Friday, April 23, 2010

China Begins Forced Sterilization of Citizens

Story from the Telegraph. Like KipEsquire, I wonder what Tom Friedman's reaction is and if he would continue viewing them as being run by enlightened elites. Excerpts from the story:

Family planning authorities in Puning, a city in the southern province of Guangdong, have detained more than 1,300 people in the drive, the Nanfang Countryside Daily said in an investigative report.

Those detained included parents who refused to undergo the surgical procedure and their "relatives", the report said.

[...]

Huang Ruifeng, a 64-year-old father of three, said he was contacted by a local official ordering him or his wife to have the surgical procedure, the Nanfang newspaper said.

Mr Huang refused, claiming he was too busy. Later his father was taken away.

Authorities said they were using "extraordinary measures" to encourage couples to undergo sterilisation, such as refusing to provide the children proper registration documents.

The move effectively denies the children access to public services such as health insurance and free schooling.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Wow, this is really extreme. I always viewed population growth as an endogenous variable. In my opinion, the causality goes this way: poverty breads children as opposed to children breading poverty. China's most successful overpopulation fighting strategy should be getting poor people out of poverty, providing better health care, etc.