Five days later, 13-year-old Mohamed clung to that piece of paper at Rawalpindi General Hospital a small slip of security in his unsettled life.

"Only my father can take me," said Mohamed, showing the paper. "I will wait for him."

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Since the Oct. 8 earthquake, more than a thousand children have been evacuated from the stricken region of Kashmir for medical care. Thousands more have been orphaned or separated from families, and authorities worry they might fall prey to child traffickers.

The threat is most dire for infants whose parents cannot be traced, who lack any identification, and who are isolated in areas where those around them have no way of finding extended family members.

The issue also surfaced after the Dec. 26 tsunami disaster that hit 11 nations around the Indian Ocean. In the best-known case, a 4-month-old nicknamed "Baby 81" was claimed by nine couples until DNA tests proved he was Abilass Jeyarajah and he was returned to his parents.

Even before the quake, the U.S. State Department had labeled Pakistan "a source, transit, and destination country for trafficked persons" while the International Labor Organization estimates that close to 100,000 people are trafficked in the country each year.

Children have been a particular target for use as laborers and in the sex industry. They often are smuggled out of Pakistan to oil-rich Middle Eastern countries for use as camel riders, preferred for the dangerous racing job because they are light.

The smugglers are generally people posing as parents or close relatives. Over the past several months, about 400 children have been repatriated to Pakistan from the United Arab Emirates as the countries work to combat the problem.