The Independent | August 10, 2025
Vietnamese authorities report that they have dismantled an international surrogacy network between Vietnam, China, and Cambodia and have rescued 11 infants from the operation. The network violated Vietnamese laws that prohibit compensated surrogacy.
PET | January 13, 2025
Thirteen women from the Philippines acting as surrogates in Cambodia were convicted under Cambodian human trafficking laws, but they received royal pardons and were taken back to the Philippines. Most are still pregnant while some were repatriated with children they birthed as a result of the surrogacy arrangements.
BBC | December 3, 2024
Thirteen pregnant women from the Philippines who were part of an underground surrogacy operation have been convicted of human trafficking in Cambodia and were sentenced to 4 years in prison once they give birth.
October 24, 2024 | EuroNews
The arrest of 13 Filipina women in Cambodia sheds light on how women with limited economic opportunities are recruited to work as surrogates, which makes them vulnerable to arrest in countries that have banned surrogacy under human trafficking laws.
CNN | October 13, 2024
A police raid on a villa in Cambodia found 13 pregnant Philippine women who they suspected to be surrogates, which is illegal in Cambodia. Cambodian authorities say that the women were charged with crimes under the country’s human trafficking laws and may face prison time, but details of the case have not yet come to light.
Thai PBS World | February 25, 2024
Thai police arrested a man thought to be a provider of frozen sperm, ova, and embryos for clinics operating in Laos and Cambodia as part of an illegal transnational surrogacy network. (Note “embryos” was incorrectly translated as “fetuses” in the article)
Hannah Beech | The New York Times | November 26, 2022
In 2018, 30 Cambodian surrogates were convicted of human trafficking, served time in prison, and gave birth while imprisoned–some chained to their beds. In exchange for suspended sentences, they have had to raise the children themselves. This journalist followed the surrogates for the last 10 months to report on their stories within Cambodia’s gray market.
By Lea Goetz | BioNews | November 18, 2019
The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) has condemned the decision by the Cambodian government to require that 30 surrogates, previously imprisoned for ‘cross-border human trafficking,’ raise the children they carried for intended parents living outside the country.
Thirty-Three Pregnant Cambodian Women Discovered in Surrogacy Raid
By Reuters | June 23, 2018
This article covers the crackdown on surrogacy in Cambodia, and the subsequent of arrest – and charge – of five people under the country’s anti-trafficking law.
In an update from The Guardian, the government also charged the thirty-three gestational mothers under the same law – they were not charged initially – raising potential questions about the use of regulation related to human trafficking on surrogacy.
These arrests are not the first. After Cambodia announced a ban on commercial surrogacy in 2016 while legislation was being considered, an Australian nurse and two Cambodian assistants were convicted of running an illegal commercial surrogacy clinic in the country. They were later sentenced to one and a half years in prison.
Long Awaited Surrogacy Draft Law Finalized
By Ben Sokhean and Erin Handley | The Phnom Penh Post | March 7, 2018
This update from Cambodia covers recent attempts to regulate surrogacy in the country, citing government representatives concerned about the impact of the practice on human trafficking.
With a push towards altruistic surrogacy – and an offer from UN Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith to help the Cambodian government formulate a law – the article also touches on questions about the potential effectiveness and drawbacks of arrangements that are not commercial. It quotes Rodrigo Montero, gender specialist at the UN Development Program, who states that “altruistic surrogacy does not exist, it is a euphemism” and “in countries where ‘altruistic’ surrogacy is allowed we see that large amounts of money are always involved.”
