Fri, Feb 10 2012

CHILD TRAFFICKING INCREASINGLY BIG PROBLEM FOR BULGARIA

Mon, Oct 02 2006 09:02 CET

1003 Views

Child selling in Bulgaria produces serious revenue of up to $20 000, The Sunday Times wrote.

Nicola Smith, the author of the report, said the sale and adoption a one-month old baby was nearly arranged in Bulgaria's second biggest city of Plovdiv.

Smith went to the Roma-populated neighborhood of Sheker mahala and easily found an old lady offering her grand-daughter for sale, Sunday Times said. "The old woman may have held the infant gently, but her face was hard. This, after all, was business", Smith said.

Baby trafficking was occurring in Bulgaria for the past 10 to 15 years and recently became a growing problem, Sunday Times said. Babies were sold before they were even born.

Some women got pregnant only to sell their babies, the article said. Others gave their babies to `loan sharks' instead of paying back their loans. Still others became victims of dealers, Sunday Times said.

Many of the babies were sold in Greece where lawyers arranged the adoption papers.

Pregnant women were usually taken to the Bulgarian town of Kulata, located at the Greek border. The dealers took the women through the border and hide them until they gave birth.

Prices could reach $ 20 000 or more, but the mothers were paid less than one tenth of the price. On occasions dealers would cheat giving the mothers nothing, the report said.

  • Print
  • Send via email
  • Translate to
  • Share:

To post comments, please, Login or Register.


Please read the The Sofia Echo forum comments policy.

Bulgaria among ‘baby traders’ – News of the World

‘We were horrified at how easy it is to buy a child,' tabloid reports, alleging that buyers range from childless couples to paedophiles.

More in this category

Bulgaria, Romania lambast Dutch anti-immigration website

Foreign ministries criticise website that calls on visitors to lodge complaints against immigrants from Central and Eastern Europe.

European Commission meets target for recruiting Bulgarians, Romanians

‘I am delighted we managed to identify and attract some of the brightest and best people from Bulgaria and Romania to come and work at the European Commission,’ EC Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič said.

Cold spell should ease its grip on Europe next week, World Meteorological Organisation says

The current ‘negative Arctic Oscillation’ – a weather phenomenon which leads to cold conditions in Europe and relatively warmer conditions in the Arctic – should shift into a more neutral pattern within the next two to three weeks.

Cold snap hits Europe; thaw a threat

The extreme cold has been blamed for almost 400 deaths across Europe. In Ukraine, where temperatures have fallen below minus 30 degrees Celsius, the cold is blamed for at least 122 deaths. Many of the victims were homeless.

Bulgaria among EU’s lowest government debt-to-GDP ratios – Eurostat

At the end of Q3 2011, the highest government debt to GDP ratio was in Greece, at 159.1 per cent.

© 2000-2012, Sofia Echo Media Ltd.

Web Design by RIZN

Sofia Echo Media is part of the Economedia Group.
The news and information content on this website is provided by our editorial team and is copyrighted. Any unauthorised reproduction or use of it is strictly forbidden. Reproduction of this website's content is permitted only with prior written permission from the Editor-in-Chief, should be propertly acredited and provide an active link back to our site. Comments posted by the website's visitors are independent of the editorial materials and do not represent the views of sofiaecho.com. Sofia Echo Media cannot be held responsible for the statements contained in visitor comments. The percentаge change in the shares' prices are based on the price of the last transaction of the current session compared to the price of the last transaction of the previous session. Bulgarian Stock Exchange data is not real-time, but updated every 15 minutes, and should not be used as a basis for decisions about buying or selling stock options.