Druzhinina Alyona Yurevna

Druzhinina Alyona Yurevna

Biography

2021: Detention in child trafficking case

On July 21, 2021, it became known about the detention of Alena Druzhinina, a reproductive physician and obstetrician-gynecologist at the IVF Center clinic in Moscow. He is a suspect in a criminal case of trafficking in children born to surrogate mothers.

According to TASS, representing the interests of the clinic, Kaloy Akhilgov, by July 21, 2021, Druzhinina has not yet been charged. Suspects and accused are no longer in the case, he added. Searches were carried out in the house of the doctor and at the place of residence of other employees of the medical institution.

According to an agency source in law enforcement agencies, in the case of the doctor Druzhinina, we are talking about babies discovered by police officers in June 2020 in one of the capital's apartments that were born under the surrogacy program. Then five babies aged six days to six months were found in the apartment of a residential building on Argunovskaya Street in Moscow. There were two women with them. It was later reported that the children were born to surrogate mothers for Chinese citizens.

Parents could not pick up babies due to restrictions imposed in connection with COVID-19. Four newborns who came to the attention of the investigation were born under the program, which was implemented by Sweetchild and the IVF Center, the fifth baby - under the surrogacy program of the clinic "For Birth."

One of the parents - Liu Jun - was detained in June 2021, after a man returned from the guardianship of a one-year-old son seized on Argunovskaya Street. He was interrogated on suspicion of involvement in the sale of babies, but was released a few days later. In early July 2021, Liu Jun recorded a video message in which he asked Russian investigators to return the documents to him in order to return to China with his son.^[1]

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