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Anastasia Balezdrova

Neither was the Roma couple from Katerini requested to pay for the baby, who was found at their house during a police raid a few days ago, nor did they give any money to buy her.

According to defender of the family Sakis Eleftheriadis, 41-year-old Eleftheria Dimopoulou from Farsala, who is in Korydallos prison, had given the child to them after being taken into custody in connection with the case of blond Maria. He points out that, in her words, the child had been born and then abandoned by a Roma woman from Bulgaria. Along with the child, Dimopoulou had given them a birth certificate issued by the municipality of Athens.

"I do not know how old the child is. According to the birth certificate that does not contain reliable information, the child was born in May 2013. My clients say that when the woman had given the baby she had stated that the child was two weeks old," says the lawyer, adding that he has not seen the baby. "During the raid at the home of my clients the child was taken by the police. I know that the baby is in hospital at present, where they are taking care of her."

The hospital in Katerini

The defender states that his clients had easily believed the woman, who had left the child in order for them to raise her, that they would be able to adopt her.

After their testimony before the magistrate, the Roma were charged with abduction of a minor child, obtaining a false certificate and disruption of family order. It is expected that they will be transported to prison since a custody measure has been imposed on them.

According to sources, the police authorities have started an investigation to determine the identity of the biological parents of the baby and sought the assistance of Interpol to apprehend them. The investigators have again directed their attention to Bulgaria and, in particular, to the village of Nikolaevo, where blond Maria’s family lives too. The same sources indicate that for this purpose the Greek authorities have requested assistance from their Bulgarian counterparts.

Meanwhile, according to director of the hospital in Katerini Asterios Farmakis, the child is in excellent health. In statements to the Greek media, he says that she has white skin and black hair, has no racial scars and her name is Sonia. It is expected that a prosecutor's decision will determine the institution that will assume temporary care of her. There is a high probability of the municipal nursery "Agios Stylianos" in Thessaloniki taking care of the baby. Director of the institution Maria Tsiutani states that the staff is fully prepared to take care of the child who is between 5 and 9 months old.

The fact that the same persons hide behind the two cases of illegal adoption of children reinforce suspicions that the discovery of little blond Maria in the Roma camp in Farsala last October has revealed the existence of a trafficking network in babies from Bulgaria, involving the arrested Roma.

The common detail in both cases is the "Civil status" department of the municipality of Athens, where little Sonia’s birth certificate was issued in September without complying with the requirements provided by law.

In parallel, Europol have requested the assistance of the Greek police in the search for little Madeleine, who had disappeared from a hotel in Portugal in 2007. According to the service, a little blond girl was noticed at a hotel in Gouves village on Crete.

Europol have asked the local authorities to investigate the video from the security cameras of the hotel to see whether the girl is Madeleine. The police in Hersonissos however failed to cooperate, as the hotel did not keep the video that was recorded months ago.

The local information website cretalive.gr argues that this was not the first time that the Greek police had been requested to investigate the case of Madeleine in the regions of Hersonissos and Malia.