Adoption fraud victims denounce investigation: "Only white men and women in panel"

THE NEWSPAPER A large-scale investigation into adoption fraud in Flanders will start at the end of this week. However, even before the expert panel meets for the first time, problems arise. The victims find the panel anything but independent and feel they have passed. "People are trying to push us aside."

At the end of April, 17-year-old Thereza De Wannemaeker from Denderleeuw testified in this newspaper about the fraud that occurred during her adoption from Ethiopia. Following her testimony, other Ethiopian adoptive children and their parents also abandoned anonymity stories of fraud. They gave poignant examples of biological parents who were wrongly declared dead, children who were pressured to lie about their age, and boys and girls who were wrongly presented as siblings.

In response to the flow of stories, MEP Lorin Parys (N-VA) urged then Minister of Welfare Jo Vandeurzen (CD&V) to put together an expert panel that could conduct an independent investigation into all possible cases of intercountry adoption fraud in Flanders. In the new coalition agreement, that plan was ratified and almost 60,000 euros were made available for it. This Friday the time has finally come: the panel will meet for the first time and the investigation will officially start

Strange things

Victims fraud angry about composition of expert panel

The investigation into adoption fraud with which the Flemish government is starting this week is already under attack. Victims complain that they were not involved in the composition of the expert panel, while that was promised. They fear a sham.

On Friday, the starting shot will be given for a large-scale investigation into intercountry adoption fraud. This was ordered just before the elections by the then Flemish Minister for Welfare Jo Vandeurzen (CD&V), after this newspaper had brought testimony about tampering in Ethiopian adoption files. Flanders wants to check whether mistakes have been made in recent decades and how they can be avoided in the future. It was promised that victims of the fraud and other adopted persons would play an important role in this.

However, it now appears that last summer an expert panel was put together in all silence, in which no experienced expert sits. "You are trying to push us aside", 23 adopted people reacted angrily in a letter to current welfare minister Wouter Beke (CD&V). "Moreover, we note that the Flemish Center for Adoption will play a leading role in research. That is extremely problematic. ”The VCA may have made mistakes in recent years and should therefore be kept very far from the investigation, according to the signatories. Minister Beke says he "appreciates" the letter and thinks it is a good idea to include experience experts in the expert panel. He emphasizes that the research will indeed be conducted independently and that the SCC has a purely supporting function.

Dutch:

Building Bridges

“Building Bridges between Belgium & India for Adoptees - A final call”

Lieve mensen, Het heeft me wat tijd gekost om na de terugkeer deze tekst te kunnen schrijven. Zoveel indrukken en emoties, het doet een mens toch wel wat. Het was voor mij de tweede keer dat ik India bezocht. Deze keer met een doel dat ook meer was dan reizen en verkennen. Het project “Building Bridges” ligt me na aan het hart, natuurlijk in de eerste plaats door mijn persoonlijk verhaal. Maar zeker ook door de ervaring van de laatste 2 jaar dat mijn verhaal met zovele anderen gedeeld wordt en ook deze anderen op muren botsen als ze naar hun roots op zoek gaan. Ik was dan ook erg blij dat Pia, onze adoptiecoach haar schouders met hart en ziel onder dit project heeft gezet, waarvoor mijn dank.

Ik hoop dat mijn verhaal kan helpen bij jullie eigen zoektocht, op welke manier dan ook: praktische tips, modelbrieven, persoonlijke ervaring,.. Door de meetings in Mumbai is alvast een eerste steen gelegd. Er is al een goed bewustzijn, beleid en methodiek om geadopteerden te helpen bij hun zoektocht. Veel hangt af van de adoptiediensten. Mijn persoonlijke zoektocht leverden enkele belangrijke antwoorden op, maar er zijn minstens evenveel vraagtegens bijgekomen. Stap voor stap komen we toch dichter bij ons doel: de weg is iets meer geopend, ook al is die nog zeer lang.

Ik schrijf mijn verhaal in dagboekstijl. Voor de formele en praktische elementen verwijs ik naar de bijlagen. Er volgt in de nabije toekomst een officieel rapport dat aan betrokken diensten en overheden zal worden bezorgd. Ik benadruk dat dit mijn persoonlijk verhaal rond deze reis. Voor iedereen zal dit anders zijn.

Cologne -

It was the desire of the couple from the Cologne area to adopt a child. In Thailand, they found happiness in a home, as they thought. With support from the Provincial Youth Office, the couple returned with a 5-year-old girl back to Germany. After only about two weeks, the couple refrained from adopting again. And did not expect the follow-up costs.

The authorities presented the Cologne namely a hefty bill. From now on, they should pay for the placement of the child in Germany. At 100 euros per day, the costs amount, the amount must be paid for a period of six years. The result is a total of 219,000 euros. The couple filed a lawsuit against the district court.

The plaintiffs had stated that because of the child's eye-catching behavior, they were unable to continue with their adoption. The youth welfare office had deceived them in the mediation, concealed the mental problems of the child. They also assumed that they would have to pay a maximum of six months for further child-care.

Cologne: Child was already behaving in Thailand

Incredibly, out of the more than 20 million orphans in India, less than 1% even make it to orphanages. #ImpactThatMatters #SupremeCourt

Out of the 20 million orphans in India, less than 1% are in orphanages. 117 districts in India do not have a single orphanage. (Source: MWCD Trackchild-Child Care Institutions in 2015). However, even those who make it there aren’t any better off.

Made of cotton, this bag is sturdy and can hold up to 8 kg at a time. Keep this bag in your backpack or car and you will never reach for plastic again!

A glaring example of this came to light in May 2018 when young girls between the ages of 7-17 suffered rampant sexual abuse over many months at an orphanage in Muzaffarpur, Bihar.

Additionally, orphanages arbitrate over giving these children a name, caste certificate and everything else. Maharashtra is currently the only state in India that does this, in addition to providing orphans with a 1 per cent reservation in government jobs.

Vacancies and internships

Vacancies

There are currently no vacancies at Fiom.

Internships

Research internship 'Distance for adoption and foundlings international'

AHMEDABAD: Continuing probe of the child-bride (https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/child-bride) sale incident, a video

of which had gone viral pushing the social justice department to act, has revealed that the 10-year-old’s father was a jobless

labourer. His desperation for money to feed his family was exploited by a village agent who arranged a ‘marriage’ of his

daughter, against Rs 50,000, to a 37-year-old Ahmedabad man. A team from Ahmedabad city women’s crime branch had on

Tuesday raided a house in Asarwa, rescued the girl and sent her to a women’s protection home in Odhav. Hadad police is

Officials swing into action to stop the sale of the baby

Even as the government is making efforts to protect girl children, incidents of baby selling and abandonment of female babies are continuing.

In a fresh such incident, the father of a female baby reportedly tried to sell his daughter at Chinavutapalli village in Krishna district on Thursday. However, the family members objected to it.

According to sources, Rajitha, wife of Rajesh, gave birth to female twins a week ago in a private hospital. Rajesh said that he cold not afford to bring up the two girls and was making efforts to sell one of the infants.

“In the last few days, a few couples visited the hospital and had a look of the infants. They said they wanted to take the baby, for which I objected,” said Rajitha’s father Savanadhri.

During the course of the investigation, hundreds of children have lost out on their education as several of them were sent back to their poverty-ridden lives

Exonerating Muslim orphanages in Kerala of child trafficking charges going back to 2014, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has filed a closure report in the Ernakulam Chief Judicial Magistrate Court.In the report submitted to the court, CBI has stated that parents and guardians of minor children had insisted that they had sent their children to Kerala hoping that they would get educated, free food and other facilities free of cost. In the report, they have stated that “no kind of exploitation was noticed by any witness”.The sensational case saw the Railway Police detaining 589 children — who had arrived in two trains from Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal —in May 2014 at the Palakkad Junction railway station. All the detained children were from extremely poor families and the majority of them did not have documents to prove their identity. However, some of the children had identity cards of Mukkam Muslim Orphanage in Kozhikode.Even when the children had been detained, the orphanage authorities had stated that some of these children were orphans and some others were there with parental permission as they were sent to Kerala hoping that they would get better education and care. The Kerala State Minority Commission said insisted then that no trafficking was involved.It was then alleged by a few child rights activists and Central agencies that it was a case of child trafficking as none of them possessed the mandatory documents such as admission papers and certificates related to birth, age, income. Eight persons too had been arrested in the case and were released on bail only nine months later.When the case did not make much progress, the Kerala High Court ordered a CBI investigation into the multi-state case in July 2015. After fours years, it has been found that it was a false alarm and a case of persecution of Muslim orphanages due to the prevailing anti-Muslim rhetoric.The case shook political circles in Kerala after the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) had alleged ‘prejudice’ while filing the FIR. Former Kerala BJP president and the current MoS Parliamentary Affairs V Muraleedharan was one of the first to demand a CBI enquiry. Even the then Union minister for women and child development Maneka Gandhi had said it was a clear case of child trafficking and she had sought a report from the state government, which was then headed by Congress-backed United Democratic Front (UDF).During the course of the investigation, CBI officials found that Idris Alam, one of the cooks at an orphanage, had admitted his daughter and son at Mukkam Muslim Orphanage and Manassery Muslim orphanage respectively in Kozhikode. His wife was also working in the orphanage as a cleaner. During their summer vacations when they went back to Bihar and Jharkhand, their neighbours and relatives, who are all daily wage labourers, requested the couple to take their children as well since most of them had at least seven children each.

Bathinda, October 17

The minor pregnant rape victim has given birth to a baby girl at Women and Children Hospital here. A day after the delivery, the newborn was handed over to the District Child Welfare Committee.

The mother and the infant are healthy after a normal delivery that took place two days ago at the hospital. The infant weighs around 3.8 kg which is a sign of a healthy baby, said a doctor.

Sukhjinder Singh Gill, Senior Medical Officer, Women and Children Hospital, Bathinda, said, “Since both mother and infant were healthy, the latter has been handed over to the District Child Welfare Committee on family members’ request. Now, they will follow up the process of child’s adoption further.”

Talking to Bathinda Tribune, Ravneet Sidhu, District Child Protection Officer, said, “Since the newborn has been surrendered by the mother and her family, she will be under observation for two months at the child adoption agency. Thereafter, we will seek approval for her adoption from the local court before the process of adoption can be initiated. It seems that adoption will take a few months. During the two-month period, parents or family members of the baby can claim the child after which (if they don’t) we will initiate the process of adoption.”