Criminal gangs target orphans to sell on as slaves

CONCERNS that children orphaned or separated from their parents by the tsunami may be falling prey to criminal gangs intent on selling them into slavery were raised by the United Nations yesterday.

The UN said it had received reports of adults posing as foster parents and children being shipped from Indonesia to Malaysia for sale, adding to worries about a "tsunami generation" of children also under threat of disease and hunger.

Officers at the UN Children’s Fund, UNICEF, were alarmed when a colleague in Kuala Lumpur received an unsolicited mobile phone text message offering children to order.

The message read: "Three hundred orphans aged three to 10 years from Aceh for adoption. All paperwork will be taken care of. No fee. Please state age and sex of child required."

Although the message mentioned no fee, a UN spokesman said: "If you read that text message, and if it is true, then either they have 300 orphans for sale or they have the capacity to seize children according to orders received."

"I’m sure it’s happening," said Birgithe Lund-Henriksen, a child protection chief in UNICEF’s Indonesia office. "It’s a perfect opportunity for these guys to move in."

Making matters worse, the hardest hit area in Indonesia - Aceh - is not far from the port city of Medan and nearby island of Batam, which are well-known transit points for gangs shipping children and teenagers out of Indonesia.

In reaction to the fears, Indonesian officials have already taken steps.

The government has temporarily banned Acehnese children under 16 from leaving the country, and the national police chief General Da’i Bachtiar said he had ordered provincial commanders around the country, especially in and near Aceh, to be alert to possible child trafficking.

He said police had also placed officers in some Aceh refugee camps, where they were urging people to be sceptical of anyone claiming to be from a charitable group aiding children or saying they are related to an orphan.

In a related development, a search by Thai and Swedish police for missing 12-year-old Swede Kristian Walker continued yesterday.

A boy matching the description of Kristian was last seen on Monday with a German man at a hospital near the resort of Khao Lak but has since vanished, despite a desperate search by his American grandfather, Daniel Walker.

The boy been listed as missing by international law enforcement agencies.

Meanwhile, a UNICEF spokeswoman in Geneva has raised the prospect of a "tsunami generation" of children.

Up to half the population in some affected areas is under 19.

"26 December, 2004, is a day that will be remembered for broken homes, shattered lives and a generation haunted, and when we think of children, we think particularly of what the trauma will mean in the coming years," she said.

In addition to having to secure food and water, many children were in a state of shock after losing parents or siblings and needed psychological counselling, she added.