Police bust huge human trafficking rings

GUANGZHOU / BEIJING - A total of 89 kidnapped infants were rescued and 369 suspects arrested in two major human trafficking cases this month, police authorities announced on Tuesday.

In one case, Guangdong police, in collaboration with their counterparts in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, cracked a cross-border organization involved in abducting and selling children from Vietnam.

"A major channel used to abduct and sell children from Vietnam to China and a big criminal network were destroyed," said an officer from Guangdong provincial department of public security.

Most members of the criminal gang are Vietnamese residents, said the officer who did not want to be named. The arrests have dealt a heavy blow to criminals involved in cross-border trafficking of children in the southern region, he added.

Most of the eight abducted infants, aged from 10 days to 7 months, had been sedated with sleeping pills and were still asleep when they were rescued.

Police detained 39 suspects in the action, which was launched by more than 300 officers from Guangdong and Guangxi at 2 pm on July 15.

All the victims have now been taken to local hospitals and health centers for further medical observation.

Police immediately set up a special task force in February after they learned that many children had been trafficked to Dongxing city in Guangxi.

The case quickly raised great concern among the central and local governments. After months of investigation, the joint action was launched.

According to sources from the Guangdong provincial department of public security, police from China and Vietnam have launched joint efforts to fight cross-border crime involving the abduction and trafficking of children. The special campaign will last until Sept 15.

In the other case, police authorities in 14 provinces and autonomous regions dispatched some 2,600 officers to crack down on a giant cross-region trafficking group of 330 offenders on July 20, the Ministry of Public Security revealed on Tuesday.

A total of 81 infants were rescued in this case. Most of the children were baby girls, aged from 10 days to just 4 months. They are now being cared for in institutions.

Police in Henan province also discovered clues in the cross-region trafficking case earlier this year and with the cooperation of the Ministry of Public Security, the joint action was launched on July 20.

Since April 2009, national police have uncovered 39,194 cases involving the trafficking of people, 14,090 of which involved abducted women and 8,717 involved children.

Meanwhile, police have broken 4,885 criminal gangs, detained 33,831 suspects and rescued 14,613 trafficked children and 24,826 women.