The Guardian-Six people arrested in Chinas Hubei province over baby-trafficking ring
November 13, 2023 3 min 576 words
这篇报道揭示了湖北省襄阳市建桥医院涉嫌参与婴儿贩卖团伙的丑闻。举报人尚官正义指控该医院院长叶有志与“网络中介”勾结，以约合1.07万英镑的价格出售出生证明。报道中指出，叶有志不仅涉嫌牵涉婴儿贩卖，还涉及违法的代孕安排。这一指控引起了社会广泛关注，揭示了中国长期以来存在的儿童贩卖问题。 叶有志因此被捕，医疗执业许可也被撤销。报道还指出，叶曾因在2010年涉及性别选择堕胎而被判刑五个月，显示其过去存在医疗丑闻。报道无法联系到建桥医院，该医院的社交媒体账号已不再活跃，网站也已关闭。 中国长期以来一直存在儿童贩卖问题，特别是在一孩政策时期。政策导致了对男孩的文化偏好，导致女婴被遗弃或通过地下网络贩卖。近年来，中国当局强调打击贩卖团伙，但问题仍然存在，引起了社会的强烈关注和谴责。这一报道突显了需要更严格监管和制度改革，以维护儿童权益和社会正义。
Six people have been arrested in central China’s Hubei province over alleged involvement in a baby-trafficking ring linked to a hospital in one of the province’s biggest cities.
The allegations about Xiangyang Jianqiao hospital first came to light on 6 November via a Weibo user by the name of Shangguan Zhengyi, who describes himself as an “anti-trafficking volunteer”. Shangguan posted a series of claims about the hospital’s director, Ye Youzhi, whom he accused of colluding “with online intermediaries” to sell birth certificates for 96,000 yuan (£10,750).
After selling a birth certificate, the hospital would follow the “normal” registration process for new babies, including issuing vaccination booklets and assisting with household registration requirements, Shangguan claimed.
Shangguan, who says he worked undercover for the hospital for a year, also accused Ye of brokering the sale of babies and facilitating surrogacy arrangements, which are illegal in China. He said that a baby girl was sold in September for 118,000 yuan and later registered in Sichuan province. It is not clear how many babies are believed to have been trafficked through the hospital.
Ye was among those arrested, according to a notice from the Xiangyang municipal government posted on Sunday. Her medical licence has also been revoked. As well as the six people who have been formally arrested, four suspects have been detained without charge.
After Shangguan publicised his allegations, Chinese media reported that Ye, 55, a gynaecologist and obstetrician, has been involved in a number of medical scandals. In 2010, she was convicted of performing gender-selective abortions and sentenced to five months in prison.
The Guardian was not able to contact Xiangyang Jianqiao hospital. Its WeChat account has become inactive and its website is no longer online. The local health authority said on 7 November that the obstetrics department of the hospital had been suspended.
Shangguan did not respond to the Guardian’s request for comment.
Trafficking has long been an issue of concern in China. During the era of the one-child policy, a cultural preference for boys led to baby girls being abandoned or sold through underground networks. Years later, a surplus of men of marrying age fulled an industry of trafficking girls and young women to be their brides.
In recent years the authorities have emphasised their crackdown on trafficking rings, especially after the case of the chained woman emerged last year. In January 2022, a video of a woman surnamed Yang, who was chained by her neck to a concrete wall, went viral. The authorities said that she had been trafficked twice as a bride in the 1990s.
In September, Yu Huaying, a woman in Guizhou province, was sentenced to death after being found guilty of abducting and trafficking 11 children in the 1990s.
The cases often prompt huge outpourings of online anger, which the authorities struggle to contain. One of the most famous recent cases was that of Sun Haiyang, a man who spent 14 years looking for his son, Sun Zhuo, who had been abducted as a four-year-old. The father and son were reunited in 2021, with the story having been adapted into a film, Dearest, which drew widespread attention to the case. Last month the kidnapper was sentenced to five years in prison, a sentence that Sun – and many people online – said was too light.
Additional research by Chi Hui Lin