'I was convinced I had been given wrong baby in 1986 – when I finally traced my real son they told me he was dead': Bittersweet ending to Russian mother's 27-year quest

A Russian mother convinced she had been given the wrong baby at a hospital is suing health officials after she finally managed to organise a DNA test - and discovered her suspicion was correct. Flera Fazlyeva, 54, from the city of Kazan in the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia, gave birth at hospital where her son was accidentally swapped with another baby boy born around the same time in 1986. After discovering the truth, Ms Fazlyeva contacted Razia Fakarova who had been given her son by mistake. But tragically, Ms Fazlyeva found that her real son, who had been named Aidar, had died in 2004 in a car accident when he was 18. She said: 'I was at the hospital on July 3, 1986. I knew as soon as they put the baby in my arms that something was not right. 'I told them then that they had given me the wrong baby and refused to take it, but then a nurse and a doctor came to me and explained to me that it was impossible, as the baby had been given a special tag right after birth. 'They pointed out that tag and told me it was just because I was tired after the ordeal of giving birth. They said that the baby and I would eventually bond. 'I couldn't shake off the feeling though, and my family didn't believe me either. We had a meeting where we decided that as we couldn't afford any medical test to check if my feeling was right, I would have to accept the baby, and I raised him as my own. 'By the time I learned about the possibility of a postal DNA test and that we could afford it, it did not give me any satisfaction when it confirmed my suspicions, and it didn't give me back my real son. 'In fact, it took years of pressure for me to track down the mother of my boy. I couldn't believe it when she told me that Aidar had died in 2004.' The son she had raised, Ilshat, now aged 27, has now met his real mother but said he did not feel any emotional connection to her. He admits he now feels lost and confused about the whole saga. He said: 'I always felt as if my mother who raised me was distant in some way, although she always did her best for me. Yet now I know that my real mother was someone else I don't feel that connection to her.' Razia Fakarova, 56, the biological mother of Ilshat, added: 'I lost my son and I buried him but with this bizarre twist I then found that actually it wasn't even my son I buried - but then I was presented with a stranger and they are telling me this is my boy.