International organ trafficking ring under investigation in Greece
Deutsche Presse-Agentur - May 11, 2004, Tuesday, 09:44:03 Central European Time

Athens - An international organ trafficking ring is under investigation in Greece Tuesday after reports that doctors removed the organs of Albanian children. A report by the Greek Embassy in Albania said the Italian, Albanian and Greek trafficking ring has been in operation since 1994. The children were either snatched from their families in various parts of Albania or sold, in many cases for the price of a television set. The victims, many of them disabled, were taken to clinics in Albania or to a clinic in Yiannitsa, in central Greece, to have their organs removed. The organs were then smuggled out of Albania and Greece and sold in Italy or France, the report, which was published in the daily Ta Nea said. (dpa cp sr)

INVESTIGATION ON CHILDREN'S ORGANS TRADE
MACEDONIAN PRESS AGENCY (Thessaloniki) - May 11, 2004

A network trading organs coming from Albanian children has been unveiled based on a report by the Greek embassy in Tirana published today by the Athens newspaper "TA NEA".

According to the report, the organs came from children, who were murdered in Albania, and were brought to Greece and Italy.

According to the newspaper report, the illegal network began its activities in 1994 and selected children with special needs mainly from Albania. Their organs were removed with the permission of their families or the directors of orphanages and instituti ons where they were hospitalized.

The transplant operations took place at hospitals in Italy and the mastermind of the network is allegedly an Italian professor. Regarding Greece, investigations focus on a gynecologist who works in a clinic at a city in central Macedonia, northern Greece .

Four Albanian doctors are also involved in the network as well as other five Albanians who acted as mediators.

Albania Denies Greek Report of Child Organs Trafficking
SeeNews - May 13, 2004 03:57 PM EEST

TIRANA (Albania), May 13 (SeeNews) - Albania's General Prosecutor's Office denied on Thursday statements of the Greek embassy that there were clinics for child organs trafficking in the country.

"There are no clinics in the country for child organs trafficking," general prosecutor's spokesman Agim Neza told SeeNews.

Neza denied reports, published by local dailies, which read that according to the Greek embassy in Albania there were several clinics in the country, involved in a criminal child organ network between Albania, Greece and Italy.

Earlier this week, Greek daily Ta Nea reported that the prosecutor's office in Thessaloniki would investigate a criminal network for child organs trafficking, which involved Albanian, Greek and Italian medics, after being alerted by the embassy's report.

According to the report, the network started operations in 1994. It has three clinics on Albanian territory, in Durres, western Albania, in Fier, southern Albania, and in a town close to Thessaloniki. The report says that the clinics used children from orphanages or kids with mental disabilities as donors.

The report states that the head of the criminal organisation is an Italian professor of medicine, who has close connections with Albanian and Italian doctors, ex-diplomats, and ex-members of the Albanian government. Government officials transported the organs from Albania to Italy in diplomatic bags, which are not subject to customs control.

The report also mentions by name a Greek gynaecologist, who had been convicted for illegal adoption, and eight Greek doctors. The report says that one of the involved Albanian medics is a close relative to a former minister.

The report, which was not made available to the Albanian authorities, is based on intelligence of Greek and Albanian police, Ta Nea reported.

"Until now, no information related to the report of the Greek Embassy has been received by the Albanian Prosecutor's Office," Neza said.

Last month, European Union External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten stated that the European Commission was aware of the existence of a clinic in Fier, suspected of being involved in child organs trafficking.

www.see-news.com

The European Parliament Discusses the Organ Transplants in Albania
One World Southeast Europe - 20 April 2004

By: Blendi Dibra

The suspicion of existence of trafficking of the human organs of Albanian children for the needs of patients in the EU member states, has urged the Greek Member of European Parliament, Ana Karamanu, to demand an explanation from the EU Foreign Affairs Commissioner Chris Patten.

Chris Patten

In the correspondence between the European Parliament and the Commission, Karamanu, from the Greek Socialist Party (PASOK), demands from Chris Patten to put pressure on the Albanian Government in order for this to prevent these crimes. Karamanu also demanded from the EU member states to improve the judicial and police collaboration against this phenomena. In her request to the European Commissioner, Ana Karamanu calls on articles published in the Albanian press and media, which quoted sources in the Italian Government.

«According to these articles, a clinic in Fieri city, practices the removal of the childrens' organs to further transport them in Italy and France, with involvement by Italian and French groups and individuals», writes Karamanu in her letter. «According to the media, these doctors mobilise Albanian networks, which pay the children’s parents whose organs are removed. Apart form this, figures report 39 missing children with no trace in Albania and their parents making no effort to find them», justifies her question Ana Karamanu.

«The European Commission has heard the rumours referring to a surgery clinic in Fier, allegedly involved in organ trafficking to the EU, but the response of the Albanian authorities regarding this issue was that ‘the technology and the necessary specialisation for the transporting of the organs does not exist in Albania’, raising suspicions on the very existence of this clinic», answered Chris Patten. According to the European Commissioner, the Mission of the Police Assistance of the EU has followed the reactions of the Albanian authorities regarding this question and has confirmed that the Albanian and Italian police forces are handling the necessary investigations. «But, apart from the investigations, for this special case, the trafficking of the human beings remains a great problem in Albania», explains Chris Patten.

«Although the Report of the Commission notes progress in the reduction of the emigration flow and human trafficking across the Adriatic, the resolving of this problem requires much more action by the Albanian authorities», says Patten. In the mean time Patten explained the need for Albania to establish a stronger collaboration with the neighbouring countries, in order to improve the results in the struggle against the criminal activities, and of special importance is the collaboration with the Europol.

The history of the infants’ scandal in 1998 at the Tirana Maternity Hospital

Why did Elizza Possca, Member of the European Parliament, visit Albania?

The Euro Parliament Member Elizza Possca surprised the lawyers in May 1998, when she knocked on the door of the Tirana General Prosecution Office. Taking interest in the case of the babies missing from the Tirana Maternity Hospital, she demanded information about the investigation on this case. According to Possca, soon the European Parliament will discuss about this kind of traffic. According to her it was the case of a scandal discovered in the cemetery of Shish Tufina, when an undertaker, surprised by the fact that some of the coffins which were supposed to have the bodies of 12 infants, were too light. It proved that two of the coffins were empty.

This brought about the scandal which was published in the “Koha Jone” journal and the Tirana Prosecution Office begun a penal procedure. There is suspicion that the mothers were told that their babies died at birth, while the babies were still alive and sold abroad. Another version states that the organs of the children were taken out and smuggled abroad, for patients waiting transplants in Western Europe. There were rumours involving the existence of a special clinic for organ transplantation where foreigners were the most regular clients. The event, covered extensively by “Koha Jone” journal, was echoed in the European media.

On May 26, 1998, the General Prosecution Office ordered the exhumations of nine bodies in the Shish Tufina cemetery. This procedural act added further suspicions. The experts came to the conclusion that the graves were formerly opened. But instead of acting, the files on the case wandered for two years in the offices of the General Prosecutor, and no investigation was started. By a decision of the General Prosecution Office the case was suspended and the file was sent again to the police for renewed investigation.

How was it discovered

The trafficking in human organs have flourished between Albania and Italy. The investigations of the secret services report that they have discovered horrible instances of criminal activities. In a speed boat that transported illegal immigrants, two special containers were discovered with eye-retinas and kidneys freshly removed form the human bodies. These organs were prepared according to all the necessary medical norms for urgent implanting in the specialised clinics in the Italian region of Lazio. “Il Giornale” covered the scandal of human organs trafficking, for which they accused the Albanian Mafia.

Original URL: http://see.oneworld.net/article/view/84019/1/

TRANSPLANTS: ITALIANS INVOLVED IN ORGAN TOURISM
ANSA English Media Service - May 18, 2004

(ANSA) - BOSTON (USA), May 18 - Italians are included in the blacklist of people from developed countries involved in so-called organ tourism, who travel to poorer countries to buy human organs or undergo a transplant operation.

Medical anthropologist Nancy Scheper-Hughes, head of the Anthropology department at the University of California at Berkeley, told a seminar during the fifth annual American Transplant Congress 2004 underway in Boston, that Italian "tourists" travelled mainly to Turkey, a country where transplant surgery is carried out using organs coming mostly from Moldova and Albania.

Hughes is one of the leading international experts in human organ trafficking. She has travelled to many of the countries involved in the traffic in organs for transplant surgery, interviewed hundreds of people who had been forced into selling one of their body organs due to lack of funds or under compulsion. Her close contacts with the FBI and her researches and investigations have won Hughes the reputation of a "trafficker hunter".

The expert who claims trade in human organs is still out of control, offered an insight into the phenomenon presenting concrete proof including photographs of organ traders, mediators and transplant surgeons, who are part of the chain, and even a kidney purchase receipt.

The victims are usually people from the poorest strata of society who live in dire poverty. Political refugees, ex-soldiers, prisoners and mentally handicapped people, usually under pressure, also become victims of the illegal body organ trade, says Hughes.

Trafficking with human organs is often mediated by medical staff, criminals who are part of organised gangs, and sometimes religious leaders.

The parameters of the phenomenon are quite precise, Hughes said. It starts in the south where the organs are sold, to the north, where they are bought, from the third world to developed countries, the organs are almost always passed from blacks to whites. Women, in turn, are rarely at the receiving end, but many organ traders are female.

As far as the geographic parameters are concerned, the majority of the trafficked organs come from India, Peru, Russia, China and Moldova. The beneficiaries, in turn, are predominantly western European countries and Canada, the U.S. and Israel.

Turkey, Iran and Romania, but also the United States, are the intermediaries which play a major role in the illegal trade of human organs for transplantation.

Price lists vary from country to country, on the black market a kidney, for instance, sells for $500 to $1,000 in Iraq to nearly $30,000 in the United States. Prices range from $1,000 to $6,000 in South Africa, from $1,000 to $1,200 in Bombay, from $1,200 to $2,000 in Manila, $2,700 in Moldova, between $5,000 and $10,000 in Turkey and Peru, Hughes said.

The identity of the organ traders is also different according to country. In Moldova most traders are young men, in India trade is mainly in the hands of women while in the Philippines the organ traders are usually the heads of families.

Poverty and lack of sufficient resources are the primary cause forcing people to become involved in the human organ trade, but the money raised by it often ends elsewhere. In India, for instance, many said they had sold a kidney in order to pay their debts and feed their families.

In Brazil some decide to sell a kidney and use the money to buy land. There are even people who sell an organ just to buy a television set. But the number of people who claim to have been tricked or forced into doing it remains high, Hughes said.

As regards Italy's involvement in the illegal trade, it is not confined only to organ tourism. Silvio Sandrini from the Brescia transplantation centre, for example, said many people coming from poorer countries, particularly Albania, try to sell their organs in the country.

Although measures are being taken against the black market organ trade, experts agree it can only be stamped out through the concerted efforts of all parties involved. (ANSA) (ES/krc)

Body part trade puzzles Italians: Report of kidnapped boy found with scar on back
Calgary Herald (Alberta, Canada) - July 18, 1997, Friday, FINAL EDITION Pg. A15

By: BRUCE JOHNSTON, THE DAILY TELEGRAPH

ROME - Italian police have been alerted to what may be a European trade in human organs removed from people in Albania -- especially young women and children.

According to an Italian government report, Albanians living in Italy -- some of them illegally -- may be involved in the trafficking of organs from Albania to Italy, Germany, Greece, Switzerland and several Eastern European countries.

The Interior Ministry was apparently alerted by Italian diplomatic sources in Albania after a young boy was found at Vlore, in the south, with a large scar in the renal area of his back.

One report said the boy had been found dead; another said he was alive, and had told the authorities he had been kidnapped and forced to undergo an operation.

No cases of organs being illegally removed for transplants have yet been proved in Italy, although Antonio Guidi, the former Minister of the Family and Social Affairs, caused a sensation in 1994 when he told a parliamentary committee he could not rule out such a trade. Months before, a trade in human eyeballs was investigated by Rome magistrates after a number of corpses arrived at a morgue from a well-known hospital with their eyelids sewn up over glass eyeballs.

Shortly afterwards, an illegal trade in children was uncovered by police at a gypsy camp at Poderaccio, near Florence, in which the going price for a healthy child was about $ 50,000. The purpose of the trade was never ascertained.

Rome's Interior Ministry has recommended that investigations into a possible trade in organs be carried out in "reception centres" where Albanians are staying, including those from the latest wave of boat people.

But a third of the 16,000 arrivals who came ashore then are thought to have disappeared, including up to 500 children who braved the journey to Italy on rusty freighters and gunboats.

Those who disappeared are thought to have made their way to Italy's big cities and a life of petty crime involving things like pimping, drugs trafficking and prostitution.

- The issue: Illegal sale of human organs.

- What's new: Reports that Albanians living in Italy may be trafficking body parts.

- What's next: Italian government recommends an investigation.

Posted for Fair Use only.