CCTV footage has captured the moment that a mother handed over her newborn baby to a teacher at a Russian airport because she felt unable to support the child.
The footage, released by police this week, shows the 25-year-old mother looking distraught as she gives her daughter, swaddled in a bright pink blanket, to a woman she met online.
The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation – the country’s main federal investigative agency – said the mother answered an online advertisement from a couple seeking to adopt a baby, because she did not have the means to support the child herself.
The teacher travelled to the Siberian city of Omsk to collect the baby, who she brought back to her home in St. Petersburg using forged documents.
Investigators said their findings had resulted in the two women being charged with human trafficking.
