Business is a little slow these days for Tao Sanjie, a Beijing woman who provides foreign and Chinese prostitutes to male customers. She noticed things changed in April after authorities raided several establishments suspected of having ties to the sex trade.

Tao (not real name), a middle-aged woman, used to make big bucks but two of her top workers, Iva and Eva from Russia, packed up and left Beijing in May to avoid the stepped up enforcement.

The two prostitutes used to have more than 10 clients every day but the widely publicized police raids against prostitution dens, shady nightclubs and hair salons have scared away many such women.

"There have been no foreign women in my place for months," Tao told the Global Times. "There are only several Chinese girls."

Clients paid 200 yuan (US$29) to have sex with Iva and Eva. Tao said the low cost made Iva and Eva receive more clients.

Tao met Iva and Eva through a middleman who used to solicit sex services from foreign women at the Seven Star Island nightclub in Beijing, one of the venues closed down earlier this year.

One of Iva's male clients told the Global Times that Iva had sex with more than 15 men a day.

During the crackdown, places like the Passion Club, or Tianshang Renjian, were among the popular venues that were padlocked.

Tao said efforts to find and hire new foreign prostitutes to replace Iva and Eva have not been fruitful.

"My friends even cannot find prostitutes from Japan and other Southeast Asian countries," Tao said.

"We have prostitutes leaving, but no one is coming," she added.

Tao said she is trying to be more cautious after the crackdown, and regular customers need to whisper the word "Siberian" when contacting her in order to get a woman.

Beijing police closed more than 250 hair salons that allegedly offered sex services and they have detained more than 1,100 people since April 11.

Police have broken up about 140,000 sex businesses involving 250,000 people annually, the Xinhua News Agency reported last year.

Wide network

The higher people's court in Shaanxi Province reported on its website Tuesday that two men in Xi'an, the provincial capital, were sentenced last month to 14 years and 8 years in prison for coercing three foreign women into the sex trade starting in December.

The three foreign women, aged 19, 23 and 29, were tricked by a man surnamed An who met them in Beijing and promised to help them study Chinese at colleges in Chengdu, Sichuan Province.

After they arrived in Chengdu, An turned them over to a man surnamed Xiao, who then forced the women to provide sex services in nightclubs.

The women tried to escape, but were beaten with electronic sticks.

One of them eventually managed to get to a police station.

The report said managers at hotels in Xi'an were invited to a hearing.

Police suspended the business licenses of the Hilton Hotel in Chongqing for 10 days in June after they discovered a club provided sex services.

Police later arrested the top shareholder of the hotel, Xinhua reported.