Illegally trafficked baby saved on train in China after grandmother tries to sell ‘dirty laundry’ born to teenage daughter

The 14-year-old teenager had been ‘overlooked’ by her family, who fretted about the perceived stain on their reputation

The uncle had sold the baby to a family in eastern China without the young mother’s knowledge

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A train worker takes care of a baby who had been saved from a couple who bought the boy. Photo: Sohu

Published: 6:30pm, 10 Jan 2022

Police in China saved a baby boy born to a 14-year-old girl from two human traffickers who bought him for 110,000 yuan (US$17,260) from the mother’s relatives.

The baby was intercepted on a train while en route from central to eastern China on December 31, according to mainland media reports. The traffickers were a couple who had paid the infant’s family to adopt the boy without the mother’s knowledge.

The train attendants became suspicious when the human traffickers asked to borrow baby milk formula. They began to ask questions and eventually called the police, who detained the couple when they could not produce a birth certificate.

The boy’s mother, a teenager surnamed Yang, gave birth to the baby at the end of November in Shenyang, in Liaoning province in northeast China.

To “protect the family reputation”, her family sold the infant to a couple who wanted to adopt a child. Yang’s mother had been taking care of the baby at the time.

The baby was being transported by a couple who had bought the boy from family members without the mother’s knowledge. Photo: Sohu

Yang lost contact with the baby’s father after getting pregnant and only shared the news with her mother when she was about to give birth, according to a report by Benliu News.