While China has tough laws to deter child trafficking with punishment ranging from up to 10 years in jail to even the death sentence, those who buy trafficked children get off lightly. Under the current law, the maximum punishment they face is three years behind bars. However, they may get a lighter sentence or escape criminal proceedings altogether if they have not abused the children or hindered efforts to rescue them.
But now, the government is seeking to slap tougher punishment on buyers as well. The draft amendment was submitted to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, in June.
There is child trafficking in China's rural areas, especially in the poverty-stricken southwest, where people traditionally prefer sons over daughters. Last year, police rescued over 13,000 abducted children, according to the Ministry of Public Security.
The proposed law sparked widespread discussion among the public on whether or not it will deter children trafficking. Supporters who advocate that buyers face punishment as severe as traffickers do say it will stop the crime by eliminating the demand. However, others maintain that buyers are not the primary evil and should be treated with leniency for the sake of abducted children.
Pro
Zhang Fengyi
Media commentator
Trafficking in human beings is the worst and most devious crime. It ruins the whole family and the future of the abducted children. Although crackdowns continue and traffickers are severely punished, the heart-rending stories about lost children keep pouring in. Many abducted children remain unfound forever. This is greatly due to the light punishment given to buyers of kidnapped children.
An advertisement on wildlife protection says, "No dealing, no killing." The same logic applies to child trafficking. As long as there are demands and the prospect of profiteering, traffickers would risk their lives to continue with the crime. This has been repeatedly proved by reality.
Before committing the crime, most traffickers find a buyer and negotiate a price first. Fundamentally, they do it for money. If the demand is eradicated by imposing harsher punishment on buyers, the crime will be eliminated.
The thought that tough punishments for buyers would hinder crackdown efforts is not a good reason to let them off. In fact, even though the punishment is light currently, buyers still do not disclose their crime. The real issue here is the lack of a sound reporting system. Rewarding and protecting whistleblowers reporting the purchase of abducted children can be a solution.
Con
Tang Wei
Media commentator
Child abductions and trafficking are complicated social issues. Long-held traditional beliefs that sons are needed to look after you when you are old and that more offspring bring more happiness, coupled with the inability of some couples to have children because of physical problems, fuel the demand for kidnapped children.
However, legal leniency may make the rescue of abducted children easier. When buyers realize what they did was illegal, they may cooperate with the police to send the children back to their biological parents, or at least, not hinder rescue efforts. Legal leniency will prevent them from resorting to extreme criminal activities.
Some children, abducted when they were infants, develop profound attachments with the adoptive family. Some don't even want to return to their biological parents. If these buyers are sentenced to prison, how to safeguard these children's interests? The crackdown on child trafficking is meant to protect children. They should not be brought to fresh harm through tough punishment for buyers who have cared for them.
Pro
Li Xiang
Beijing Times
There should be severer punishment for buyers of abducted children. The exemption provision in the current law provides a loophole for buyers to escape punishment.
Some may say that many people buy children because they cannot have their own biologically. These buyers deeply love the children they buy and care for them. It is already an emotional distress for them when the children are returned to their biological parents. Sentencing them in jail at this time seems too ruthless.
However, this cannot be the reason for not punishing buyers. As Aristotle said, "The law is reason free from passion." No emotion or prejudice should sway justice. If the law forgave criminals because of their lesser culpability, it would lose its credibility as the custodian of people's legitimate rights.
The function of law is to accurately define the crime of children trafficking and purchase and stipulate corresponding punishment. As for families with no children, it is an issue under the purview of civil affairs departments and social organizations. These families can always adopt children legally.
Con
Shi Hongju
People's Court Daily
Severe punishment for buyers will undoubtedly contain the rampant crime and comfort victims to some extent. But imposing the same penalty on buyers as traffickers is unreasonable for at least three reasons.
First, it will go against the principle that punishment should be commensurate with the severity of the crime. Imposing punishment that is proportionate to the crime is the mark of a modern judicial system. People who buy children are not as evil as those who abduct children.
Second, it may make it more difficult to crack down on child trafficking. Both the kidnapping and the purchasing take place covertly. In most scenarios, police officers first arrest the traffickers, and then follow their trail to reach the buyers and rescue the abducted children. Rarely is it the other way round with people reporting the purchase of kidnapped children. If the proposed amendment comes through, buyers would get more vigilant and conceal their identities when buying trafficked children. Consequently, the lost children would never be tracked down, even if the trafficker is arrested.
Third, when sentencing a buyer, a common practice should be taken into consideration – adoption, though unauthorized by the state. Some parents, unable to raise their newborns, give them away to relatives for adoption. The adoptive family then pays some cash voluntarily. In addition, many well-off families want to adopt abandoned children out of charity. These adoptions are based on mutual agreement and do no harm to anyone. If the law imposes the same penalty on traffickers as well as these people, those who did not intend to break any law would get unduly punished.
Con
Yang Tao
Media commentator
Criminals who abduct children for selling them are devious and cause huge harm to the individual, family and society. They should be severely punished without any doubt. However, the consequence of buying kidnapped children is comparatively less destructive. Buyers are not as evil as traffickers. They don't commit the crime directly; they buy the kidnapped children to raise them.
The proposed amendment is actually an advocacy of the severe punishment doctrine, which depends on severe punishment to solve problems and maintains severe punishment will solve every problem. But this is not true. Severe punishment may deter crimes for a short time but is not the ultimate solution.
Pro
Liu Wujun
Editor in Chief, Justice of China
A strong demand is the root cause of child trafficking despite ongoing efforts to crack down on the crime. If buyers get off with light punishment, it will only fuel the crime. Under the current law, buyers of kidnapped children can evade criminal proceedings if they do not harm the children or hinder rescue efforts. Because of this leniency, there are few cases in which buyers get punished. This has made the demand for trafficked children remain strong and is stimulating more crimes.
Actually, buyers are traffickers' accomplices and deserve severe punishment. It goes against legal logic if one is sentenced to several years in jail while the other is exempted. |