Corruption, Mafia and Religious Terrorism Behind the Human Organs
Trafficking in Egypt
by EveryOne Group
10 Nov 2011 03:41:35 -0500
Rome/Arish, November 10, so11. EveryOne Group is continuing its
investigations, humanitarian actions and relations with international
institutions and NGOs in an attempt to combat the terrible phenomenon of
human organ trafficking. Over the last few days, after working with the CNN
and other media to bring this odious trafficking to the attention of public
opinion worldwide, our human rights defenders have sent new witnesses
accounts and evidence to the international agencies that are committed to
fighting the human organs trade. We have also started to collaborate with
the COFS (Coalition for Organ-Failure Solution), a non-profit international
health and human rights organization that is attempting to combat the
trafficking of humans for organs and put an end to the exploitation of the
poor as a source of organ and tissue supply. Here, in summary, are the
updates about the trafficking in human organs in Egypt that we have sent to
the international authorities, NGOs, and the media.
The World Health Organization still considers Egypt one of the main centres
for the global black market in human organs. The laws approved when Mubarak
was still President were not enough to reduce the illegal phenomenon. The
market for human organs is an international market, like the drugs market,
in which the Russian (or Israeli) Mafia, Arab Mafia and other criminal
organizations work closely together to make huge profits.
Until a few years ago in Egypt there was a difference between smugglers and
human traffickers. Sometimes the refugees encountered a gang of smugglers
(from the Rashaida or al-Tarabin Bedouin tribes) and struck an agreement. On
the receipt of $2,000 for Muslim refugees, and $3,000 for Christian
refugees, the smugglers accompanied them to the border with Israel. Today,
however, the Rashaida, al-Tarabin and al-Sawarka bands are working for Arab
organized crime. The "passeurs" are the Bedouin smugglers who enter into the
first agreement with the refugees already in Sudan or Libya. They then sell
the groups of refugees to other bands when they enter the Sinai region.
These traffickers ask from $10,000 to $25,000 per person to take the
refugees to the border. To convince their relatives abroad to pay the
ransom, the traffickers beat, torture, rape, and mutilate young refugees.
Some are murdered by the traffickers to show the others they mean business.
The girls are repeatedly raped, even in front of other refugees. The
traffickers are always armed (and often under the influence of drugs) and
the refugees are imprisoned in underground shipping containers. The camps
are in Rafah, Gorah, Arish and other cities inside Bedouin property, often
among fruit orchards and gardens. Those who fail to pay the ransom money are
transferred to the organ market, and do not come back. We know of some cases
of refugees who have survived the clinics after having only a kidney
removed.
The former president Hosni Mubarak and his wife Suzanne had begun fighting
this trafficking before the revolution. It is a difficult problem to solve
because of weaknesses in - or the corruption of - law enforcement, and also
because organized crime in Egypt is part of the fundamentalist jihadist
movements. The head-traffickers are often seen by the population as "heroes
of Islam" because they finance jihad activities. This is the case for the
Palestinians Abu Khaled or Abu Ahmed, or the plunderers from the Sawarka
family. Very often the human organs black market supplies the traffickers
with weapons, instead of money they exchange them for human kidneys. All
the smugglers who control the tunnels between the two sides of Rafah are
dealers in weapons, human beings and human organs.
The institutions in Egypt are perfectly aware who the traffickers are, and
know of their links to Al-Qaeda and religious terrorism, but they do not
intervene, either out of complicity or fear. Gangs have been known to attack
police stations in order to free arrested accomplices.
With regard to the clandestine clinics, we have heard of mobile clinics and
clinics in the cities. We know there are some illegal clinics in Cairo and
that even in some official clinics they have removed organs for the black
market, but unfortunately we have been unable to obtain precise data on
this. Organised crime has succeeded in hiding this reality. Careful
investigations are needed to reveal the dynamics of this aspect of human
organs trafficking.
The Arab Mafia is closely linked to religious terrorism (see for example
Lorenzo Vidino's research) and the other Mafias, including the Russian Mafia
( <
http://www.jamestown.org/single/?>
http://www.jamestown.org/single/?)no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=4246 ).
Trafficking in human organs is carried out by all criminal organizations and
is a phenomenon that has no borders. The various Mafias in the world are not
being fought effectively enough. In Italy the Mafia has a turnover of around
200 billion Euros annually. But this is a different matter, a very delicate
and crucial one. With regard to the Sinai, there are clear links between
organized crime and terrorism.
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Received on Thu Nov 10 2011 - 07:22:35 EST