Chad Sentences Zoe's Ark Six To Hard Labor

A Chadian court sentenced six French aid workers to eight years of forced labor Wednesday after finding them guilty of trying to kidnap 103 African children and bring them to Europe.

The sentence was announced on the fourth day of the trial.

The defendants, who work for the French aid group Zoe's Ark, maintain they were driven by compassion to help orphans in Darfur, which borders Chad.

That was quick. After four days at trial, the six were found guilty. Hard labor just doesn't seem sufficient for these six miscreants who claimed that they were just trying to help rescue Darfurian refugees.

These aid workers claimed that they were helping rescue orphans from the Darfur genocide when they were stopped by Chadian authorities in October, but it turned out that many of the children they were taking were actually Chadian children with families. They dressed up the kids in fake bandages to make them look like orphans in need of medical attention.

They took advantage of a human rights catastrophe, took advantage of families in Chad, and then took advantage of families in France who thought that they were going to be helping Darfurian refugees start a new life.