Crete arrests linked to illegal adoption ring
Two Bulgarian women – a mother and her daughter – were yesterday charged by a prosecutor in Crete of being involved in an illegal child adoption ring, court sources said. The women, aged 48 and 25, were arrested in Iraklion on Tuesday on suspicion of being linked to a ring that brings pregnant young Bulgarian women to Greece a few weeks before their due dates. Police said the women are taken to a state hospital to deliver and the ringmasters then put the baby up for adoption. The children are illegally sold to childless couples, officers said. The 25-year-old woman had recently given birth and was charged with attempting to illegally give up the child for adoption, which is a criminal offense. Her mother was charged with the same crime but was also accused of attempting to profit from the offense.
