Netizens from across the country have teamed up in cyberspace to
share information about missing children in the hope of reuniting
some of the families whom fate has scattered.
The "Sending the Missing Children Home" campaign was launched by
the website www.baobeihuijia.com (the Chinese words for "Sending
the Missing Children Home").
A woman surnamed Ye who goes by the Internet alias "Shanghai
Kedou Mama" said people had previously operated similar but
separate websites in Shanghai, Jilin, Guangdong and Hubei.
"The warm-hearted people who have launched such websites
eventually started meeting in cyberspace via QQ or MSN. We decided
to band together on one website to help those heart-broken parents
who have lost their children," Ye said.
Zhang Baoyan started the first such website, in Tonghua, Jilin Province. She knows what it is like to
lose a child, having previously been separated from her son for a
few hours.
"I have deep sympathy for parents whose children have been
kidnapped or gone missing and wanted to help them out by building a
website," she said.
Zhang and her husband, an information technology teacher,
started designing the website at the end of last year and had their
official launch on April 30.
The founders of similar websites soon started using Zhang's
website to share information they had collected about missing
children.
Zhang said one of the best methods is to take photos of homeless
children, especially those who are forced to beg at pedestrian
crossings, and then post the photos online.
"Although taking a photo is no big deal, we persist in doing
this and hope it could help some parents," Zhang said.
According to information posted on the website, 20,000 children
are kidnapped or go missing every year in China.
At the moment, some 600,000 children have either been kidnapped
or are missing, Ministry of Public Security data show.
Police rescued 10,000 such children between 2001 and 2004,
according to www.baobeihuijia.com.
A Shanghai member of the website surnamed Shen, said: "We have
asked a legislator to draw up a motion on the issue for the
National People's Congress."
(China Daily June 14, 2007)