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A cruel witchdoctor who carried out female genital mutilation on a one-year-old girl is believed to have fled Ireland after carrying out the horror act.

The woman from East Africa vanished after gardai began probing the barbaric butchery on the little child in south Dublin.

The child’s parents, a married African couple, were jailed in January for the mutilation of their daughter in the first case of its kind in Ireland’s history.

Last night a senior source said: “Detectives believe someone was brought in to carry out this awful act. The child could have died.

“The parents would not accept the child was mutilated and claimed she had fallen on a toy. They completely denied the mutilation in interviews.

“Detectives from two garda stations on the south of the city who carried out the investigation believe a quack doctor carried out the butchery - the couple had hired her to do it.

“At one stage detectives thought this person was hiding in Tallaght, but that lead proved to be a dead end.

“It’s understood this witchdoctor, understood to be from East Africa, fled the country when the alarm was raised.

“It’s a common, but horrific practice, to carry out this procedure on little girls from certain African countries. Gardai believe this witchdoctor would probably have carried out several such acts.

“It is part of the culture in parts of East Africa and immigrants to Ireland have been hiring such women to carry out the butchery, carrying on the terrible tradition.”

The child’s parents were found guilty last month at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to carrying out an act of FGM on the then 21-month-old girl at an address in Dublin on September 16th, 2016.

The 37-year-old man and 27-year-old woman were also found guilty of child cruelty on the same day. They cannot be named to protect the identity of the child.

The father was sentenced to five and a half years and the mother to four years and nine months.

FGM was criminalised in Ireland in 2012 and carries a maximum sentence of 14 years imprisonment.

The procedure sees the female genitals deliberately cut, injured or changed when there is no medical reason for this to be done.

The State did not argue that the couple had carried out FGM themselves, but had “aided and abetted, counselled or procured” it.

The trial heard that they had attended a hospital with their daughter and asked for help because she was bleeding from the genital area.

They had claimed the child had sustained her injuries by falling backwards onto a toy while not wearing a nappy.

The parents’ version of events was disputed by several medical experts.

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Gardaí­ were notified and carried out a search of the accused’s family home.

The court heard the child would have gone into shock within 20 hours had her bleeding not been stopped.

The parents came to Ireland in 2008. The woman is a naturalised Irish citizen, while the man faces a deportation order. They had no previous convictions.

The couple’s three children are now in the care of the mother’s sister.

An estimated 5,800 women and girls in Ireland have undergone FGM, with human rights charities warning that another 2,700 are at risk.