Chinese fathers of child slaves seek help online

BEIJING, June 13 (Reuters) About 400 Chinese men whose children were sold to work as slaves at brickworks were seeking help online after risking their lives and spending all their savings in a mostly futile search, media reported today.

At least 1,000 children, with the youngest 8, were kidnapped near train or bus stations in the central province of Henan and had been sold to work in northwestern Shanxi, the official People's Daily said on its Web site (www.people.com.cn).

The fathers from Henan, who ''spent all the money they had and risked their lives to go deep into the mountains looking for their children, had already rescued about 40, the report said.

''We were shocked by what we saw,'' it quoted the fathers as saying in a petition letter.

''Some children had been isolated from the outside world for seven years, and some were beaten and maimed because they tried to escape, and the backs of some were burnt by supervisors with burning red bricks,'' the letter was quoted as saying.

''They worked 14 hours a day, but had little to eat ...

Being beaten up was common,'' it said, adding that some children were buried alive when their injuries got worse.

To save the children guarded by ''thugs'' and supervisors was not easy and local police ''not only did not help, but even prevented'' them from freeing the children, the fathers were quoted as saying.

Since the online campaign was launched, police from Henan had urged their counterparts in Shanxi to help with the rescue.

Last week, state media reported the rescue of 31 people, forced to work for a year as slaves at a brickworks run by the son of a local Communist Party official in the same province.

Among them, eight were so traumatised by the experience that they were only able to remember their names, and one labourer was beaten to death with a hammer for not working hard enough.

REUTERS SM VC1513