Chinese police have cracked 982 criminal rings engaged in children and women abducting and trafficking in the past seven months, an official with the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) said Thursday.

More than 6,000 victims had been rescued and some 6,200 suspects detained in the ongoing campaign as of Oct. 28, said Yang Dong, deputy director of the Criminal Investigation Department under MPS.

Yang said since the campaign was initiated on April 9, the ministry has ordered police bureaus nationwide to launch investigation immediately after children are reported to be missing.

The requirement came after people complained that some grassroots public security departments began their probe only 24 hours after people went missing.

"Some foreign scholars have suggested the first several hours are the 'golden period' to save abducted children, so we decide to focus our efforts in that period," Yang said during an online interview on the ministry's Web site.

Other measures adopted in the campaign include issuing wanted lists on MPS Web site and local media publications and setting up a DNA databank to help parents find their missing children by collecting blood samples.

Abducting cases are prone to taking place in the country's rural areas and urban-rural fringes, where parents are less vigilant, he said.