Southwest China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region has reported 125 cases of smuggling women and children in 2005, up 123.2 percent year on year, according to the region's public security department.

In last July, police in Guangxi, collaborated with their counterpart in Vietnam on cracking down on cases of trafficking women and children, cleared up 12 smuggling rings, arrested 37 suspects and rescued 105 smuggled Vietnamese women and children, who have now been consigned to their own country, the department said.

Since 2001, the regional police have cracked down on 100 women trafficking cases and arrested nearly 200 suspects. The number of the rescued Vietnamese women add up to 1,800, according to sources from the region's public security department.

Guangxi borders on Vietnam by water and land. As economic and cultural ties between China and Vietnam have been enhanced, cases of cross-border crimes in the region are also on the rise.

According to the Chinese laws, those who are convicted of smuggling women or children can be jailed for five to ten years, and those who are involved in grave or major cases can get life imprisonment or be sentenced to death.

(Xinhua News Agency January 24, 2006)