Vietnamese police have rescued four trafficked Chinese children who were on their way to a third country, local newspaper Saigon Liberation reported Wednesday.

Following a suspected taxi to a house in southern Ho Chi Minh City, the police caught red-handed a local woman hiding four Chinese children aged 11-14 in the house on Tuesday morning. Thanks to reports of the taxi driver, the police arrested 36-year-old Nguyen Van Tien from the city, who is a member of a human trafficking ring.

Tien confessed that the ring transports foreign children to Vietnam, a transit point, and then to a third country.

Tien said he has so far hired automobiles, mainly taxis, five times to transport a total of 19 Chinese children aged 5-12 from the city to southern Tay Ninh province, in which his accomplices would take them to Cambodia.

The four Chinese children, including a 14-year-old girl, her 12-year-old brother, their cousin, and an 11-year-old boy (their friend living next door), said five days before May 9, when going out in China with their aunt, they were taken to somewhere they did not know.

Besides Tien, Vietnamese police detained seven suspected people for further investigation.

(Xinhua News Agency May 10, 2006)