French ‘child smuggling’ trial to begin next week

SIX French humanitarian workers accused in Chad of trying to smuggle 103 African children to Europe will go on trial on December 21 after authorities speeded up the handling of their case, lawyers said last night.

In an affair that has strained ties between France and its former colony, the six face charges including attempted kidnapping and fraud after they were detained in late October for trying to fly the children, aged one to 10, out of Chad. The accused French nationals are members of a humanitarian group called Zoe’s Ark, which said it planned to place children from Sudan’s war-torn Darfur region with European families for fostering.

Chadian authorities and UN officials said the majority were not orphans and came from eastern Chad.