BABIES FOR SALE
INDONESIAN babies are being smuggled in increasing numbers across the Kalimantan border into Sarawak, Malaysia, for sale to childless couples. Pregnant Indonesian women are forced to give birth in heavily guarded boarding houses run by human trafficking syndicates, their babies seized by force and sold. TEMPO's investigative team takes a close look at the illicit trade.
July 1, 2003
ONE morning early in June, a young woman in a red sweater sat on the floor in the corridor of a police station in Entikong, a border crossing town between Indonesian West Kalimantan and the East Malaysian state of Sarawak. Her teenage face radiated innocence. Three fierce-looking samseng, thugs of labor agents, stood nearby, each armed with a mobile phone.
Several hours later a thick-set man walked into the police station, casually seized t
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