There was nothing to suggest that they had been murdered, but a lack of immigration records meant police managed to trace only two of the missing children.

All of it, frankly. Do you think they sent Scotland Yard agents with flashlights to the five continents? If not, how do you understand “international search”? At most, they probably did a computer search (Interpol, or other similar database). How many kids in Africa do you think are on an international database? Consider also the following statements that don’t jibe:

Detective Chief Inspector Will O’Reilly said inquiries revealed 300 black boys… had not reported back to school in the three months before his death and were “lost into the system”. (Note also that the dead kid was found in September, so “three months before” means the summer. All they’re saying is, 300 African boys did not return to school after the summer.

a lack of immigration records makes them almost impossible to trace, police say. Hmm.. what good is an international search, then?

Most of those questioned said the children had returned to Africa. Why was this discounted as a possibility?

But Tim Benson, head teacher at Nelson Primary School in East Ham, London,… said most children were probably happily ensconced in another school.

This was a very badly written story, worthy of the Enquirer—or Drudge.

Education welfare officers basically do what you suggest should be done, and don’t tell the police unless they think a crime’s been committed:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/child/story/0,7369,1483935,00.html

Births are registered. There is no obligation to register changes of address with the state if you do not have a driving license. Councils track names and addresses for tax purposes, but these are not correlated nationally, nor should they be. It is not compulsory to attend school: some children are homeschooled. It isn’t compulsory to register for child benefit.

What should happen is if a child is not attending school is the local authority should send a social worker to the last known address to investigate. That’s all.

Families have privacy rights too. It’s even in ECHR.

As mentioned by a few posters above, these children have not disappeared. They just stopped going to school. There is no evidence that anyone investigated why. None is offered in the article.

Despite an international search, police were able to find only two of them, Mr O’Reilly said. Most of those questioned said the children had returned to Africa.

Which part of “despite an international search, police were able to find only two of them” is unclear, exactly?

In the US, according to this source, The average dropout rate for large urban school districts nationwide is 51 percent. That’s probably hundreds of thousands of kids “disappearing from school”.

The Washington Post, one of the most respected papers in the country/world has its FIRST article today about the Blair-MI6 meeting notes that show that the US was “fixing intel to policy”.

And where, praytell, was this article? Front page-above the fold? Nope. Front page-below the fold? Nope. A2? Nope.

A-[expletive deleted]-18.

read more here

That’s the CNN-y and president-y way to say trite and superficial, I guess.

Thanks, kcindc.