China says to crack down on sex-selective abortion

BEIJING, Jan 23 (Reuters) China has pledged to step up efforts to combat sex-selective abortions, state media reported, in a drive to correct gender imbalances that the government says could be socially destabilising.

About 119 boys are born in China for every 100 girls, an imbalance that has grown since it introduced a one-child policy more than 25 years ago to curb population. That restriction has bolstered a traditional preference for boys.

The Central Committee of the ruling Communist Party and the State Council, or cabinet, had issued a document stating that anyone who illegally tested the gender of a fetus or carried out abortions based on the sex of the fetus should face ''serious punishment'', the official Xinhua news agency reportedyesterday.

The bodies added that party and state would increase efforts to protect baby girls and that anyone who killed, abandoned or harmed them would be punished ''severely'', Xinhua said.

Authorities would also step up supervision over hospitals that used ultrasound equipment or abortion pills, it said.

''The document said the gender-ratio imbalance, which has been developing for some time, amounts to 'a hidden danger' for society that will 'affect social stability','' Xinhua said.

China is the world's most populous nation with about 1.3 billion citizens at latest estimate.

Last year it scrapped plans to make sex-selective abortion -- which is already banned -- a crime. Experts have said such a step would more effectively deter parents from aborting baby girls.

Xinhua did not say whether those plans would be revived.

The document echoed the findings of an official report on demographics released earlier this month, which had warned of the hidden risks to social stability of having millions more men of marriageable age than women.

However, the authorities also reaffirmed their commitment to the one-child policy, saying the nation continued to face big challenges from its growing population.

''Maintaining a low birth rate is the priority of family planning during the next phase,'' Xinhua quoted the document as saying.

Reuters DKA DB0920