Anita Gradin was the Swedish Commissioner. Danielsson worked in her Cabinet on children issues.

Gradin was the Head of the Swedish adoption authority mid eighties.

Stockholm 1996

World congress against the sexual exploitation of children

The first international congress dealing with the problem of the sexual exploitation of children for profit was held in Stockholm from 27 to 31 August. The initiative for the meeting came from ECPAT (End Child Prostitution in Asian Tourism), working in collaboration with the Swedish government, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and a group of NGOs supporting the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The congress was attended by government representatives from most of the UN countries, participants from various international and regional organisations (including the UN Centre for Human Rights, the International Labour Organisation, the World Health Organisation, UNESCO, UNHCR and Interpol), NGOs, health professionals and media representatives from across the globe.

Nine year old Marinela forced to sexual services for one dollar a time by

her 18 year old girl pimp outside the Bucharest railway station is but one

example of thousands of children exploited in the world today, said EU

Commissioner Anita Gradin when taking part in the opening of the UN world

Congress against sexual exploitation of children in Stockholm, August 27.

Aid director found dead

The Irish Times

The Irish Times

November 24, 1995

From Russia (or China or Peru or Bucharest) with love
by Geraldine Sherman
 

(Toronto Life November, 1995)

ALISON PENTLAND-FOLK labours tirelessly in the bizarre, looking-glass world of international adoption, trying to unite babies from foreign countries with Canadians desperate to become parents. The people she sees, mostly couples in their early forties, have endured years of marriage-straining infertility. Many delayed having children until they established their careers, then found it was too late. A generation ago, these couples would have had little trouble adopting in Toronto. Today, the demand for babies far outstrips the local supply. About 22,000 couples, and hundreds of single people, sit on adoption agency waiting lists for an average of six years. More than half the babies and toddlers Canadians adopt, about 2,500 a year, come from outside the country.

Alison's two children, Colin and Madeleine, born in Romania in the early 1990s, became part of her family through complex transactions involving social workers, lawyers, governments on two continents, and substantial sums of money. "We're all survivors," Alison says. "It makes for an incredible family." As a member of SPARK -- Support for Parents Adopting & Raising World Kids -- she regularly invites prospective parents to her west end home for a crash course in how the system works.

She sits on a low stool in her living room, within reach of several boxes of reference material. Surrounding her are six couples. The women settle in, but several men perch on the arms of their chairs, as if ready to bolt. "Be honest," she begins, "how many of you fought with your spouse on the way here?" Everyone giggles. She assures them conflict is normal. There's usually one partner who still dreams of a biological family.

An article in the QLD Sunday Mail dated Aug 27 1995 alleges that baby selling was being carried out in Queensland.

In the article two women one a natural mother and the other other an adoptive mother tell their stories of how the matron of St Marys Home at Towoong deliberately broke the laws of the time and sold babies to adoptive parents for the sum of fifty pounds or in todays equivalent $100.

The matron Ivy McGregor forced mothers to sign adoption papers before the birth of their babies and then arranged adoptions of newborns to adoptive parents outside Australia.

One 16 year said that she was sent home from the hospital after the birth without seeing her baby. She only saw the baby when she was taken back to the hospital to hand the baby over to the adoptive parents. She recalls the look of compassion at her distress from the adoptive mother when she handed over the child.

The matron then told her to look out the window and watch the adoptive parents take the child away.

UNDER SUSPICION

John Davies is a hero to some adoptive parents, a baby-selling profiteer to many governments

BRUCE WALLACE

At the very least, John Davies doesn’t look like the baby seller so many people make him out to be. People who traffic in children are supposed to be shadowy figures with suspicious eyes, living by furtive movements that make them difficult for police and journalists to track down. John Davies is a warm, welcoming bear of a man. He opens his home to visitors. He answers every question asked about his activities in an articulate, soft-spoken manner. He has an address on the Internet.

To those people who have adopted children out of eastern Europe with Davies’ help, the British-born Anabaptist minister is even a hero. “While governments conspire to make the eye of the needle even smaller for international adoptions, Davies thumbs his nose at bureaucrats and tries to break their cartel,” says one New York City businessman who adopted a Romanian child through Davies. “It has made him enemies in high places, but I think he is sort of like Indiana Jones, an entrepreneur.” Davies, who has lived in Romania since 1991, says that he is simply an advocate of children’s rights and a sworn opponent of government-controlled adoptions. That process, he maintains, is too slow and follows national political interests (such as China’s tendency to put mostly girls up for foreign adoptions) rather than the interests of children.

Arguments of Amsterdam Court of Appeal of Adopting Child to Single Mother 'Selective' Court set aside law for non-existent right to adoption

The First Multiple Family Room of the Amsterdam Court of Appeal has lightly set aside the law. In fact, the chamber composed of the masters Willems-Morsink, De Vreeze-Oostvogel and Streefkerk has allowed the adoption by a single person to sabotage the law and manipulate it with human rights ....

From our reporter

Victor Lebesque

AMSTERDAM

I. INTERNATIONAL ADOPTION PROCESS IN SPAIN

REQUIREMENTS TO PROSPECTIVE ADOPTIVE PARENTS

According to regulations in Spain (Article 175 of ?21/1987) the candidate-adopter must be at least 25 years old. When married couples apply to adopt, it is enough for one of the parents to be at least 25 years old.

In any case, the adoptive parent must be at least 14 years older than the adopted child.

The recommended age difference is into account in the time of home study preparing which is no more than 40 years difference between the candidate-adopter and adopted child. Exceptions can be allowed in case of adoption of children with special needs.

Barnardo's children recall hard times

Independent, The (London),  Jun 27, 1995  by GLENDA COOPER

Amigoe

09-05-1995

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