Spain: Police Arrest 5 For Trying To Buy Kidney

Arrests were made by Spanish police in collaboration with police in Germany and Belgium

Spanish police said they had arrested five people accused of trying to buy a kidney from an immigrant for €6,000 (US$7,000).

Officers in Spain made the arrests working in collaboration with others in Germany and Belgium, a brief police statement said. It did not say exactly when the arrests were made, according to RTE.ie.

"The immigrant tried to pull out of the deal while he was undergoing clinical tests, so he was kidnapped, beaten and threatened with death to make him go ahead," the statement said.

The person wanting to buy the organ was the leader of a criminal gang specialized in robberies, who wanted it for a son with kidney disease.

Police chiefs and the head of Spain's National Transplant Organization were due to give more details at a press conference later today.

In March, 14 European nations in Spain signed the first ever international treaty to fight human organ trafficking.

The business generates €1.05bn in illegal profits worldwide every year, according to the Council of Europe, which drew up the treaty.

In January 2014 Spanish police arrested a rich 62-year-old Lebanese man suspected of trying to buy the healthy liver of a Romanian.