The activist, Somaly Mam, resigned from the foundation that bears her name days after Newsweek reported that key assertions she made — including being sold into slavery at age 9 or 10 and spending a decade in a brothel — were untrue. The Newsweek article also raised questions about the stories of women the Somaly Mam Foundation held up as examples of the horrors of sex trafficking, including Long Pross, who claimed to have had her eye gouged out by a pimp after being forced to work in a brothel.

HONG KONG — A well-known Cambodian crusader against sex trafficking who attracted celebrity support for her cause has resigned from the foundation she started after being confronted with allegations that she and others connected to her group fabricated stories about their experiences as young victims of the sex trade.


“While we are extremely saddened by this news, we remain grateful to Somaly’s work over the past two decades and for helping to build a foundation that has served thousands of women and girls,” said Gina Reiss-Wilchins, executive director of the foundation, in a statement issued Wednesday. “We don’t expect this transition to be simple, but we ask that you stand with us in the face of these serious challenges and help us to honor all victims and survivors, and the millions of women and girls who are enslaved across the globe.”

She said the foundation retained a law firm in March to investigate the allegations, which were raised by The Cambodia Daily in 2012 and 2013.

Mam helped draw millions of dollars to the cause by enlisting support of luminaries such as Oprah Winfrey, Queen Sofia of Spain, actress Susan Sarandon, and Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook, who along with Sarandon sits on the foundation’s advisory board. Her work has been highlighted by journalists including Nicholas D. Kristof, a columnist for The New York Times.


The Newsweek article noted that Mam said she had been “sold in the brothel” by a man she knew as Grandfather, who turned her into a domestic slave at a very young age, sold her as a virgin to a Chinese merchant, and then forced her to marry a soldier at age 14.

But Newsweek quoted acquaintances and teachers from her childhood as saying they did not recall Mam’s being raised by the “grandfather” figure, and one childhood friend said she remained in the village until she got her high school diploma. The article also notes that Mam made conflicting claims about when she was sold into slavery and how long she had worked in a brothel: At the White House, she said she was sold into slavery at 9 or 10 and spent a decade in a brothel; in her book she said she was trafficked starting at about 16.

In its 2012 annual report, the foundation said it had raised $2.8 million that year.

But some have questioned the group’s practice of using young women to press the cause of highlighting the horrors of sex trafficking. Pierre Fallavier, who advised Mam’s antitrafficking group — known by its French acronym, AFESIP — told The Cambodia Daily the group’s work illustrated aid organizations’ practice of using composite portraits of people in their zeal to raise funds.

People “were saying the stories Somaly told about herself and some of the girls were exaggerated,” he wrote. “At that time I did not want to listen, because I could see the good AFESIP was doing.”