Parents of the babies sickened by melamine in the Chinese tainted milk scandal shot down a $160 million payout, and now they're being punished. Zhao Lianhai, organizer of a parents' news conference slated for yesterday, was picked up by the Chinese government and detained.
The families' lawyer, Li Fangping, says the government did it just to keep the parents from talking.
The payout would have put $29,000 (200,000 yuan) in the bank accounts of the parents who lost their babies (six in all were killed), while parents whose kids suffered kidney stones would get just $290 (or 2,000 yuan). Parents whose children were sicker -but survived - would likely get $4,380 (30,000 yuan). The plan, outlined in the China Daily, said the total one-time cash payouts (for all parents affected) would be $131 million (900 million yuan). Another $29 million (200 million yuan) would be put into a fund to cover bills for lingering health problems.
The numbers, the parents say, are far too low (and I'd agree with them - $29,000 for a dead child?). Put into Chinese economic terms, one of the families' attorneys said it represents one half of the per capita annual income for rural Chinese residents.
The parents have been advised not to sign anything, and a set of ten parents had planned Friday's press conference to broach their next step. That's been called off, and with Lianhai in custody, nothing has been rescheduled.
Image: Toronto Star
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