Galery

1

Anastasia Balezdrova

After the interrogation that began at about 03:00 pm on Wednesday and lasted throughout the night, the prosecutor in Trikala compiled the indictment against the seven persons apprehended in an attempt to buy and sell a baby. They are accused of involvement in a criminal organization that in recent years has carried out 11 similar illegal adoptions in Greece.

In this case, once again, the mother is from Bulgaria and sources claim she is of Roma origin. At the same time, many women of the same origin but from other neighbouring countries such as Romania and Albania are also residing in Greece but there has almost never been news that one of them had been apprehended for having tried to sell her child.

The immediate question therefore is whether the bad practice is widespread only among the Bulgarian Roma. According to an expert who has been involved in the detection of many such cases it is naive to believe that they have monopolized this "market". "The reason for the apprehension of the Bulgarian Roma women is that they want to receive cash. The others manage to hide, because they receive the amounts in a veiled manner, through the purchase of a house or car," he said for GRReporter.

In his words, the negligence and inaction on the part of the institutions in Bulgaria and Greece are the main factors for the flourishing of child trafficking. "In their testimony, these women almost always say that they visited a gynaecologist in Bulgaria in the first months of their pregnancy. This is logical, since they are interested in minimizing the likelihood of the embryo having a problem. Then they come to Greece where they give birth to their children and sell them, and no one in Bulgaria cares where the expected baby, the result of a recorded pregnancy, has disappeared to."

The situation in Greece is no different and the chaos in the "Civil Status Department" of several municipalities has revealed this following the case of little Maria. Her supposed adopters are still in custody on charges of documentary fraud, as it turned out that Eleftheria Dimopoulou had managed to declare the birth of many children in order to receive social benefits. Less than a year later, the employees who had issued the relevant certificates were acquitted. Furthermore, in the past, there were several cases of arrested doctors and lawyers who were subsequently released and now they continue to practise their professions.

Today, the seven persons apprehended in an attempt to buy and sell the baby in Trikala appeared before the investigator to testify. The procedure continued throughout the day but it is not yet clear whether they will be sent into custody or if some of them will be released.

According to the local electronic edition trikalavoice.gr, the defenders of the apprehended lawyer and notary claim that they were not involved in the case itself and only prepared the documents for adoption.