The three were all teenage girls, and all friends from the same school in southwest China's Chongqing.

And they all lost their lives on the way to school last December after a truck ran into the tricycle they were riding on.

The only difference was that one of the girls was from the countryside, while the other two were from the city.

It meant the family of He Yuan, 14, only received about a quarter of the compensation awarded in the other two cases because of their rural household registration.

The families of the other two girls each received more than 200,000 yuan (US$25,000).

The case has caught the attention of National People's Congress (NPC) deputies. They have called for the abolishment of the "unfair treatment" of farmers when it comes to payouts for traffic accidents.

"Everyone's life is equal and people should be compensated to the same standards," said NPC deputy Xie Bing yesterday.

Currently, compensation for traffic accidents is calculated by the wage and living standards of the areas where the victims are registered, according to China's laws.

Despite the fact He Yuan and her parents had migrated to Jiangbei District of Chongqing several years ago, they were compensated by the "countryside standard" because their household registration was still in a nearby village.

Xie called for a "unified" compensation standard between urban and rural residents, as more and more farmers have moved to cities to earn their living.

"As a matter of fact, migrants are urban people now but they are treated differently just because of their household registrations," said Xie, who is also president of Sichuan Hantang Industrial Co Ltd.

Xie said in her city of Dazhou of Sichuan Province, even some private company owners are labelled as "farmers" because they did not change their registered living details when they moved from rural regions.

"That will lead to lower compensation if they are involved in traffic accidents," said Xie, who cited official statistics that indicate more than 100,000 Chinese die in road traffic accidents every year.

According to sources from the Ministry of Public Security, among the victims killed in traffic accidents every year, farmers, farmer-turned migrant workers, and self-employed businesspeople are the majority.

Huang Songyou, vice-president of the Supreme People's Court, echoed Xie's demand, saying the court will soon make public new compensation standards.

"We are in an effort to amend the legislative interpretation on compensation relating to traffic disasters," said Huang.

He did not comment on Xie's calls to unify compensation standards.

Payouts for families of those killed in traffic accidents are currently worked out as 20 times the local annual average income and living expenditure of the victim's registered place of living.

(China Daily March 13, 2006)