European Union: common platform for adoptions presented
Wednesday 20 February 2008
These are the fundamental points of the declaration presented by Buquicchio: the need to request the consent of the minor for adoption, where he is able to express it; the duty to assess the child's wishes and the need to listen to him in the process that decides her legal status; the obligation to have consent for the adoption of the child by the father; the extension of adoption to heterosexual couples who are not married but registered in a register of civil unions and singles.
The text highlights that the ban on international adoption cannot be the adequate solution for thousands of minors living outside the family in Europe. Preventing adoption is in stark contrast to the principle of acting in the best interest of the child enshrined in European conventions and treaties on the rights of the child. As Deputy Secretary Buquicchio pointed out, this was the case in Romania, which effectively blocked international adoption from 1 January 2005 to combat illegal adoptions - the law on child protection, in fact, provides for it only for minor whose grandfather resides abroad -. Yet the trafficking of minors would not have decreased, they say from Strasbourg, on the contrary, the Romanian criminal organizations would continue to get in touch with foreign families, willing to offer any amount in order to have a child. Countries that have already blocked international adoptions should, therefore, according to the promoters of the initiative, review their procedures and gradually reopen international adoption.
In this sense, the promoters of the initiative hope that the member governments of the European Union and the Council of Europe will collaborate in greater depth to seek safe and legitimate solutions to guarantee the right of orphans and abandoned children to have a family. A basis from which to build is the existing Community legal instruments of the European Union and the Council of Europe, but new instruments should be agreed upon if necessary. The signatories expect the Declaration to be precisely a tool to urge Governments to act in this direction, to achieve significant and immediate progress in the supreme interest of the abandoned child.