Police arrest 13 for child trafficking, rescued infants still unidentified
Police arrest 13 for child trafficking, rescued infants still unidentified
By Deng Jingyin
Police in Guangdong Province have arrested 13 people for trafficking 26 babies, local authorities announced recently.
Lin Xiuxiang, resident of Shanwei, admitted to purchasing 26 male infants in Yunnan Province and selling them in Guangdong Province for profit. Based on information gathered during interrogation, police have since been able to track down 11 of the boys, yet still are unable to identify their origin, the Guangzhou Daily reported Sunday.
Police said the oldest was a month old, while the youngest was only a 10-day-old infant.
Ma Hanqiang, a policeman, was tipped off that Lin's home was a transfer station for a baby trafficking network in 2009.
Lin was arrested by police on January 22 at home and later confirmed as a fugitive included on the national most wanted list for child trafficking in 2001.
Investigators found that Lin bought an infant for 31,500 yuan ($4,742) from another trafficker named Wen Hanhuan, and sold the baby for 41,000 yuan ($6,173) in Guangdong.
Wen was arrested in January, admitting that he earned a commission ranging from 1,000 to 3,000 yuan ($150 to $451) per transaction by selling babies.
The report did not explain how or where Wen acquired the infants.
Although police sent blood samples to the relevant authorities in order to match their DNA with a national database, they failed to identify the families for any of the 11 babies, an indication that their parents have still not reported their child missing to authorities.
The inability to track down the families of recovered children is not uncommon, and some babies end up as foster children in policemen's families.
A traditional preference for boys in rural areas compounded with family planning policies is attributed to the increase of child trafficking cases in recent years.