LAGOS, Oct 15: Police in southern Nigeria have raided a purported orphanage where they found 17 pregnant girls, arresting the owner on suspicion of planning to sell their babies, a spokesman said on Saturday.

The owner and a young man “suspected of having been hired to impregnate the girls” were arrested, police spokesman Emeka Chukwuemeka said. “We are suspecting that young girls are deliberately encouraged to become pregnant so once they give bith to the child, the child will be sold to interested persons, maybe childless couples,” he said.

Police acted on a report of “suspicious activity” at the institution in Ihiala, in the southern state of Anambra, that claimed to be an orphanage, Chukwuemeka said.

The police were trying Saturday to contact the girls’ parents. “We’re making arrangements to reunite the girls with their families; we believe they have parents,” he said. It was not the first time Nigerian authorities have dismantled a so-called baby factory. In May, police in the state of Abia, also in the south, freed 32 pregnant girls thought to be forced bear children destined for sale.

Some of the girls said they were promised between 25,000 and 30,000 nairas ($150 to $180), while the children were sold for between 300,000 and a million nairas, according to the National Agency for Prohibition of Traffic in Persons.—AFP