Tsunami kids 'smuggled'

2005-01-04 17:41

Jakarta - Human traffickers are preying on children made homeless or orphaned by the tsunami disaster in the devastated Indonesian province of Aceh, the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) said on Tuesday.

Unicef's spokesperson for Indonesia, John Budd, said there had been one confirmed case of a child being smuggled out of Aceh to the nearby North Sumatran capital of Medan for trafficking purposes.

He said Unicef's Malaysian office had received an SMS on Tuesday advertising 300 orphans from Aceh aged between three and 10 who could be bought.

Budd said: "It's chilling. What this indicates is that they have got children or they have a network where they can identify a child and take them."

An Indonesian government has also moved to head off the trafficking of children from Aceh by placing a ban on any child under the age of 16 leaving Aceh without their parents.

Banning adoptions

Heri Krisitanto of social affairs ministry said: "The aim of the travel ban is to ensure there is no adoption and to prevent any sale and trafficking of children from Aceh."

He said a ban on any adoptions in Aceh has also been imposed for the same reason.

National police detective chief Commissioner Suyitno Landung said on Tuesday, the issue was of deep concern and authorities were trying to register all homeless or orphaned children so they could be tracked.

Landung said: "We have deployed officers to relief centres to collect data on the children."

The government has estimated that 35 000 children have been made homeless, orphaned or separated from their parents in Aceh, which remains in chaos more than a week after the tsunamis destroyed much of the province's west coast.

More than 94 000 Indonesians were killed in the December 26 tsunamis, with almost all of the deaths in Aceh, a remote province on the island of Sumatra.

Budd said there had been many reports of child trafficking in Aceh over the past few days that Unicef, local non-government organisations and the Indonesian government had been trying to confirm.

'Ruthless criminal gangs'

He said Unicef was "adamant" that at least one child had been stolen and taken to Medan, saying the report came from a reliable local non-government organisation.

He also said Medan was a well-known centre for the trade in children.

He said: "There are ruthless criminal gangs based out of Medan who have been involved in this for a long time."

Authorities have in the past arrested people on child trafficking charges in Medan, where the rings are well-known for selling babies for adoption to people in Malaysia and Singapore.

Budd also said Unicef had received reports from local non-government organisations that "hundreds" of children from Aceh had been taken to Jakarta since the disaster happened.

- AFP