Immigration unit breaks up trafficking ring, rescues five Thai workers in Taiwan

Taiwan's National Immigration Agency has dismantled a transnational human-trafficking ring of 22 people led by a 40-year-old Vietnamese-Chinese woman surnamed Chen, rescuing five Thai victims who had been lured to Taiwan with false promises of well-paid work.

The Kaohsiung City Special Operations Brigade, part of the agency's Southern District Affairs Corps, announced the case on Wednesday, 17 June 2026.

According to investigators, Chen and her associates posted fraudulent recruitment advertisements in Facebook groups and on social-media platforms, using the lure of high salaries to attract residents from remote areas of Thailand.

Some victims sold their family property or took on debt to pay the substantial brokerage fees demanded of them.

Once they arrived in Taiwan, the victims were dispatched to locations across the island to perform illegal labour.

Because the victims could not speak the local language and most held overstayer status, the group seized the opportunity to confiscate their passports and restrict their freedom of movement, keeping them under prolonged control and unable to seek outside help.

The victims were forced into long-hour, low-wage labour with no rest days.

Some were housed in cramped, rudimentary truck beds or work sheds in mountainous areas, where day-night temperature swings were severe and basic living facilities were absent.

With food supplies inadequate, some victims could only catch fish and shrimp from nearby streams or forage for wild vegetables to stave off hunger.

Investigators said the victims' basic survival needs and personal dignity had been seriously violated.

The brigade traced the network after breaking up a separate transnational trafficking and illegal-brokerage operation led by a man surnamed Lin in February this year.

Continuing to work up the chain, the unit located Thai women whose movements were being restricted at a farm in Miaoli, where they had been forced to live in poor conditions and went without regular meals.

Investigators found that the ring, with Chen at its head, had established a reception network across Kaohsiung, Nantou, Taichung and Miaoli.

The group unlawfully took 47 passports from Thai nationals, with criminal proceeds estimated at nearly NT$4 million (about US$135,000).

After months of evidence-gathering, the Kaohsiung City Special Operations Brigade formed a task force with the Criminal Investigation Brigade of the Miaoli County Police Bureau, acting under the direction of the Miaoli District Prosecutors' Office.

The task force went deep into a mountain farm and successfully rescued five Thai victims, seizing 47 passports at the scene.

In early March this year, the task force referred Chen and the other 21 suspects for prosecution on suspicion of breaching the Human Trafficking Prevention Act and the Employment Service Act.

The victims said they had always believed the money they received fell within the normal range of Taiwanese wages.

On learning how much they were legally entitled to earn in Taiwan, and how large the gap was, they were said to be shocked and realised they had been subjected to labour exploitation through trafficking.

After the rescue, the brigade immediately activated placement and protection procedures, with professional social workers providing daily care and legal assistance.

The workers were also helped to apply for lawful employment and residence permits in Taiwan.

According to the brigade, it was only after obtaining legal work and wages that the victims fully grasped the severity of their earlier exploitation, and they expressed deep gratitude for the timely rescue.

Brigade head Chao Chih-cheng said the unit maintained a "zero tolerance" stance towards human-trafficking crime.

He said it would continue to cooperate with prosecutors to crack down on illegal brokerage rings and unlawful employers, and to actively investigate trafficking cases in order to safeguard lawful employment rights.