Malawian police have arrested ten men for murdering an albino woman, as a team from the United Nations conducts a two-week assessment after a series of similar killings.
At least eight albinos have been murdered in the last two years, reportedly for their bones that are used in witchcraft rituals.
“They dragged the woman to a farm and killed her. They removed eight bones from her body, packed the body in a sack and buried it at the scene,” the country’s police spokesman Kondwani Kandiado told AFP.
The police say the lead suspect Gerald Phiri, 38, is the victim’s uncle.
“They were motivated to kill the woman after hearing rumours that albino bones fetch a lot of money,” Kandiado said.
After murdering the 21-year-old woman, the suspects are alleged to have taken the bones to the administrative capital of Lilongwe, but an arrangement to sell them didn’t materialize.
Albinos, who have white skin and yellow hair as a result of a genetic disorder, are regularly killed for their body parts in several African countries including Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania.
