Dug up bodies bought for cremation quotas
Print Edition
TWO officials in south China’s Guangdong Province have been found to have purchased dug up corpses from grave robbers in order to meet government cremation quotas.
In late June, a resident surnamed Gu from Shizhai Village of Beiliu City in south China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region reported that his grandfather’s body had been stolen from the cemetery where it was buried.
Since grave robbers frequently operate in the region, Gu and other family members had been guarding the grave. However, they failed to prevent the theft of the remains.
Then in early July, police from Beiliu City apprehended a grave robber, surnamed Zhong.
Zhong admitted that he has stolen more than 20 corpses from local villages at night, put them into bags and transported them by motorcycle to neighboring Guangdong Province.
He said he sold the corpses to two officials from Gaozhou City and Huazhou City in Guangdong.
With the help of Guangdong police, the two suspects, surnamed He and Dong, local officials in charge of funeral management reform, were arrested. They told police that they bought the corpses to meet government cremation quotas.
China has a long tradition of ancestor worship, which usually requires families to bury their relatives and construct a tomb.
In recent years, the country has encouraged cremation to save on limited land resources, creating great controversy in rural regions.
In He and Dong’s towns, local government has demanded that a certain number of the dead should be cremated each month, based on the total local population of the previous year.
But on hearing of the policy , locals began burying relatives in secret.
Pushed to meet their quota, the two officials sought to purchase exhumed remains and send them to funeral parlor for cremation.
Dong was found to have bought 10 corpses for 3000 yuan (US$490) each.
The number of bodies purchased by He was unavailable, though he is said to have paid 1500 yuan for each. The deal was supposedly “approved” by the government.
Further investigations are under way.
Many Guangxi villagers have reported that the bodies of relatives have been stolen by grave robbers in recent years.
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