others where she was again forced into sex work This continued until the day she escaped.

Speaking about that moment, she told ITV: ‘One day, I think the trafficker forgot the keys on the table in the corner and the Chinese man in there asks me do you want to escape, do you want to go? I remember, I said yes, we escaped. I remember, I did not have my shoes on, I ran with my bare feet.

‘We ran and ran for about an hour.’

The years of abuse have taken their toll on her body. She was forced to sleep with so many men that she had permanently damaged her spine.

Thanh was trafficked around Europe before she escaped in London (File picture: Ulrich Baumgarten via Getty Images)

Yet, she has since been reunited with her son and is facing up to the prospect of her new life.

She said: ‘There’s lots of things that I want to do; I want to get a job, go back and see Vietnam…and to explore places, holidays – I would love to do it one day.’

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