Five-year-old triplets travel around China to find mother who "abandoned them"

Three brothers are reportedly travelling around China in search of the mother who abandoned them.

The triplets, who will be five next month, were spotted in Shenzhen in the south of the country on Saturday where they were handing out missing persons notices, according to People's Daily Online.This is allegedly the second time that the mother has abandoned her children.

The flier, which the boys distributed, claimed that their mother, Han Xinghua, 27, left out of the blue.

It said that there had no argument between Han and the father, who has not been identified. Han also took her two-and-half-year-old daughter, who's been nicknamed Hanhan, according to the flier.

A separate report alleged that the mother had given birth to the triplets out of wedlock with the father, named as Huang.She then reportedly left to marry another man who she had her daughter with.

After the marriage failed, Han allegedly returned and married Huang.

According to the report, Huang has tried to track down his wife on several occasions and only recently heard that she might be in Shenzhen, which was why he travelled to the city with the children.

Missing mum

The boys attracted a lot of attention from members of the public, who stopped to photograph them. There has been mixed reaction from the public after photographs of the children emerged online.

Many Chinese web users expressed their sympathy but some questioned the legitimacy of their story and whether it was a scam.