Children's Day sparks tears for the missing

WHILE families across the country celebrated Children's Day on Saturday, many parents would have been in tears over their missing loved ones.

Around 200,000 children go missing every year in China with very few, around 200, found, according to China National Radio.

Many parents believe their children were kidnapped to be sold by human trafficking gangs, and experts are calling on changes in the law to make punishment harsher.

Yang Suhui, who lost her son 22 years ago, still drives a van with photographs of her son on it. They were taken on Children's Day in 1991.

"I lost my son on June 5 that year, a few days after we took him on a family trip," Yang said.

Xiao Chaohua, a father who lost his son six years ago and who is now active in the search for missing children, said his team had collected information on 700 of them but only two had been found.

"I hope whoever is raising my child can tell me where he is," Xiao said. "I can give my son to them if he is treated well, and I only need to know that he is alive."

An art exhibition in Beijing commemorates 61 children who went missing in past decades.

Li Yueling, the curator, said the exhibition is an ongoing part of a campaign begun in 2011 by Yu Jianrong, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. The campaign aims to rescue abducted children by asking the public to post pictures of child beggars online.

"I not only wish to find the missing children for the parents, but also want to question the social conscience," Li said.

Experts say the huge number of missing children is partly due to the lack of punishment for buyers.

Zhang Zhiwei, a professor at the China Institute of Political Sciences and Law, said: "Many are aware that kidnapping is a crime, but the current law has little criminal punishment on people who buy the kidnapped children."

He said China should step up punishment on kidnapping as the current penalties are too lenient compared with the potential financial benefit.

In March, the central government issued a seven-year plan to tackle kidnapping by asking authorities to take blood samples of parents so they can match the samples with those from children suspected of having been kidnapped.

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