Y Loan and Pi Yo Rong.

VietNamNet Bridge – A four-month old boy who was nearly buried alive with his mother has been rescued by a woman in his same village in Mang Yang District, in the Central Highlands Province of Gia Lai.

This baby has been transferred to an orphanage named Vinh Son 1 in Thong Nhat ward, Kon Tum town, Kon Tum Province.

The boy, named Pi Yo Rong, was nearly buried alive with his mother under the custom of Jorai ethnic minority people on July 2.

Under the custom, babies of less than one year old whose mothers die and fathers can’t afford to nurture them must be buried alive with their mothers, so that the dead mothers can breastfeed them.

Luckily, knowing that the baby was about to be buried alive with his mother, Ksor H’Thip, a villager ran from the field to the funeral to adopt the child. However, her family is very poor so the child has been sent to the Vinh Son 1 Orphanage.

When the boy was rescued, he was very weak but after ten days at the orphanage, he has recovered.

At the orphanage there is another girl who is in the same situation with the newly rescued child. The girl is named Y Loan, belonging to Xe Dang ethnic group, who was nearly buried alive with her mother in Plei Kan, Ngoc Hoi District in Kon Tum province.

Y Loan is now a sixth-grade student at the Tran Hung Dao Junior Secondary School in Kon Tum town. Holding the four-month boy in her arms, Y Loan said: “Loan and Rong will be siblings because we are in the same plight”.

According to Kon Tum people, the depraved custom of burying alive babies with their dead mothers still exists in many provinces in the Central Highlands.

Han Minh