Chinese kidnap victim reunited with parents after 31 years
- Tears of joy as hundreds turn out to welcome home the lost boy of their village
- DNA samples crack the case after decades of heartache
A man who was abducted as a child 31 years ago was finally reunited with his parents in a celebration which included hundreds of people from surrounding villages in Sichuan province, southwest China.
Qin Yujie – whose given name was Cheng Xueping – knelt and sobbed as he hugged his long-lost parents in Chengjiawan village, surrounded by “Welcome Home” banners and the noise of firecrackers.
“I have been looking for you for years and couldn’t find a clue,” Qin told his weeping parents Cheng Jiguang and Gaolingzhen at their reunion on Friday, according to the Western China City Daily newspaper.
As well as the joy of seeing their son again, the Chengs were also able to meet Qin’s wife and children for the first time as hundreds of people gathered around them, many of them in tears.
Qin was three years old in 1988 when he was snatched from a construction site in Guizhou province, southern China, where his parents were working. They searched frantically for their son over many hours that day and, since then, have spent their life savings and borrowed money to travel all over China looking for traces of their son.
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Eventually they provided DNA samples to a national database established by the police to assist in the search for China’s many abducted children.
After three decades they finally learned the truth – that their son had been abducted and sold to a village in north China's Hebei province.
