Catholic.org | Jun. 13, 2012

Incident just the latest in continuing horror saga of Chinese 'family planning officials'

A Chinese woman was beaten and had her child forcibly aborted at seven months of pregnancy in Shanxi Province, China. In a nauseating twist, these 'officials' took a photograph of the woman lying in bed with her aborted child lying at her side.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - The woman, Feng Jianmei, was beaten and dragged into a vehicle by a group of family planning officials while her husband was at work. When the officials asked for money for fines from Feng's family and did not receive the funds, they forcibly aborted Feng at seven months. After taking a grisly snapshot of the deed, Feng is receiving medical treatment in Ankang City, Zhenpin County, Zengjia Town, Yupin village.

Reggie Littlejohn, president of Women's Rights Without Frontiers, said, "This is an outrage. No legitimate government would commit or tolerate such an act".

"Those who are responsible should be prosecuted for crimes against humanity," Littlejohn said. "WRWF calls on the United States government and the leaders of the free world to strongly condemn forced abortion and all coercive family planning in China."

This loathsome act came after global pressure appeared to have stopped Chinese family planning officials in Changsha, Hunan province from following through with a threatened forced abortion on a woman and her unborn baby in the fifth month of pregnancy.

In a separate instance, a 37-year-old woman, Cao Ruyi, was dragged from her home and beaten on the morning of June 6 by more than a dozen Chinese family planning officials. The mother, five months pregnant, was accused of violating China's "one child" policy because she and her husband already have a six-year-old daughter.

Cao's husband "expressed their thanks to ChinaAid for exposing the violent manner in which the local family planning officials dragged his wife to the hospital and the threat of performing a forced abortion on her."

"He said the domestic and international attention and concern that Fu's publicity efforts elicited was the reason Ms. Cao was allowed to return home," a ChinaAid added.

However, before her release from the hospital, Cao was forced to sign a guarantee that she will pay nearly a $1,500 "pregnancy termination deposit fee," which will not be returned if she has her baby. The deposit will serve as partial payment of her fine for giving birth to a baby without government permission. She will also be required to pay a "social burden compensation fee" of $25,000.