HEARTLESS!!! Pitiful Image 6 year old Albino Boy whose Hand was Hacked Off to make Potions for Witchdoctors in Tanzania

 

Hidden: Many children are now kept in special schools, away from their families and behind protective walls

 This is the first picture of a six-year-old boy whose hand was savagely hacked off by hired assassins who collect albino body parts for witchdoctors to turn into charms and potions for their rich clients.

Baraka Cosmas was attacked on Saturday evening by a group of men, who stormed into the home he shared with his parents in western Tanzania.

The young boy was held down while the gang chopped off his right hand, before beating him and his mother Prisca Shaaban so badly both have been hospitalised. Image after the cut

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Savage attack: A group of men hacked off six-year-old Baraka Cosmas' right hand on Saturday night

Shockingly, Baraka was the third child to be attacked because of the colour of his skin in just over three months. 18 months old Yohana Bahati was snatched from his home less than a month ago, while four-year-old Pendo Emmanuelle Nandi was taken at the end of December.

Yohana's mutilated body was found a few days later, while Pendo has never been seen again.

All three cases are linked to a trade in albino body parts, fuelled by the high prices they fetch and a belief in the 'magical' properties of the skin and limbs, said to bring wealth and luck.

The men who viciously attacked Baraka at the weekend are likely to have been little more than petty criminals at worst, carrying out the bidding of a witchdoctor.

The witchdoctor will have paid a significant amount for the limb - but who paid the witchdoctor is likely to remain unclear.

Jonathan Beale, managing director of Standing Works, a charity working to protect Tanzania's albinos, says until these people are rooted out, government efforts to curb the attacks and killings are likely to have little impact. 

'This most recent tragic attack serves to remind us that current responses from the government, police force and justice system are not sufficient and do not target the heart of this crisis,' he told

'Sadly what we see from the government are measures which react to this crisis in a surface level fashion. 

'We call for a criminal investigation beyond the hired assailant or witchdoctor, and the gathering of thorough evidence on those involved at higher levels of this absurd trade.'

So far, while few kdinappers and witchdoctors have ever been successfully tried for their role in the incidents, not one buyer has ever been prosecuted for their part in the albino trade.

However, the government has announced a ban on witchdoctors - and last week, it was announced 32 had been arrested in the Geita region, the same area where Yohana was killed last month.

'The witch doctors were arrested in possession of different items, including potions and oil from an unknown source,' police cheif Joseph Konyo told reporters - but didn't say whether they had been charged.

But Mr Beale warned targeting all witchdoctors may mean attention is diverted from the real killers.

He said: 'We do hope that the government declaration to ban all witchdoctors in the country does not distort the judicial task at hand by indicting individuals practising traditional rituals who may be entirely innocent, yet by default are to be considered killers.

'Even more dangerous is the idea that this could create a smokescreen of impunity for those who actually fuel the trade by approaching witchdoctors with their demands.'

But the Tanzanian government does seem to addressing the problem - described by President Jakaya Kikwete as a 'shame' on the nation.

At the same time as the arrests were announced,  a court sentenced four men to death for their part in the 2008 murder of 22-year-old Zawadi Mangidu.

She had died after her legs and right hand were hacked off with an axe and machete after being attacked while eating dinner in her village - also in Geita, north-west Tanzania.

Among the condemned was the young woman's husband, Charles Nassoro.

And Nassaro is far from the only family member to be implicated in the attacks and murders of Tanzania's albinos.

In each of the three most recent cases, a close family member has been arrested.

Both Baraka and Yohana's fathers were among the accused, while Pendo's uncle has been implicated.

These four cases perhaps point to how strong the lure of the money offered is - and, by default, to the wealth of those purchasing the potions and charms.

It is further support for Mr Beale's calls for those at the top of the ladder to be targeted.

'What is required are intelligent strategies which target the source of these crimes,' he said.

'The sad reality is that, in one of the poorest countries in the world, for years to come there will always be poor individuals who will commit these atrocities for money. 

'As much as we commend the government on its efforts, until the law enforcing authorities look beyond the obvious we are putting plasters on a wound here.'

Poor little boy...may God visit the pepertuators of this evil deed with his rot! SMH