An obstetrician was among those found helping human traffickers sell Vietnamese children to Chinese families in a cross-border case cracked by police in south China.

Sun Yizhi (right) refuses to claim his twin daughters Sun Li and Sun Min (left) yesterday when they met for the first time in five years after the twins were abducted on December 10, 2006, in southern China's Fujian Province. Police detained two suspected abductors, Wu Jinshi and Zhang Heshan, on Saturday and arranged the meeting yesterday, only to find that the father was reluctant to take his daughters home because he said he "couldn't accept what they are now."

Police in Guangdong Province and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region yesterday revealed details of their operation on July 15 in which they broke up a trafficking gang, saving eight children and detaining 39 suspects.

They said the gang, 31 of whose members were from China and eight from Vietnam, had smuggled 21 infants to China since June 2.

The Vietnamese smuggled children across the border into Guangxi and handed them over to the Chinese who, in most cases, sold them to neighbors and relatives, the Yangcheng Evening News reported.

Guangdong police found an obstetrician in the province surnamed Lin had been taking care of the children before buyers were found, the report said.

However, five of the eight rescued children have serious health problems.

Two of the youngest children, less than a week old, still have umbilical cords attached, the Guangzhou Daily reported.

The traffickers transported the children in buses for more 20 hours and even fed them sleeping pills, the Guangzhou Daily said.

The children, most of them boys, were being sold at about 40,000 yuan (US$6,215) and many buyers did not know that the infants were from Vietnam, the report said.