Cii Radio| Ayesha Ismail| 14 February 2018| 27 Jumadul Ula 1439
The emergence of a website dedicated entirely to selling children of all ages to interested customers sent shockwaves across the Egyptian society recently.
“We have children for sale, of all ages for those interested in adoption or buying,” read a statement on the website, which offers newborns, infants and children up for sale whose biological parents are unknown.
The prices vary on the basis of gender, skin colour, health conditions, eye and hair colour, in addition to an array of other physical characteristics.
A computer science engineer discovered the notorious website after creating a Facebook page to help find missing children.
Ramy el-Gebali said his page, which has 1.2 million followers, helps families of lost children by posting pictures of their missing children and the parents’ contact information in case any of the page’s followers have seen them.
Some followers of Gebali’s Facebook page, who live in the al-Shorouk city, northeast of Cairo, had told him about a suspicious apartment that housed many children and was always “frequented by some families who seem to come and leave with children.”
The followers told Gebali the arriving families drove fancy cars and showed signs of wealth. Gebali says the neighbours reported what they saw to the police, and it turned out that the apartment residents were child kidnappers who wanted to put the kids up for sale.
From that incident, Gebali noted, he became more interested in knowing how these child traffickers find their customers.
By researching, Gebali came to discover the shocking website that helped the child traffickers find their customers.
Gebali said he found the owner of the website to be an Arab citizen residing in the Netherlands.
He was able to figure out how the process of selling the children through the website had been carried. He later informed police of his findings, along with the Human Trafficking department at the Egyptian Attorney’s Office.
Authorities are now taking the necessary measures, he added.
Source – Al Arabiya
