Interpol search for Romanian children adopted abroad
29 September 2006 Oana Craciun, Cristina Hurdubaia | 0 comments | 948 views
Rating: 1 votes
Romanian investigators have asked for Interpol's help to track down children sent for adoption abroad instead of others.
Children adopted only on paper in the 1990s by several foreign families and their possible substitutes are being sought not only by Romanian prosecutors and police officers, but also through Interpol. Prosecutors from the Criminal Investigation and Forensic Section of the General Prosecutor's Office, together with officers from the Criminal Investigations Department of the General Inspectorate of Police (IGP), are investigating the situation of the 11 children who are known to have remained in Romania, never reached their foreign families, but who were replaced by others.
Representatives of the Prosecutor's Office informed us that the prosecutors have requested the Ministry of Administration and Interior (MAI) to communicate the border points through which 11 children destined for international adoptions are said to have left the country.
Advertisement
At the same time, the identification data of the people who accompanied them and the declared destination upon leaving the country were also requested. Interpol's mission is to verify whether the adopted minors are currently with the families who adopted them on paper and not in Romania, as is actually suspected. To date, the accredited foundations and associations that carried out the adoption mediation activities for the 11 children have not been identified, the prosecutors of the General Prosecutor's Office also said.
First there were 40
The scandal of children exchanged before the border broke out last year, in October. Then, Theodora Bertzi, secretary of state at the Romanian Adoption Office (ORA), received information from all over the country that 40 children who should have arrived in the 90s with families in France, Italy or the USA actually remained in Romania, some even with their natural families. After further investigations by the Prosecutor's Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, in January 2006, the ORA received confirmation that in 11 of the cases, the children had been replaced with others and substitutes had crossed the border in the names of those who were to be officially adopted. Bertzi stated that, in order to take the children out of the country, the passports of those who had never left were used and that the minors who arrived in their place may be "stolen or missing children". Theodora Bertzi claims that the transfer across the border could have been done quite easily, considering that "up to the age of 14, a child does not have a photo on any official document, and the adopted children were babies."
The authorities say that they have never encountered such a situation before and that is why they have asked the Prosecutor General's Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to find out exactly who is to blame.