理性与公平处罚拐卖儿童

The viral proposals have sparked heated online discussion on appropriate punishment for child abduction and trafficking.

Wang Xizi, the deputy head of Peking University Law School, says this discussion is a good thing.

"In my opinion, the huge emotional outcry will prompt not only the government and judicial departments but the whole society, to step up efforts in dealing with the social problem. Moreover, the reposts actually are a kind of public debate on the issue, which will help to form a comprehensive legal system with emotionality and rationality to effectively eliminate such crimes. "

Experts say the rapid and wide spread of the post reflects the fact that people have long been holding these concerns.
Psychological researcher Zhu Jianjun offers his thoughts on the reasons behind the move.

"Some people forwarded the post out of fear. For those who have kids, or those who don't have kids but consider child kidnapping as quite terrible thing, they wish there could have ruthless law which can greatly reduce human trafficking cases. Thus they will obtain a sense of security."

At present, only kidnappers in the most serious trafficking crimes are liable for death. The minimum penalty is five years in prison.

In the end, those in favor of the posts usually blamed the current law for being too merciful to traffickers.

In response, many Chinese law professors have expressed their own opinions, and some suggest web users to recognize that some public pages may be saying these things in a bid to attract hits.

Wang Xizi with Peking University Law School, further points out that the public's emotional concern is acceptable; however, laws should be fair and rational.

"It's polarized thinking to hand down death penalty to anyone involved in human trafficking, actually, the idea needs to reach rational and fair standards in criminal law and sanctions. So the call can only be regarded as emotional expression instead of rational analysis on fighting the criminal behavior of trafficking. To present emotions is acceptable, but as for law, it's always essential to take justice, fairness and rationality into consideration."

Some lawyers think the uniform punishment also would deprive the criminal of his right to defend himself.

Still, many legal professors admit that harsher punishment for those buyers could partly solve the problem.

Figures show that in 2014, Chinese police rescued over 13-thousand children, many of whom were sold to childless families nationwide.

For CRI, I'm Wang Wei.