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The Secretary of the Nordic Adoption Council, Ole Bergmann, has passed away

A true fiery soul has passed away.

Most of us knew Ole Bergmann as a warm-hearted, humorous and utterly wise man. There was not much Ole did not know about.

He worked in adoption for more than 35 years and was for a number of years director of DanAdopt, and until he passed away, he was secretary of the Nordic umbrella organization Nordic Adoption Council. Ole fought for what he loved until the day he died.

Ole was well-liked by everyone. He was a true Nordic voice. He could talk to everyone, no matter where they came from, yes he could even sing in Finnish.

His sudden death has shocked all colleagues both here at home and in the Nordics, and he leaves a huge void. His commitment to adoption was incomparable.

#SAVETHECHILDREN: HOW A FRINGE CONSPIRACY THEORY FUELED A MASSIVE CHILD ABUSE PANIC

Overview

A conspiratorial protest movement known as #SaveTheChildren swept across the United States, Canada, the UK, and Europe in the summer and early autumn of 2020, inspiring hundreds of in-person marches and demonstrations. The stated goal of the #SaveTheChildren campaign was to raise awareness around the horrors of “child sex trafficking,” a commonly misrepresented (although very real) problem in the United States and globally. However, much media coverage of this new movement initially failed to recognize that #SaveTheChildren was inspired by outlandish and debunked claims popularized by the online QAnon conspiracy movement; chiefly, the false notion that a “cabal” of politicians and celebrities participate in the satanic, ritual sexual abuse of children worldwide. By using social media to amplify misleading statistics and other misinformation, the #SaveTheChildren conspiracy movement contributed to an explosion of fear and anger surrounding child sex trafficking in the United States, and the proliferation of radical, conspiratorial beliefs that had previously been relegated to a relatively small, online community of conspiracy theorists.

Background

Sex trafficking – defined under U.S. law as “trafficking in which a commercial sex act is induced by force, fraud, or coercion” – is a real, troubling but commonly misunderstood problem. While the QAnon community’s understanding of the term “child sex trafficking” evokes the misleading image of children being kidnapped by strangers and then transported across statelines or international borders to be sold for sex, most real cases of sex trafficking of minors involve teenagers who are pushed to commercial sex work due to extreme poverty, abuse, or other devastating circumstances.1 In its 2020 “Trafficking in Persons 

 

Ukraine’s Propaganda War: International PR Firms, DC Lobbyists and CIA Cutouts

WASHINGTON DC — Since the Russian offensive inside Ukraine commenced on February 24, the Ukrainian military has cultivated the image of a plucky little army standing up to the Russian Goliath. To bolster the perception of Ukrainian military mettle, Kiev has churned out a steady stream of sophisticated propaganda aimed at stirring public and official support from Western countries.

The campaign includes language guides, key messages, and hundreds of propaganda posters, some of which contain fascist imagery and even praise Neo-Nazi leaders.

Behind Ukraine’s public relations effort is an army of foreign political strategists, Washington DC lobbyists, and a network of intelligence-linked media outlets.

Ukraine’s propaganda strategy earned it praise from a NATO commander who told the Washington Post, “They are really excellent in stratcom — media, info ops, and also psy-ops.” The Post ultimately conceded that “Western officials say that while they cannot independently verify much of the information that Kyiv puts out about the evolving battlefield situation, including casualty figures for both sides, it nonetheless represents highly effective stratcom.”

Key to the propaganda effort is an international legion of public relations firms working directly with Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs to wage information warfare.

Adoption: Right to Information Versus Right to Confidentiality

Abstract

The right to personal identity begins with the right to life. Therefore, the notion of individual identity and personality has been encouraged. Whenever there is question of adoption, and in particular about inter-country adoption, all the different elements that constitute the identity of the child, including not only name, nationality and family relations, but also cultural environment, must be taken into account. This chapter deals with children’s right to identity, guiding principles/policies, understanding the surrendering process, feedback from recognized adoption agencies in India and information tips for older adoptees.

US should expedite adoption of Ukrainian orphans, NC congresswoman says

A member of Congress from North Carolina has called on the Biden administration to expedite the adoption process for Ukrainian children. In a letter addressed to Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Rep. Deborah Ross urged the federal government to expand and streamline the adoption process. “We must take concrete steps to bring orphans in critical danger to safety in our country,” the Wake County Democrat wrote. “Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine has created a dire humanitarian crisis, leading millions of people to flee their homes,” Ross said. “However, children without families have been left behind with no means to evacuate Ukraine’s war-torn cities, making them particularly vulnerable to the resource constraints and violence rampant throughout Ukraine.” She added Russian advances could block adopted children from coming to the United States, noting that President Vladimir Putin banned American adoptions from Russia nearly a decade ago. The call for an expedited process came as Ukraine fights to halt an invasion by Russian forces. Hundreds of Ukrainian people have been killed by Russian bombs, while millions have hidden in underground shelters or fled the nation, the Associated Press reported.

In the letter, Ross urged the federal government to appeal to the Ukrainian government and gain permission for the U.S. embassy in Warsaw, Poland, to issue expedited visas for Ukrainian children already in the adoption process with U.S. families. Since the war began, more than 2 million people have fled to Poland, which borders parts of western Ukraine, according to the AP. Ross said the federal government should also work with Ukraine to allow families in the adoption process to attend court at the Ukrainian embassy in Washington, D.C., instead of in Ukraine. She added that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services should work with the State Department to “streamline humanitarian parole applications in conjunction with normal visa-issuing procedures.” “To be clear, the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security should by no means compromise vetting standards for organizations that work with orphans or prospective parents in the interest of moving children out of Ukraine quickly,” Ross said. “I ask that the federal government maintain all necessary protocols to ensure unaccompanied children do not face trafficking, exploitation, or abuse.” The Friday letter came nearly a week after Ross shared concerns about the safety of orphans stranded by the war. “With everything going on, we really have to highlight this and show that we can make a difference in these children’s lives,” she told MSNBC’s Ayman Mohyeldin. “There are loving families in the United States who are ready to welcome them.”

How the Christian Church and U.S. Government Work Together to Traffick Children Worldwide Through the Lucrative Adoption Busines

The European Adoption Consultants (EAC) is a business that was set up in 1991 by then President George H.W. Bush and Bill Barr, his Attorney General.

This agency has been caught numerous times in its 41-year history trafficking children by fooling parents in poor countries with financial incentives, like promising an education for their children abroad, and then placing them in Christian orphanages where American families will pay a high price to adopt the children.

These families willingly buy these children because in most cases they have been lied to, stating that the children were either orphans, or that their parents did not want them, when the truth was that these children were kidnapped for financial gain.

CNN actually did an investigation on the EAC in 2017, interviewing parents who had been lied to about their adopted children, and then found out from the children themselves that they had parents back in their home country who loved them. This is still up on YouTube: https://youtu.be/jeuSgtFepwE

I am certainly not a fan of CNN, nor Anderson Cooper and his known ties to the CIA, but this is undoubtedly one of the best investigative reports they have ever done, even if it was politically motivated.

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Director for EU Affairs Ambassador Faruk Kaymakc? paid an official visit to Brussels

Paying an official visit to Brussels Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Director for EU Affairs Ambassador Faruk Kaymakc? attended the 79th Türkiye-EU Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) Meeting and held a string of meetings with high level EU Officials between 16-18 March 2022.

On the first day of the Brussels programme, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Director for EU Affairs Ambassador Faruk Kaymakc? held meetings with Oliver Varhelyi, EU Commission Neighborhood and Enlargement Commissioner, Mariya Gabriel, EU Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth and Nacho Sanchez Amor, the European Parliament Türkiye Rapporteur.

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Director for EU Affairs Ambassador Faruk Kaymakc? also came together with Ylva Johansson and European Commissioner for Home Affairs, Simon Mordue, Chief Foreign Policy Advisor to the President of the European Council Charles Michel, Themis Christophidou, European Commission Director-General for Education, Youth, Sports and Culture, Charles Fries, Deputy Secretary-General in charge of the Common Security and Defence Policy and Crisis Response,

On the last day of the programme Deputy Minister Ambassador Kaymakc? came together with Marie Arena, European Parliament Subcommittee on Human Rights Chair and Fernando Andresen Guimaraes, Diplomatic Advisor in the cabinet of President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.

Adopted child to take caste of single mother: Bombay High Court

The Bombay High Court said that the adopted child will take the caste of single mother and authorities cannot insist on the caste certificate of father.

The Bombay High Court has directed the administration to issue a caste certificate to the adopted son of a single mother, assigning him the same caste as her.

The woman had adopted a boy from an orphanage in the Tardeo area of Mumbai. At the time of adoption, the 5-year-old boy was called Pappu and the identity of his biological parents was not known. According to procedure, the woman had applied for registration of birth in the record of the Municipal Corporation and the certificate was issued in 2010 which showed the woman as the mother.

Since the woman was from “Hindu Mahyavanshi” caste, which is a scheduled caste, she applied for issuance of boy’s caste certificate to the deputy district collector. However, the authority, in 2016 rejected the application on the grounds that documents of the caste of the boy’s father were not submitted and so the boy was not entitled to get a caste certificate.

Aggrieved by the order, she approached the District Caste Certificate Scrutiny Committee in Mumbai City, which dismissed the appeal in 2017 and confirmed the order passed by the deputy district collector.

‘We were human beings’: UK families seek apology over historic forced adoptions

Liz Harvie was 16 years old when she discovered her name was actually Claire Watts.

Sitting on the sofa of her childhood home, on a tree-lined street in a Birmingham suburb, she had just been given a sheet of paper containing the first chapter of her life.

The document said “Claire”, a “compact baby” with a “pale complexion” and “light auburn hair”, had been born at a Northampton hospital in January 1974 and then put up for adoption.

It also included descriptions of her birth parents: Yvonne, a “neat”, “articulate” and “quite attractive” telephonist who liked swimming, reading and knitting, and Andrew, a “well-built” wireless operator who liked rugby and tropical fish.

“It was mind-blowing,” said Harvie, now 48. “I was reading about a different person born in a different part of the country. Technically, it was me.”