Criminal gangs 'crippling children and forcing them to work as beggars'

Criminal gangs in the Guangdong industry hub of Dongguan have been enslaving large numbers of physically disabled children, and forcing of them to work as beggars on the street, according to reports.

The criminal organisations, dubbed “beggar gangs”, keep the children in captivity, provide only minimum rations to keep them alive and pocket any money earned by the children as beggars, a 30-minute a Phoenix TV investigative report revealed, citing multiple accounts.

In extreme cases they even cripple healthy young children to elicit more sympathy from passers-by, the report said.

Wang Xiuyong, who was close to the head of one of the beggar gangs, said the gang members would each morning drive vans loaded with disabled beggars and drop them off at crowded locations around the city, keeping them under close supervision.

At the end of each day, the children would be picked up, have their earnings confiscated and returned to captivity in secret locations.

Most of the beggars were disabled children – many of them limbless or suffering from gruesome wounds – who had been stolen, abducted and even “rented” from their hometowns and brought to Dongguan for this profitable “business”, Wang – who is himself physically disabled – was cited as saying.

“The more severely handicapped they are, the more valuable they are,” Wang said.