Kidney Trafficking Thrives in Kurdistan and Police Remains Unconcerned

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Kidney Trafficking Thrives in Kurdistan and Police Remains Unconcerned

22/05/2011 06:16:00By HEVIDAR AHMED

Four years ago, Kurdish surgeons made an exciting announcement to the people of Kurdistan: they were finally able to do kidney transplants. This came as joyful news to many patients whose lives depended on the surgery, but the development brought with it a thriving black market in kidney trafficking.

As a Rudaw investigative reporter, I followed this story and found out that this underground industry involves experienced black-market dealers as well as professional doctors.

It wasn’t possible to introduce myself as a journalist to my sources, as they would not have shared any information with me. So I went undercover as a person in need of a kidney.

I first learned that the whole kidney business started in a private hospital where transplants are performed, in Erbil, the capital of the autonomous Kurdistan Region of Iraq. 

At the hospital entrance I told the staff that I had a patient who needed a kidney. They immediately asked if I knew a kidney donor.

“I have come from Zakho and I don’t know anybody here,” I told them.

Zakho is a town in the province of Dohuk, near the Turkish border and several hours’ drive from Erbil.

“You need to find someone who is willing to donate their kidney to your patient. And you need to bring documents from the Ministry of Health and the court,” said one of the staffers.

After talking briefly amongst themselves, one of the staff members turned to me and said, “There are many dealers. You just need to find them and buy a kidney from them.”

I asked this person for a dealer’s telephone number but he said he knew none. He did, however, tell me that most of the dealers are Arabs, and that I could possibly find one if I went to Erbil’s Doctors’ Street. I went, but to no avail.

I returned to the hospital and approached a few people who were there for kidney transplants. One said he had spent 30 million Iraqi Dinars (more than $20,000) for the surgery. 

I asked him how he had found the kidney, but he dodged my question.

“You know, what you are saying is like asking for drug,” he said. “But I’ll give you a dealer’s phone number. You see no evil, say no evil.”

I called the number he gave me and told the person at the other end that I needed a kidney. Twenty minutes later, he called back and gave me the phone number of another man in Kirkuk.

I called. The man who answered asked me about the age, blood type, and illness of my patient, and hung up. Minutes later, he called back and gave me another dealer’s phone number. I’ll identify the third person as A, his first initial. I arranged to meet him in a popular part of Erbil. We changed coffee shops several times before sitting down to talk, as A was very cautious and suspicious of everyone around.

Finally, in a café where he felt secure, he asked me what I needed.

“I need a kidney,” I said.

“It’s very easy,” replied A.

He said that it would cost me 11 million Iraqi Dinars to get a kidney, and 13 million for the surgery. The dealer said that there were some legal procedures I would need to take care of, but that he would assist me and try to facilitate things through his contacts.

A promised to take care of the medical tests at the lab, but warned me not to make any mistakes when answering questions at the Ministry of Justice. He instructed me to say that the kidney had been donated by a relative.

Although the parents of the donor technically need to be present at the interview with the Ministry of Justice, the dealer assured me not to worry.

“We will take care of that too,” said A.

He told me to give him my final word as to whether or not I was sure I wanted the kidney, because there were customers in line who would take it right away.

I went to the lab A told me about. One of the doctors there said that the majority of people who sell their kidneys are Arabs and live in Baghdad’s Sadr City, one of the country’s poorest areas.

The doctor at the lab said that a doctor in Erbil, named S, carried out kidney transplants. He also said that kidney dealers no longer accompany their customers to government offices, as some of them have been arrested.

Despite the high cost of the surgery, not all transplants are successful. Some patients have to try several kidneys. Kamaran Mustafa, 24, said, “I have bought five kidneys so far. But they all failed to function properly. The fifth one has been better than others.”

After some more inquiries it became clear that the area near Dr. S’s clinic was the best place to find kidney dealers. I went there and met a dealer who wanted to be identified as Talal.

“It is the easiest thing to find someone who wants to sell a kidney.”

Talal said he found the kidney sellers in Baghdad, and that it was easy for him to find customers for them as well.

“There is good coordination between me and Dr. S,” said Talal “I take the patient and the kidney seller to him, and he carries out the examinations quickly.”

I managed to get an appointment with Dr. S, and after meeting him at his clinic he promised to find me someone who could get me a kidney.

Shortly afterwards he gave me a phone number for a kidney dealer who was waiting outside the clinic. As soon as I went out, I saw A, the same dealer I had been dealing with earlier. I immediately walked away so that he wouldn’t see me. He was there with two young Arabs who seemed to be the ones selling their kidneys.

Iraqi laws consider trading of human organs a crime, and although the Kurdish parliament has not yet passed any of its own legislation on this particular issue, the Iraqi laws are currently in effect in the Kurdistan region and make organ selling criminal.

Mustafa Mukhtar, a judge in Dohuk’s Personal Status Court, said, “If it is provided that individuals sold and purchased a kidney, they are both liable to be prosecuted.  The punishment for these offences is one year’s imprisonment and a fine.”

Mukhtar said that donating organs for transplant is allowed by law, even in the case of people who are comatose but whose hearts still function.

“Also, if someone wills to have his organs donated, provided that at the time the will is written he is in good mental health, his organs can be donated,” said Mukhtar.

If it is this easy for an average citizen to find a kidney dealer, why are the police not acting on this issue?

Erbil’s police chief, Colonel Abdulkhaleq Talat, said, “We as police do not intervene in this because it is a humanitarian issue. But there are people who file complaints with us, saying that they’ve been cheated while buying organs for transplant. In such cases, we act.”


http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurds/3693.html