Mentally disabled laborers discovered in Harbin

Here's an English news link:

CHINESE police have rescued 33 intellectually disabled people forced to work at a building site by slave labour merchants after the apparent suicide of a detainee alerted authorities.

The Chinese press offers some information. For example, the report above says that about 2/3 of the 33 people discovered were mentally disabled, and that they came from all over China. The ringmasters behind this operation go to train stations around China and target people who are mentally disabled and lure them to Harbin with a promise of the princely sum of 60 RMB a day. Most of them were recruited in recent months, and everyday they were taken to and from the construction grounds where they did hard manual labor, like piling brick and moving sand. They were only allowed to eat porridge and vegetables, or leftovers from restaurants. And if they got out of line, there was always someone there to beat them back into submission.

The police have taken six suspects, and of the coolies, 26 have been returned to their hometowns and while seven have decided to remain in Harbin.

The first picture is the window where the guy who committed suicide by jumping to his death (and thereby alerting the outside world); the second picture says that the room where the guys who beat the others stayed was much better than where the slaves lived.