SHOCKING! Eleven babies rescued from traffickers in China

Eleven babies have been rescued from a trafficking ring in the Yunnan province, southwest China, AFP reports.

Police say 32 suspects have been arrested in connection with the case and that the babies’ parents were being tracked.

An officer at the Kaiyuan Railway Police Station told AFP that investigations into the suspected trafficking began in February and that it is believed that the children involved belonged to parents who had exceeded China’s one-child limit.

The officer who didn’t give his name said: “So far, we haven’t found that any of the children have been stolen.

“The babies are now housed in our local children’s welfare centre, and these past few days people have been calling to find out more about their situation, with some hoping to adopt them”.

The case elicited shock and disbelief among Chinese people as local authorities circulated photos of the babies in the hope of finding their parents.

According to the news agency, a user on Sina Weibo, a Chinese version of Twitter, wrote: “These children were sold by their own biological parents. To send them back to those people, it’s just too complicated.”

Child trafficking is a flourishing underground industry in China and tens of thousands of children are believed to be stolen or sold each year. The situation is fuelled by a traditional preference for sons and the one-child limit.

Police in east China’s Fujian province announced on Monday that they had arrested 13 suspects and rescued seven children in a separate trafficking case.