CHINA: China reaffirmed its commitment to its tough one-child policy of family planning when it punished 13 government officials in Shaanxi province for allowing a woman to have nine children.
One of the greatest experiments in social engineering ever seen, the one-child policy was imposed in 1979 as a way of containing population growth already running at dangerously high levels in the world's most populous nation.
The government reckons that since the policy was introduced, China has prevented over 400 million births. There is now an average birth rate of 1.8 children per couple in China, compared to six children when it was introduced.
Two officials in the northwestern province were arrested and 11 others dismissed for their role in the case.
A family planning official from Ankang City, together with the head of Huangan village, gave false documents to Tang Guoying and her husband Zhang Yunqing allowing them to have a second child in late 1997.
Investigators discovered Ms Tang (40) had nine children since she began living with Mr Zhang in 1982, when she was 16. Two daughters were adopted by relatives and another three children died young, the China Daily reported, and the family had bribed the officials to get the false documents.
Chinese people generally dislike the one-child policy, particularly in the countryside, and now the country is facing the threat of a greying population, with a massive dependency ratio as the children of the one-child policy era are forced to provide for many older relatives.
But the government is sticking to the policy.
"The current family planning policy must be kept basically stable, a fundamental measure to cope with the fourth baby boom in the next five years," Zhang Weiqing, the director of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, said last month.
However, Mr Zhang acknowledged many challenges remained, particularly as China will see its total population, including those of working age and those retiring, peak in the middle of this century.
Although it is widely known as the one-child policy, there are exceptions. People in the cities can have a second child if both husband and wife come from one-child families and farm couples are allowed to have another if their first was a girl.
Many ethnic minorities are allowed to have two children, and there are no restrictions on the number of children that Tibetans can have.
The policy is commonly blamed for an alarming rise in the male-to-female ratio. Experts say 117 boys are born for every 100 girls in China, way above the normal level of 100 females to 104 to 107 males. This means there are nearly 13 million more boys than girls under the age of nine.
Farmers want sons because they believe they are better able to provide for the family and support their elderly parents. Gender scanning of the foetus is illegal in China but a large black market flourishes.