Left-behind girl sets fire to homes to bring Mom back  

12岁留守女童烧邻居房屋：事情闹大了妈妈就回来

12岁的广安女孩小琳为了见妈妈，竟然烧毁邻居家的房屋，只因她觉得“事情搞大了，妈妈就回来了”。这样的极端案例，足以给留守儿童的家长敲响警钟。如果你在这个城市打工，如果你的孩子也留守老家，你一定要看这个版。然后拿起电话，给你的孩子打打电话，谈谈心、问问暖。 [查看全文]

(ECNS) – A 12-year-old girl who has been left behind in her rural home with her grandparents set fire to her neighbors' houses, saying she hoped to bring her mother back to see her, the Chengdu Business Daily reported.

Xiaolin has been sent back to her grandparents and school by local police.

Xiaolin, who lives in a remote village in Guang'an, Sichuan province, set fire to a neighbor's woodshed on March 6, damaging six rooms belonging to three villagers and causing economic losses of about 50,000 yuan ($8,040).

"I didn't intend to burn their houses down," Xiaolin told the police. "I just thought we would have to compensate for the damage if I started a fire, and then my mother will have to come back."

Xiaolin's parents are divorced, and over the last 10 years, she has seen her mother only once.

Xiaolin said that in her memory her mother is kind and beautiful, but she just didn't come back to see her.

But the arson didn't get her mother to come back home. Aqiong, her mother, said she couldn't come back now, but promised to visit her on her birthday, Aug 25 on the lunar calendar.

Chen Hua, an assistant professor of psychology at Sichuan Police College, said Xiaolin suffers from maternal deprivation, and she tried an extreme means to get her mother's attention.

Xiaolin is one of a dozen left-behind children in the village.

China has 60 million left-behind children. The problems they face should not be ignored, experts said.