Girl 'witch' to be thrown into river, court told

LONDON - A schoolgirl told a British court on Thursday she was put into a laundry bag and was going to be thrown from a third-floor apartment window into a river by her mother and aunt who thought she was a witch.

Prosecutors say the girl, brought to London from Angola by a woman claiming to be her mother, had been regularly abused by members of her family after they had become convinced she was putting curses on members of her family.

The court has heard the abuse culminated in a plan by her 38-year-old "mother" and another woman, Sita Kisanga, 35, who says she is the girl's aunt, to kill her.

"They put me in a bag and said they would throw me away," the girl, sitting next to a large teddy bear, told police in a videoed interview shown to London's Old Bailey court.

"They called my uncle and they all started slapping me. They were going to throw me into water. They were going to throw me off the third floor where my auntie lived," she said.

The girl, who can't be named for legal reasons, has already told how she was starved, beaten, cut with a knife and had chilli pepper rubbed into her eyes during months of torture.

The mother and aunt are accused of conspiracy to murder. They and two other defendants have also been charged with child cruelty.

All four deny the charges and the trial continues.

- REUTERS