Society

Police arrest 18 in child trafficking cases

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2011-05-14 18:11

FUZHOU - Eighteen suspects have been arrested and 19 children freed in two cross-provincial human trafficking cases in East China's Fujian province since Wednesday, local police said Saturday.

Police were tipped off last December that a ring including Su Tonghui, a 29-year-old woman, and several others, was trafficking children out of the southern province of Yunnan.

A months-long police investigation found that ring members trafficked children from Yunnan to cities in Fujian, selling them there.

Police raids in Fujian from Wednesday to Friday led to the arrests of 15 people in Quanzhou and the freeing of nine children in Quanzhou and Sanming, the provincial public security bureau said in a statement.

In another case, a suspected ring member confessed to trafficking more children than earlier revealed and exposed more abductions committed by other ring members, according to the statement.

This led to the arrests of three more people in the case and freeing of 10 children Thursday in the city of Sanming.

Last year, police arrested 11 suspects and freed 49 people, including 40 children and nine women, in the case that involved the southern regions of Guangxi, Yunnan and Guizhou.