Police in the city of Zoucheng, in eastern China, have shut down a human trafficking ring that involved low-income migrants who sold their children. Just last month, police reported that seventeen infants had been sold to other Chinese buyers. Thirteen of the infants were rescued and placed in welfare centers and the remaining four are currently being searched for. Investigators reported that the parents involved in the trafficking were migrants who moved from the poorer area of Sichuan to Zoucheng to seek better work opportunities. The husbands would go to work while their wives stayed home and sold their baby, sometimes babies, to raise money. One couple was even reported to have sold three of their children. During the month of July, China rescued 89 trafficked minors and arrest 369 suspects after discovering two child trafficking gangs. One of the minors uncovered was as young as ten days old. Prices for the children would vary with boys begin sold up to 50,000 Yuan and girls up to 30,000 Yuan.
Human trafficking has become a global social problem with annual profits of approximately $31.6 million and an estimated 2.5 million people being trafficked. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development reported that human trafficking is the third largest sector of organized crime, coming after drugs and weapons. Asia and the Pacific top the statistical chart with 56% of humans being trafficked and the United States coming in at 10.8%. Of the 2.5 million people trafficked, children make up 1.2 million every year for labor and sexual exploitation. Asia makes up most of this population due to the one child policy which states that families can only have one child, preferably a boy, unless the first child is a girl or is born with a disability. This policy also touches another social issue occurring in two of the largest countries, India and China, which is Gendercide. Families often take part in this Gendercide through female infanticide which is the intentional killing of baby girls in preference for boys. Nearly 6,000 baby girls have been killed in the past ten years due to this trend.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/04/china-baby-trafficking-ring-shut
http://www.unglobalcompact.org/docs/issues_doc/labour/Forced_labour/HUMAN_TRAFFICKING_-_THE_FACTS_-_final.pdf
I absolutely hate human trafficking and the various forms that it comes in. When it involves children though it hits home. My mother lost my oldest sister because of complications and that made me value the whole process of having children even more. The fact that women are actually having children only to sell them away for money really gets under my skin. There are many women out there who can't have children. It is another thing to put the child up for adoption to have a better life, but throwing them away from money is another issue. I think the people who are doing this should be prosecuted as criminals as well
ReplyDeleteIt is very sad that this is the reality for China. Luckily, there are organization in the world are fighting this cause.
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