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Filipino says she was raped and left newborn on plane
Source: Agencies |
September 17, 2010, Friday
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A Philippine woman who admitted giving birth to a baby on a flight from the Middle East and then leaving him in the trash on the plane said she was raped by her employer.
The baby was found by a security guard at Manila's airport last Sunday in a trash bag unloaded from a Gulf Air flight from Bahrain. The trash apparently came from the plane's bathroom.
Lawmaker Lani Mercado said she met yesterday with the woman, who told her that she had been raped by her employer while working as a maid in Qatar and became pregnant. Her employer's wife then forced her to return home, and she managed to hide her pregnancy and board a flight.
"She had labor pains in the plane," Mercado said. "Then she gave birth."
Mercado said the woman told her she abandoned the baby because she was afraid of what her family would say.
Mercado, who serves on legislative committees on children and women, said she met with the woman at Manila's National Bureau of Investigation headquarters to try to help her.
The woman gave birth while the plane was approaching Manila, according to the bureau's chief, Magtanggol Gatdula. The woman has been shown a picture of the child, and "she's very eager to see her baby," he said.
The woman left in June last year to work in Qatar for three years, and her family was surprised when she suddenly returned home, said police Inspector Jeffrey Vicente, quoting her husband in northern Apayao province with whom she has two children.
The three-kilogram baby, still attached to the placenta, was found wrapped in tissue paper. Officials said the baby, already bluish in color, may have died within a few minutes had he not been found.
The baby, temporarily named George Francis after Gulf Air's flight code GF, is now fine but underwent an X-ray because of two bumps on his head, welfare officer Thelsa Biolena said.
The 30-year-old woman was located on Wednesday in Apayao after investigators set out to find the person who sat in a bloodstained seat on the plane.
Authorities brought her to Manila for questioning and testing. Social Welfare Secretary Dinky Soliman, who has custody of the baby, cautioned that authorities are still working to confirm that the woman is the mother.
She earlier said authorities plan to conduct DNA tests and that it would take at least a month to establish whether she is the parent.
About one in 10 Filipinos works abroad, many as domestic workers and laborers in the Middle East.
The baby was found by a security guard at Manila's airport last Sunday in a trash bag unloaded from a Gulf Air flight from Bahrain. The trash apparently came from the plane's bathroom.
Lawmaker Lani Mercado said she met yesterday with the woman, who told her that she had been raped by her employer while working as a maid in Qatar and became pregnant. Her employer's wife then forced her to return home, and she managed to hide her pregnancy and board a flight.
"She had labor pains in the plane," Mercado said. "Then she gave birth."
Mercado said the woman told her she abandoned the baby because she was afraid of what her family would say.
Mercado, who serves on legislative committees on children and women, said she met with the woman at Manila's National Bureau of Investigation headquarters to try to help her.
The woman gave birth while the plane was approaching Manila, according to the bureau's chief, Magtanggol Gatdula. The woman has been shown a picture of the child, and "she's very eager to see her baby," he said.
The woman left in June last year to work in Qatar for three years, and her family was surprised when she suddenly returned home, said police Inspector Jeffrey Vicente, quoting her husband in northern Apayao province with whom she has two children.
The three-kilogram baby, still attached to the placenta, was found wrapped in tissue paper. Officials said the baby, already bluish in color, may have died within a few minutes had he not been found.
The baby, temporarily named George Francis after Gulf Air's flight code GF, is now fine but underwent an X-ray because of two bumps on his head, welfare officer Thelsa Biolena said.
The 30-year-old woman was located on Wednesday in Apayao after investigators set out to find the person who sat in a bloodstained seat on the plane.
Authorities brought her to Manila for questioning and testing. Social Welfare Secretary Dinky Soliman, who has custody of the baby, cautioned that authorities are still working to confirm that the woman is the mother.
She earlier said authorities plan to conduct DNA tests and that it would take at least a month to establish whether she is the parent.
About one in 10 Filipinos works abroad, many as domestic workers and laborers in the Middle East.
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