Greek couple held for buying Roma girl
Print Edition
Police in Athens yesterday said they had arrested a Greek couple suspected of having purchased a Roma baby for 4,000 euros (US$5,500).
The couple, a 53-year-old man and his 48-year-old wife, told police that they had received the baby girl, then only a few weeks old, from a Roma woman in March. The woman then unsuccessfully tried to register the baby as her own child.
Private adoption is legal in Greece as long as money is not exchanged in the process.
The couple was later charged with abduction and trafficking of a minor after admitting to the prosecutor they paid money to obtain the baby, the state-run Athens News Agency reported.
The case came amid heightened scrutiny by Greek authorities after the discovery of a mystery blonde girl living in a Roma camp in the country with a couple who were accused of abducting her.
Yesterday, Bulgarian authorities announced that DNA samples had confirmed that the parents looking after the girl, known as Maria, were not her biological mother and father.
Greece’s supreme court has ordered a general review of newborn registrations after the discovery of Maria exposed lax recording practices around the country permitting the misuse of state benefits.
Maria’s false parents, who were arrested last week, are believed to have declared a total of 14 children to claim increased family support benefits.
The woman, 35-year-old Sasha Ruseva, told police that she gave birth to a baby girl while working in Greece four years ago as an olive picker and left it there when it was seven months old, according to Bulgaria’s interior ministry.
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