A mother faces losing her 10-year-old son after she locked him alone in their home with only dry rice to eat and vanished for eight days with their dog.
Little Mikhail was taken to hospital and mum Natalya Azarenkova was been detained by Russian police after the tot shouted for help.
He alerted neighbours when he shouted from his flat in an apartment block in Peredelkino, Moscow. His door was locked from the outside and he begged them not to call the emergency services because he feared he would be sent to an orphanage and never see his mother again.
Starving Mikhail told how she had left him rice - but no water to cook it - after saying she was going to walk their dog. During her absence, the 31-year-old mum appears to have looked after
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