A Belgian baby bought by a Dutch couple via the internet is to be taken into care, a court in Zwolle ruled on Thursday.

The Dutch couple reportedly bought the baby for an undisclosed sum from a couple in Gent, Belgium who had decided to sell the child because they needed money.
According to one media report, between €5,000 and €10,000 was paid for the child. The Dutch couple deny buying the baby and said in a tv interview that they only paid costs associated with the pregnancy. They picked up the child shortly after its birth in June.
The court said on Thursday that the parents had broken laws on international adoptions. ‘We are talking to the couple who want [to keep] the child. We realise that this is a painful situation for them,’ Martin Dirksen, director of the Overijssel youth social work department told news agency ANP. ‘They wish to cooperate with the court’s decision.’
Family history
The child protection agency said removal would be better for the child. ‘It is of fundamental importance that a child has clarity about his or her family history,’ director Marie-Louise van Kleef told ANP.
The child protection agency will publish its final recommendations on the child’s future within six weeks. This must also be approved by the court.
Earlier this week, the Dutch court reached a landmark ruling in another Belgian internet adoption case when it gave the Belgian biological father visitation rights to baby Donna.
Baby Donna was born to a surrogate mother three years ago, who then told the biological father she had miscarried and sold the baby to a Dutch couple.
The father had demanded the baby be returned to him but the court said there was no reason to take the baby from her adoptive Dutch parents.