A car show in Wuhan, which last Friday included five-year-old girls modelling bikinis, has sparked an angry public reaction in China, mainland newspapers reported on Friday.
Photographs of the bikini-clad children, posing like adults and circulated widely online, prompted thousands of angry comments. Some outraged netizens accused parents of the five-year-olds, and the show’s organisers, of exploitation of children and child pornography.
But parents and organisers of the event on Sunday defended the use of child models, Beijing Youth reported. Zhang Ping, a spokeswoman for the company which organised the modelling, said: “The information circulated online [about the child models] is very much distorted.”
She said the car show had been an opportunity for the children to participate in a modelling competition. Zhang said each child only modelled for five minutes and brought their own bikinis.
She said the children had not been paid for modelling and did not profit financially from the car show.
Zhang said she did not believe her company had done anything wrong. Although, she admitted the car show might have been an “inappropriate” place for child models.