One girl, Ham Sreynech, then 17, tells how she was locked in house by man demanding sex. She fought him off and managed to escape

Dozens of girls from Cambodia are tricked into going to China 'for work' - but end up being bought by businessmen for marriage and slavery

Freezing as a blizzard struck her, the teenage girl staggered through the streets, pathetically dressed in thin clothes, starving, alone, in an alien country and with only enough money to buy a single bottle of water.

Her ordeal, sleeping in icy doorways, lying under park benches, was to last for seven days, with no hope from anywhere, for 18-year-old Ham Sreynech had escaped from a cruel family's house where the 37-year-old owner had beaten her, grabbed her throat and thrust himself on her each night demanding sex.

She was thrown into a prison cell which she had to share with eight Africans, terrified as the nights went by that they would rape her.

Sreynech, a former worker in a factory making garments for the High Street stores of Britain, had been tricked by a callous human broker into travelling to China from her home in Cambodia after believing she was being flown to South Korea for a good paying job.

Desperate: Cambodian teenager Ham Sreynech, 18, who was tricked into travelling to China and found herself trapped with a cruel family who beat her and made sexual demands

Instead she landed in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, and was driven to a 'Brides' House', where two other young Cambodian women sat bewildered in the semi darkness.

It was just the beginning of a horror story for Sreynech, who has struggled to put the horrors of her experience behind her since recently arriving back in Phnom Penh.

But today she courageously agreed to tell her disturbing story for the first time to MailOnline in the hope that her government will work harder at stopping Cambodian women being tricked into flying out of the country on the promise of work in South Korea and other Asian countries.

When I arrived a woman broker who locked me in the house said "no, no, you aren't here to work, you are here to marry a Chinese man".'What Chinese man?' I asked, and she said "whoever picks you" Ham Sreynech

'When I arrived a woman broker who locked me in the house said "no, no, you aren't here to work, you are here to marry a Chinese man".

'What Chinese man?' I asked, and she said 'whoever picks you'.

Men came and went, examining the women in the Brides' House like farmers at a cattle auction. Sreynech's frightened companions were eventually chosen as brides and were driven away, leaving her terrified and alone. She could not have imagined what was to follow.

As she told her harrowing story tears ran down her face - and the face of Miss Chhan Sokunthea, head of the Women's and Children's Rights section of the local human rights group, ADHOC.

The organisation has been struggling to force the government to toughen up laws to stop the trafficking of Cambodian women to China - but it is a hard fight because brokers, who befriend families in the hope of enticing away single women, cleverly use the lure of money, spreading the word that it will flow back to the poor in Cambodia.

Other women, desperate for a husband and failing to find a suitor in Cambodia, jump at the chance of finding a rich Chinese man to share her life with, only to find that they are also rejected for marriage in China - but not before they are passed around families as sex objects, being raped, says Miss Chann, by the father, brother and son.

Hopes: Ham had been told that she was going to a job in South Korea, but was to suffer a terrible ordeal

If they fall pregnant, they are ordered to terminate the foetus by drinking a special Chinese concoction that brings on a miscarriage.

So far this year, 35 women, most of them from poor, uneducated families, have been officially recorded as having been trafficked to China. But there are fears there are dozens if not hundreds more who have suffered this fate.

Sixteen of the 35 managed to return with the aid of charity groups but none has a happy story to tell. One woman has told how she was 'sub-let' to three men, each passing her onto another when they had tired of sex with her.

'What they go through is a violation of human rights, a form of modern slavery,' says Miss Chhan. 'We are frequently hearing of desperate phone calls from the women in China begging their families to get them home, but the families don't have the money. So they borrow and get into more debt.'

We are frequently hearing of desperate phone calls from the women in China begging their families to get them home, but the families don't have the money. So they borrow and get into more debt Charity worker Chhan Sokunthea

Miss Chhan has a paper mountain of stories relayed by tricked women, making it hard for her to come to work each morning, knowing what awaits her. But she is encouraged by the results after placing those lucky enough to return in a half-way house.

Sreynech is there now, working at putting the nightmare, which began 11 months ago, behind her. She had gone to the airport with her mother, one of her four brothers and her father, a poor farmer, and it was then that the 'job broker' who arranged her passport and visa revealed that she wasn't going to South Korea after all, but to China.

'I was shocked, but because all the arrangements had been made I got on the plane,' she said.

'Another broker met me at the airport in China and took me to a house and shut me in a room. Two other Cambodian women were there. We talked and we had the same story - we were told we were going to work in South Korea but here we were in China instead.

'Then the men started coming. They were let in and looked at us, pushing and prodding. I felt like an animal. The other two were chosen after a few weeks and I had to wait there for many weeks more before I was picked by a Chinese man who said he was going to marry me.

'I told him no, I was there for work, but I was driven to his house. The broker told me that if I didn't marry him, my passport was going to expire and I would be taken to the police and be in serious trouble.

'I was worried for my family because they were expecting me to send money to them - I had given up my job in the garment factory, so that was an income that was now missing.

Chhan Sokunthea, head of Women's and Children's Rights in Cambodia admits even she is traumatised by the harrowing stories of women tricked into going to China for work and ending up being 'traded' as brides

'What saved me from being rushed into a marriage was being 17 at the time because you have to be 18 to marry in China.

'I couldn't speak Chinese so I couldn't talk to the man or his family, who were also there. But he made sign language, ordering me to sweep the floors, clean the whole house, wash dishes, wash all their clothes. They kept me locked in an upstairs room and ordered me not to leave.

'At night there was only one bed. He ordered me to sleep in it and tried to have sex with me the first time but I fought and kicked and he grabbed me by the throat and beat me because I refused him.

'This happened every night. I tried to sleep at an angle in the bed so he couldn't touch me, but always he was demanding sex and hitting me when I fought him off. I had very little sleep. It was a nightmare. He knew I was thinking of escaping.

'If you try to escape, I will catch you, he told me.

'I would rather die trying to escape than dying here in this house I said.'

One day when no-one was at home, Sreynech hurried down from the room that was her upstairs prison and dashed through the streets, finding out from strangers with gestures where the nearest police station was.

I tried to sleep at an angle in the bed so he couldn't touch me, but always he was demanding sex and hitting me when I fought him off Ham Sreynech

Because she couldn't speak Chinese she got nowhere with the officers - and then her tormentor's mother turned up and dragged her back to the house, where the weeks of cruelty, the beatings the almost-chokings and the demands for sex continued.

What she did not know was that other women who had been forced into marriage and had failed to have a child 'legally' because they were infertile were farmed out by the husband to a brothel or into the sex industry - or sold to another Chinese man.

Determined to end the agony, Sreynech managed to sneak away again one day when no-one was at home. Her passport had been hidden by the family and she knew that her only hope in this city of strangers was to reach the Cambodian Consulate and beg for help.

She reached an office and was told to come back later because it was lunch time. When she approached the building again a guard told her to go away because she had no passport and no-body knew who she was. Pointing out she was there to get a passport got her nowhere.

Overwhelmed with a feeling of utter rejection, she turned tearfully away and started walking.

'Snow was falling, it was very cold and I didn't have enough warm clothes on. I walked around and around, sleeping on the streets, in doorways, with no food.

'I was getting weak after seven days but I didn't want to die on the street. I saw a tourist place and asked the man there to help. He said he would call my sister in Cambodia and tell her I was in trouble, which he did. At least it started things happening in Cambodia to get me home.

'He bought me some food but then he said he had to take me to the police station. They put me in a cell with eight black Africans who watched me day and night. I was terrified they were going to rape me because I was in there with them for more than two months.'

Scarred: Ham Sreynech reflects on her 11 months of hell on her return to Cambodia

The broker in Cambodia meanwhile told her penniless family that he wanted $4,500 if he was to help Sreynech come home. They didn't have that kind of money - not even enough to pay for her air fare.

Her mother and father found their way to the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association - ADHOC - which, through outside charities managed to arrange for Sreynech's journey home.

She still has bad dreams about her experience, but she knows she is just one of hundreds of women who have been duped like her.

Incredibly, though, she is working hard at turning her life completely around - and is learning Chinese so she can become an interpreter.

'Perhaps I can help other women who get into trouble over there,' she says. 'It is going to take me a while, but I am determined to learn.'