A woman in the Suntarsky district of the far eastern Sakha republic will go on trial for trying to sell her 5-month-old son through the WhatsApp messaging service, the regional branch of the Investigative Committee said Thursday in an online statement.
Law enforcement officials posing as prospective buyers detained the woman during a supposed swap in which the woman intended to hand them the child in return for 1.5 million rubles ($22,930), the statement said.
The woman earlier on July 2 broke an agreement with prospective adoptive parents when they refused to buy her an apartment in the regional capital Yakutsk and help her pay off a bank loan of 196,000 rubles ($2,990) in exchange for the child.
Her parental rights over the baby have been suspended pending a court case on charges of the attempted sale of an underage person, the statement said.
… we have a small favor to ask. As you may have heard, The Moscow Times, an independent news source for over 30 years, has been unjustly branded as a "foreign agent" by the Russian government. This blatant attempt to silence our voice is a direct assault on the integrity of journalism and the values we hold dear.
We, the journalists of The Moscow Times, refuse to be silenced. Our commitment to providing accurate and unbiased reporting on Russia remains unshaken. But we need your help to continue our critical mission.
Your support, no matter how small, makes a world of difference. If you can, please support us monthly starting from just $2. It's quick to set up, and you can be confident that you're making a significant impact every month by supporting open, independent journalism. Thank you.
Remind me later.
