dibya’s blogosphere

Small boys have long been abducted for sale in China, but in recent years the country’s strict birth control policy, which has led to abortions of girls in families intent on having a boy, has left the countryside short of female babies.

According to a recent report in the British Medical Journal, 124 boys are born for every 100 girls in the country as a whole, and in one province the figure has risen to 192.

Stolen girls have therefore become increasingly valuable commodities in an unspeakably cruel trade. Many are bought by farmers who want wives for their small sons when they come of age or by men who want a child bride without a dowry, say police and the state media.

The public security ministry says that between 2,000 and 3,000 children and young women are kidnapped every year, but the newspapers have put the figure at 20,000. Only a few cases are solved.

“I can’t eat. My wife cries every night. Our son, who’s one, has been sick since his sister vanished and now he’s in hospital,” said Xiang Xiang’s father, Li Faming, 35.

He and his wife were permitted a second child because their first was a daughter. His pain testified to the emotional bond that many young fathers develop with their girls, in contrast with an older generation for whom sons were a prize and daughters a burden. His story is typical.

He makes just enough money as a decorator to survive in Shuangqiao, a slum district on the fringe of Kunming, the capital of Yunnan. The province, in southwest China, is a centre of human trafficking spreading to Burma, Laos and Vietnam.