Kazakhstani Police Break Up Baby-Selling Ring

“Police have busted a baby-selling ring at a maternity hospital in Kazakhstan, it was revealed today.

Medical staff at the centre in Shymkent sold at least ten newly born children rejected by mothers for between £650 and £1,960 each.

Under Kazakh laws these ‘unwanted babies’ should have been sent to orphanages but instead they were offered immediately on the black market to childless couples.

‘A head of a perinatal ward and one of the doctors were detained,’ said a source in the prosecutor-general’s office in Shymkent.

‘So far we received permission to arrest two people, but there was an entire group of people involved which the investigation is currently working on.’

The babies put up for sale were those ‘rejected by mothers after they gave birth,’ added the source.

‘Families that for various reasons could not have babies were found, and babies were offered at a price varying from one to three thousand dollars.’

The scam included forged documents indicating that the mother buying the baby had given birth at the hospital, which is in southern Kazakhstan.

A mother buying a baby received documents confirming she gave birth at that particular hospital,’ said the source.

Families purchasing the black market babies were from various regions of Kazakhstan.

So far there is no indication that they children were sold abroad, but it is unclear what checks the baby-selling gang made about parents who took the children.

‘As of now, we have confirmed the facts relating to ten such sales, but the numbers might grow significantly,’ said the source.

It is unclear what will now happen to the sold babies, and whether they will be allowed to remain with parents who paid cash to buy them illegally.

The problem of babies sold on the black market is not isolated to this hospital.

News agency KTK.kz reported that ‘there were about a 100 crimes involving sales of babies and children in Kazakhstan in 2014.’

Askhat Daulbayev, Prosecutor General in the ex-Soviet state, said: ‘People who wish to adopt a child consciously choose to violate the law, preferring to buy rather than go through an official adoption procedure.

‘They are forced to do so because of the high complexity and red tape involved in adoptions.’

In order to legally adopt in Kazakhstan, parents can wait ‘in a queue’ for a year or more while they sort documents, it was claimed.

Comments from Kazakh citizens to the story on the scandal were not entirely critical.

‘I will not be popular with what I’m about to say, but if parents decline to take a child, and a maternity hospital can immediately find new parents, I think they should not be punished for it too harshly,’ said Ivan Petrov.

But another commenter said those responsible should face the full force of the law.

‘The problem is that they have been selling them, which flouts several articles of the criminal code,’ warned Tarlan Nagiev. ”

Police break up baby selling ring at a maternity hospital in Kazakhstan where at least 10 new-borns were sold to childless couples for up to £2,000
[Daily Mail 6/9/15 by Will Stewart]

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