Girl, 10, 'gives birth' in Spain

[EpyonXero]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11684854

November 2010 Last updated at 08:45 ET

Girl, 10, 'gives birth' in Spain
According to official statistics, a total of 178 girls under 15 gave birth to children in 2008


A 10-year-old girl, believed to be of Romanian origin, is reported to have given birth in southern Spain.

The girl gave birth to a daughter last week in the city of Jerez de la Frontera, according to Andalusia's social affairs minister Micaela Navarro, the AP news agency reports.

The father of the baby is also believed to be a minor, aged 13, reports say.

Officials are deciding whether the mother and her family can keep custody, newspaper Diario de Sevilla reports.

The baby's grandmother was photographed in Spanish newspapers smiling outside the family's modest block of flats in the town of Lebrija, AFP reports.

Her 10-year-old daughter is reported to have moved to Spain from Romania just three weeks ago.

The woman, identified only as Olimpia, was quoted as saying that the mother was "very well, like the daughter, who is very well and very pretty".

According to the Andalucia daily, Diario de Jerez, which first reported the story, the grandmother could not understand the wide level of interest in the case as "this is the age we get married in Romania".

According to Spanish newspaper El Pais, 178 girls under the age of 15 gave birth in Spain in 2008.