Ganjam: An Italian couple adopted an orphan girl, Sneha, from the Utkal Balashram in Berhampur city of Ganjam district in Odisha today.

The Italian couple from Genoa were identified as Nicola Gambaro and Elisa Ubegio.

The couple took custody of the child after completing necessary formalities in presence of the district collector Vijay Amruta Kulange and District Welfare Officer.

According to reports, Sneha was rescued from an abandoned place on December 4, 2017.

After the rescue, the information was uploaded on the portal site of Central Adoption Center for adoption through the Special Adoption Agency. Later, she was declared free by the Ganjam Child Welfare Committee.

A NUMBER OF babies who died at Cork County Home were buried in the same coffins as adults, or in coffins containing amputated limbs.

The revelation is included in the final report of the Mother and Baby Homes Commission of Investigation.

The report, which was released earlier this month, confirmed that about 9,000 children died in the 18 ‘homes’ under investigation.

The Commission had difficulty in locating certain burials records, if they existed, of several institutions such as Bessborough Mother and Baby Home.

The Commission also struggled to locate burial records for Cork County Home and District Hospital, a former workhouse that was subsequently renamed St Finbarr’s Hospital.

The Covid-19 outbreak has left many newborn babies of illegal surrogate mothers stranded in Thailand because of international travel bans.

"Many babies from commercial surrogate mothers could not be given to the clients due to the Covid-19 travel ban in many countries," Dr Akom Praditsuwan, the Department of Health Service Support (HSSD), said yesterday.

The government on Friday reported 586 new Covid-19 cases, 573 local infections and 13 imported, raising the total to 22,644.

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Dr Akom said the babies were now being cared for by officials from the Ministry of Social Development and Human Security as police and other agencies tried to track down all those complicit in the illegal business to charge them with human trafficking.

The Susan Clinic, which belongs to one of the doctors alleged to have engaged in a baby-selling syndicate, has been shut down by the HeFRA, under the MOH, in collaboration with the Ghana Police Service.

The Lartebiorkorshie-based clinic owned by Dr. Hope Quarshie, was closed down for also operating without a license, which residents say has been in operation since December 31, 2020, citinewsroom.com reports.

Dr. Philip Bannor, who is the Registrar of the Health Facilities Regulatory Authority (HeFRA), said the shut down follows several attempts they made to get the facility to be properly registered.

“The last time we came here was within the last six months. We did an operation, and we found out there was no license. We have given them opportunities to comply and that has not happened that is why we have taken this measure against them,” he said to a cross-section of the media.

He further stated that their non-compliance, particularly within the era of a pandemic, poses great dangers.

The investigation into the possible role of the Dutch government in illegal adoptions from abroad between 1967 and 1998 has been completed. The report of the Intercountry Adoption Research Committee will be published on Monday 8 February. On that day, the committee will hand over the investigation to Minister for Legal Protection Sander Dekker. He commissioned an investigation into possible wrongdoing in international adoptions.

The committee focuses on adoptions from Bangladesh, Brazil, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Colombia. Illegal adoptions may have been made at that time involving Dutch government officials. Earlier, according to Dekker, it had already been shown that this may have been the case with illegal adoptions from Brazil in the 1970s and 1980s. That's why he set up the committee.

The researchers were given access to all information about the adoptions and were allowed to interrogate involved (former) officials. They also sent a questionnaire to a large number of Dutch adopted from abroad. The report was actually due on October 1, 2020, but due to the corona virus, the committee did not meet that deadline. For example, it was not possible to go abroad for research.

Tjibbe Joustra, former chairman of the Dutch Safety Board (OVV), is leading the investigation. Beatrice de Graaf and Bert-Jan Houtzagers are also on the committee. De Graaf is a terrorism expert and professor of the history of international relations at Utrecht University. Houtzagers works at the Council of State.

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Differing procedures based on faith against the Constitution

The Supreme Court on Friday asked the government to respond to a plea seeking uniform, religious and gender neutral grounds for adoption and guardianship of children in the country.

A Bench led by Chief Justice of India Sharad A. Bobde issued notice to the Centre on the plea by advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay that people of different faiths continue to follow different statutes and personal laws in matters of adoption and guardianship.

“Even after years of Independence, adoption and guardianship procedures are very complex cumbersome and neither gender nor religion neutral,” the petition said.

It said Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Jains are dealt with Hindu Adoption and Maintenance Act and Hindu Minority and Guardianship Act. Muslims, Christians and Parsis have their own personal laws. Couples belonging to different religions have to seek adoption under the JJ Act of 2000. NRIs, overseas citizens and foreign prospective adoptive parents, living in a country which is signatory to the Hague Adoption Convention and wish to adopt Indian child, need to approach an authorised foreign adoption agency or central authority subject to the Adoption Regulation of 2017.

Couples secured guardianship orders in India in 2011, with view to adopting the children in Ireland

A High Court judge has criticised a nine-year delay by the Adoption Authority of Ireland in making adoption orders for four Indian children living here since 2011 with couples anxious to adopt them.

Mr Justice John Jordan said the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption required the relevant authorities “shall act expeditiously in the process of adoption”.

In these cases, causing or allowing a delay between 2011 and 2020 “is not acting expeditiously – if that is not an understatement”, he said. Time and expedition “should be measured in weeks and months – and not in years”.

He made the comments in a judgment granting applications by the Child and Family Agency and three couples for orders authorising the authority to make adoption orders concerning the four children, aged 11-15, including two siblings.

A High Court judge has criticised a nine-year delay by the Adoption Authority of Ireland in making adoption orders for four Indian children living here since 2011 with couples anxious to adopt them.

Mr Justice John Jordan said the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption requires the relevant authorities “shall act expeditiously in the process of adoption”.

In these cases, causing or allowing a delay between 2011 and 2020 “is not acting expeditiously – if that is not an understatement”, he said. Time and expedition "should be measured in weeks and months and not in years”.

He made the comments in a judgment granting applications by the Child and Family Agency and three couples authorising the Authority to make adoption orders concerning the four children, aged between 11 and 15, including two siblings.

The children were described as “orphans” in documents from the relevant Indian authority but other documents from the same authority said they had been “abandoned”.

Globally, an estimated 580 (approximately 5-8% of couples) million people experience infertility, with more than half, 372 million in lower and middle-income countries (WHO, 2004). Africa has the largest burden of 10-32% of infertile couples (Okonofua, 2005).

On 20th January 2021, the Ghana Medical Council (MDC) and the Economic and Organized Crime Office (EOCO) issued a joint statement about the involvement of some medical practitioners, social welfare officers and individuals in what appears to be a complicated syndicate involving baby harvesting and baby selling using trusted government facilities and departments like hospitals and the department of social welfare as a conduit. The disturbing news flooded the nation’s traditional and new media as Ghanaian expressed their shock.

The MDC and EOCO needs to be commended for the painstaking and detailed undercover work from June to November 2020, which led to the subsequent arrest of some the culprits. It is our hope that, those found culpable will be made to face the full rigors of the law and not left off the hook as happens with some criminal cases so as to end the culture of impunity and to serve as a deterrent to others who may want to engage is such albeit “lucrative” illegality and inhumane acts.

While recognizing the great sacrifices and contributions of health and social workers to promote “the best interest of the child”in line with Ghana’s Children Act and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, there is an urgent need to address the emerging worrying trend of baby selling, baby stealing and missing babies which has the likelihood of entrenching the practice of baby harvesting.

To nip this emerging canker in the bud, RISE-Ghana wishes to highlight the following concerns to improve policy and practice:

Like 25 other couples, Genkenaar Christophe Claes and his husband Koen Segher have been waiting for an adopted child for much longer than average. A damning report from the Flemish Ombudsman Service now shows that their trajectory has been unfair and non-transparent. But the couple cannot count on a solution for the time being.

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