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Phoebe Zhang
Phoebe Zhang

Opinion | Boy’s death a reminder of China’s neglect of ‘left-behind children’

  • Detention of three teens over the death of a third – all ‘left-behind children’ – should prompt national reflection on their neglect, first by the parents, then by the state

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Children play in the schoolyard of Chongshan Primary School in Longfu township, in southern China’s Guangxi, in 2015. Photo: AFP
Phoebe Zhang

On March 10, a 13-year-old from a junior high school in Handan city, in China’s northern Hebei province, went missing. A day later, his body was found in an abandoned vegetable shed with injuries to his head and back. The police acted quickly. On the same day, they detained three of the victim’s classmates on suspicion of murder.

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The case has shocked the public. The three students, aged between 12 and 14, may be the youngest murder suspects China has seen in a long time. A police investigation is ongoing, and no formal arrest has been made. But there has been abundant discussion over whether the children need to be punished if found guilty.
In the past, only those 14 and older could be held responsible under criminal law. But in 2020, a new amendment lowered the age to 12 on a case-by-case basis, depending on whether “cruel” methods were used to injure or kill.

Many in the public have called for a severe punishment. But there has been little discussion of the core of the issue: what changed the children?

The suspects and victim had one thing in common – they are part of a large demographic known as the “left-behind children”. Their parents are migrant workers, part of the hordes who left for the big cities for work and who helped built the wonder of China’s rapid urbanisation.
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But they couldn’t always take their children. Some were too busy, had no stable housing or faced restrictions in enrolling their children in city schools, so many left them at home in the care of elderly grandparents.

06:09

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