Boy chained up as his father tried to sell him

CHAINED to a pole, a young boy was offered for sale by his father in a modern slave auction.

Yong Tsui had put up a small table with a sign on it giving his eight-year-old son's age, name, and capacity for hard work. But when bidders began to ask how much he ate, furious passers-by turned on the auction and attacked Fai's father to stop the sale in Wuhan, central China.

Police, who now have the boy in care, said Mr Yong told them the boy's mother had died three years ago and he could no longer afford to raise him.

"He has no job, home or money. He says he wasn't interested in the money, just in finding a home for the boy," said one officer.

Mr Yong said he had read how another youngster, Cheng Jindan, aged two, had been offered day care after being kept in chains while his father worked as a rickshaw driver and his handicapped mother scavenged for rubbish.

The youngster was chained in the street to keep him safe after his older sister Jinhong was snatched by kidnappers while playing with friends, he said.

Child abduction is rife in China, where the victims frequently end up in forced labour or the vice industry.