Five suspects have been arrested for forcing laborers in a north China brick kiln to do backbreaking manual labor, according to a central government work team investigating the case in Shanxi Province on Monday afternoon.

Those in custody are kiln boss Wang Bingbing, foreman Heng Tinghan, and hatchet men Zhao Yanbing, Heng Mingyang, and Liu Dongsheng. The five have confessed to the charges, local police said.

Police are searching for three other suspects, namely Zhou Xueping, Chen Zhiming, and Jin Xingjian.

Police investigations showed Heng Tinghan, 42, a native of central Henan Province, lured 31 rural laborers from railway stations from Zhengzhou in Henan and Xi'an in Shaanxi as well as Yuncheng in Shanxi Province with promises to help them find jobs, and then forced them to work in the brick kiln at Hongtong County of Shanxi Province.

Heng sub-contracted the kiln in Caosheng Village from Wang Bingbing in February 2006.

The laborers were forced to work long hours on meager rations, dogs were hired to prevent them from escaping, and many received burns and other injuries working in the hot kiln.

One person died in November 2006 and his death is being investigated.

Wang Dongyi, father of Wang Bingbing, has been fired as party chief of Caosheng Village.

"We are investigating whether other officials were involved," said Zhang Mingqi, secretary of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions.

The work team consisting of officials from the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Labor and Social Security and the All-China Federation of Trade Unions is in Shanxi to investigate the case.

Sun Baosu, vice minister of labor and social security and head of the work team, said the case "had an extremely negative impact,” and pledged to find out the truth, rescue all victims and punish the perpetrators.

The local government has settled wages, paid compensation for victims, and sent apology letters to the workers, said Zhang.

"We are in touch with the family of the dead worker," said Zhang, adding that 23 of the 31 victims have been contacted and that police are still searching for the other eight.

Chinese police have detained 168 people accused of holding workers in slavery under appalling conditions at small brick kilns and mines in Shanxi and Henan.

By Saturday, 315 people -- including 22 aged under 18, had been freed after police raided more than 3,700 small brick kilns and collieries in Shanxi, the country's leading coal base, many of which were unlicensed.

The use of slave workers hit the headlines after a "call-for-help" letter was posted on the Internet earlier this month by more than 400 parents in Henan who believed their missing children had been sold to the small brick kilns as slave workers.

(Xinhua News Agency June 19, 2007)