A top European political body is to investigate claims of stolen babies at birth in a Ukrainian city. The case has already been reported among three mothers.

"People are afraid to even give birth now," says Kharkiv campaigner Tatyana Zakharova.

Ruth-Gaby Vermot-Mangold, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (Pace) rapporteur, will be visiting a Ukrainian hospital to meet and speak with the victims, including Ms Zakharova and some Ukrainian officials.

The trip will also take her to the capital of Kiev, amid reports that babies are being snatched at birth in other Ukrainian cities as well.

The reports of such baby thefts go back as far as to the autumn of 2002 but the case achieved wider publicity last year after MPs from across Europe tabled a motion at the Pace, which brings together 46 countries.

The Council of Europe team is due to be in the Ukraine to compile a report that will then be handed to the Parliamentary Assembly about the three cases.