China plans tougher laws on sex-selective abortions

BEIJING (AFP) - Fearing the approach of a ticking "bachelor bomb," China is planning tougher laws against sex-selective abortions that have boosted the number of boys in recent years, state media said Saturday.

The State Council, or cabinet, is drafting special regulations that specify punishments for parents and doctors who abort fetuses after discovering they are female, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Abortions motivated merely by gender are already illegal in China but existing laws do not specify the punishment for such acts, according to Xinhua, which gave no timetable for the new rules.

The sex ratio among Chinese toddlers is becoming ever more skewed as a direct result of the nation's one-child policy.

This is because couples that cannot give birth to an unlimited number of children are more likely to abort female fetuses in the hope of having a much-wanted son.

"The root cause is traditional thinking that boys are better than girls, especially in poverty-stricken areas," said Song Jiang, a population expert at Beijing's Renmin University. "Those people expect boys to support the family."

In some parts of China, sex-selective abortions have created a situation where there are more than three boys for every two girls, Xinhua said in a separate report.