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Vanessa Cai

A shadowy go-between known as “Aunt Mei” allegedly involved in a notorious child trafficking case has been arrested, according to police in southern China.
Police in the city of Guangzhou said the woman, surnamed Xie, had been identified last year, and the case was still under investigation, state media reported on Saturday. The reports did not specify when the arrest was made.
For years, police were aware an intermediary had been involved in the trafficking case, but Aunt Mei remained at large because they were unable to identify her.
The woman allegedly brokered the sale of nine boys in Guangdong province from 2003 to 2005.
A major development in the case came in early 2016, when police arrested five suspects. Police said the lead suspect, Zhang Weiping, confessed that the children had been trafficked through an intermediary, nicknamed Aunt Mei.
In 2018, Zhang and another gang member were sentenced to death for kidnapping children, two others were sentenced to life imprisonment and a fifth person was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
All of the children who had been abducted were found and reunited with their families between 2019 and 2024, according to media reports.
One of the victims, Shen Cong, made headlines nationwide when he reunited with his parents in March 2020, ending a 15-year search by his family. Police said the boy, who was two years old when taken from his home, was sold to another family in a different city soon after he was abducted.
Aunt Mei gained infamy on Chinese social media, where she was the subject of a years-long manhunt.
In 2017, police released a portrait of the woman to the public for the first time with a reward for tips that might help with the investigation. An updated portrait was made public in 2019, and police at the time said the woman was around 65 years old, about 1.5 metres tall (4 feet, 11 inches), and spoke Cantonese and Hakka.
Images of the suspect regularly appeared on social media, and state media called on the public to “remember this face” and report sightings.

The first two missing children in the case were found in late 2019. Another five victims reunited with their families in the following two years, and the last two missing children were found in late 2024.
Child trafficking has been rampant in China in recent decades, driven by the traditional preference for sons and the lingering impact of the now-scrapped one-child policy.
Families wishing to buy a boy could get in touch with agents across the country who would connect them to trafficking networks.
Despite government crackdowns, child trafficking remains a persistent problem, and in some cases parents even sell their own children.
Other high-profile cases include the child trafficker Yu Huaying, who abducted 17 children in a case dating back to the 1990s. Yu was sentenced to death in 2023.
The court said Yu abducted children in southwestern China, including Chongqing municipality and Guizhou province, then took them to Handan in northern Hebei province and sold them to buyers between 1993 and 1996.
Her first involvement with human trafficking was selling her own son, who was born in 1992.


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Police identify the woman, surnamed Xie, as the intermediary who brokered the sale of nine children in Guangdong province


Police identify the woman, surnamed Xie, as the intermediary who brokered the sale of nine children in Guangdong province.


Human trafficking

Crime

Crime in China

Guangzhou

China’s infamous ‘Aunt Mei’ arrested after decade-long hunt for child trafficker

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Police identify the woman, surnamed Xie, as the intermediary who brokered the sale of nine children in Guangdong province

Police identify the woman, surnamed Xie, as the intermediary who brokered the sale of nine children in Guangdong province