Sweatshop owner held, workers freed
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A factory boss was captured Tuesday in southwest China's Sichuan Province for allegedly enslaving mentally ill workers sold by an asylum owner, said local government officials.
![A mentally ill worker rests in a room at the Jiaersi Green Construction Material Chemical Factory in Toksun county, Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. [Photo/Xinjiang Metropolis News]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/bmp/site1007/20101215/0019b93bd68d0e72559501.bmp "A mentally ill worker rests in a room at the Jiaersi Green Construction Material Chemical Factory in Toksun county, Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. [Photo/Xinjiang Metropolis News]") |
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A mentally ill worker rests in a room at the Jiaersi Green Construction Material Chemical Factory in Toksun county, Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. [Photo/Xinjiang Metropolis News] |
Li Xinglin, owner of Jiaersi Green Construction Material Chemical Factory in Toksun County of northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, was captured by police at 6 pm in Chengdu, capital city of Sichuan, according to information released at a press conference held at 8:30 pm by the Toksun county government.
His son, Li Chenglong, was also captured in Chengdu. Additionally, 12 mentally ill workers that Li Chenglong took with him were rescued, according to officials.
The owner of a shelter, Zeng Lingquan, was detained late Monday evening in Sichuan Province for allegedly selling people under his care in Quxian County, Sichuan, to the factory.
The Toksun county government has contacted Quxian County Government to make sure the 12 rescued workers are cared for, said Yang Jin, Party secretary and deputy head of the county, during the press conference.
More than 10 workers had been treated badly during the past three to four years in the plant, including eight mentally ill people, according to local sources.
Li Xinglin and his son fled to southwestern Sichuan Province on Sunday after media exposure. The son and the 12 mentally ill workers took a bus to Sichuan, Yang said.
The factory in Toksun County had been shut down. Also an investigation team has been sent to the factory.
"Once the workers are rescued, the local government will order the company to give them compensation," Yang said.
Li's wife is currently in police custody.
The factory was registered on July 16, 2006. Covering more than 6,667 square meters, it produces talcum powder and quartz sand.
On Dec. 10, reporters from Xinjiang Metropolis News were tipped off that the factory was using mentally ill workers, and went to the factory and interviewed the owner about pollution as a foil to view the conditions there.
Some neighbors of the factory said that other similar plants in the area were closed during the winter season every year, and workers could receive at least 150 yuan each working day. But workers at Jiaersi factory worked all year round without pay, according to the reporters.
The floor of the workshop was covered with thick dust, but workers had no masks, the reporters wrote, noting that they appeared to be intellectually challenged.
The reporters quoted Li Xinglin as saying that his workers were from Quxian County's shelter for beggars in Sichuan. The shelter, also called the disabled self-reliance group, was an adoption agency for the physically and mentally disabled, organized by local farmer Zeng Lingquan.
Quxian County beggar shelter in Sichuan had never registered with the local Civil Affairs Bureau, and had neither applied to register, said Wang Yong, director of Quxian Civil Affairs Bureau.
This is an illegal profit-making organization, which is not a rescue station, nor a charity house, said Zhang Tao, director of Department of Civil Affairs of Sichuan Province.
If disabled people are able and willing to work, they can get jobs from the Disabled Person's Federation, said Yuan Yiling, deputy chief of Social Affairs Section of Department of Civil Affairs of Sichuan Province.
The treatment of the mentally ill people as reported by local media has caused public outrage across the country.
In 2007, 32 people were found to have been enslaved in a brick kiln in Shanxi Province from March to late May of that year. One person died and 18 suffered injuries as a result.
