The newly appointed special advocate for survivors of institutional abuse brings an unshowy sense of determination to her mission

Patricia Carey was born in a mother and baby home, and then adopted, but it was not something she talked about when she became chief executive of the Adoption Authority of Ireland more than four decades later.

“I made a conscious decision when I worked for the adoption authority not to discuss my own personal origins,” she says. “I didn’t want it to colour my professionalism.”

But when taking up the new role of special advocate for survivors of institutional abuse in March this year, Carey felt it was important to share that she had been born in Bessborough Mother and Baby Home, Co Cork, in 1971. She believes it gives her “a little bit of an edge” in understanding this particular part of Ireland’s dark, yet very recent, social history.

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MUMBAI: Bombay high court on Thursday allowed a couple from Hyderabad to meet their 7-month-old adoptive child, who was allegedly trafficked, at a children’s home in Mahalaxmi three hours daily for six days a week. 

Vacation bench of Justices Sandeep Marne and Neela Gokhale modified their order, passed on Tuesday, that had allowed them visitation rights for 12 hours daily. 

“Accordingly it is directed that petitioners shall have the right to visit the child between 3 pm and 6 pm every day from Mon to Sat,” they added. 

The couple had filed a habeas corpus petition to direct the Child Welfare Committee to produce the child and hand over her custody to them. Their petition said that since their marriage in 2015, the wife had three miscarriages. Her aunt introduced them to a couple from Visakhapatnam who wanted to give the fifth child up for adoption. 

On Sept 23, both parties executed a deed of adoption and the seven-day-old baby was brought home. Since then the couple has taken care of her. On April 29 a team from Mumbai Crime Branch–Unit II “forcibly” took the baby away. They informed that the aunt was arrested in an FIR registered at Vikhroli police station for trafficking. 

GRONINGEN - The Public Prosecution Service is prosecuting 19-year-old Jamesley S. from Warffum for the murder of his 17-year-old ex-girlfriend Jet from the Groningen village of Winsum. The Public Prosecution Service found Snapchat videos on his phone that showed the young man had made a plan to kill the girl. On February 21, he waited for Jet in Winsum for an hour. When she was near her parental home, he stabbed her in the back without saying anything.

This was announced on Thursday during a first preliminary hearing in the criminal case in the Groningen court. Jamesley S. has confessed. Jet allegedly wanted to end her relationship with Jamesley S., but according to the Public Prosecution Service, "no motive has yet been found" during the investigation.

That one stab was fatal for Jet. She was found seriously injured on the AS Blécourtlaan and died shortly afterwards. Jamesley, in addition to the knife, also appeared to have taken a full-face helmet, ski goggles and a bag of clothing to Winsum. He was quickly arrested and confessed that he had killed Jet.

During the first session, a visibly affected Jamesley S. remained silent. He seemed intimidated by the full room with emotional relatives and friends of Jet, a camera crew and many journalists writing.

Harveer Dabas

Bijnor: After two children — Chirag (12), a student of class 4, and his neighbour Mahir (4) — were found murdered in Ketwali Pandki in Amroha district on Wednesday, Chirag’s 15-year-old adopted sister, who is also his cousin, turned out to be his killer, police said on Sunday.

Chirag’s father, Raju Saini, had adopted his sister’s daughter 15 years ago when he had no child. However, later his wife bore two children.

Amroha SP Kunwar Anupam Singh said, “We detained the deceased’s sister who confessed to her crime. She is not Chirag’s biological sister, so he used to taunt her. On May 8, when her parents were out for agricultural work, Chirag taunted her again. She struck him with a stick on his neck, causing him to collapse unconscious, after which she strangled him to death. She hid her brother’s body behind a heap of bricks. Cops recovered the rope and stick used in the crime.

”The body of Mahir was exhumed on Friday. Cops are still determining the cause of his death.

It is one thing to love a child you have given birth to or adopted, and quite another to love and care for someone who may be with you for only a few months or years. This Mother’s Day, three foster carers talk to Neha Bhayana about why it’s important to take in children who would otherwise languish in a shelter or orphanage.

‘His parents are missing but till then I get the joy of raising him’ Leela Jedia | Has one foster child. This Mother’s Day is special for Leela Jedia. The Chittorgarh-based government school teacher had yearned to be a mother for years. Her wish came true on January 10 when she got six-year-old Rihaan* home from a local institution through a foster-care scheme. Rihaan’s biological parents have gone missing, so the district authorities had decided to place him with a foster family. States are slowly trying to deinstitutionalize care for children who are not eligible for adoption as it is considered better for the child’s development to live in a family set-up.

Leela knows Rihaan may be taken away from her someday, but she is happy to be his mom till then. “If he is reunited with his parents, it will be good. But till then, I feel blessed to experience the joy of raising a child. He has completed our family. Hear him say ‘mamma’ is a beautiful feeling,” says the 55-yearold, adding that they will be happy to have him forever if his parents are not found. The Jedias had applied to adopt a child but they have been on the wait-list for years. When they learnt about kids who spend years in shelters because they are not eligible for adoption or are not getting adopted, they approached the Foster Care Society, Udaipur, for support.Now, when Leela returns from work every evening, Rihaan runs to open the door and the duo then spends the evening playing and doing homework. Rihaan knew very little compared to most six-year-olds, so Leela has been teaching him colours, the names of fruits and vegetables as well as basic manners like not making noise while chewing food. “I cook different subzis daily as I want him to develop a taste for all vegetables. He is not fond of sweets though, unless we get his favourite gulaab jamun,” she says.

They have enrolled Rihaan in a reputed English-medium school and engaged a tuition teacher as well to help him reach on par with other kids in his class. Leela hopes to bring home one more child, ideally a girl, via adoption or foster care. “All couples who are financially stable should foster a child, even if they have biological children. Children who stay in orphanages have to move out when they turn 18. At that point, they have to suddenly face the world outside. When they are with a family, we educate them, teach them good values, and make them competent enough to live in the world,” she says. “Hum ek bache ki life bana sakte hai and khud bhi maa baap hone ka sukh pa sakte hai (we can make a child’s life better and also experience the joy of being parents.)”

‘We have raised five children. We can love one more’ Liji Thomas | Has 5 biological children and 1 foster child Most couples feel overwhelmed with the responsibility of even one or two children. But Kozhikode residents Liji and Bijo Thomas felt blessed to have five kids. In fact, when their eldest daughter — she is 25 and their youngest is 13 — got married and moved to Kanpur last year, Liji felt a void. Since they are not eligible to adopt as they already have biological children, they applied for foster care via the District Child Protection Unit (DCPU) and brought a 12-year-old boy home in January after due procedures. Seventeen children have been placed in long-term foster care in Kozhikode so far. Sahil’s* parents were unable to care for him due to confidential reasons and had voluntarily put him in a government-run children’s home four years ago. They gave consent for placing him in foster care too. Liji is happy they got the opportunity to look after Sahil. “We have the experience and the resources which come from parenting five children so we thought why not take in one more child and let him also benefit from what we had learned over the years. A child growing up in an institution has very little chance of understanding how society or family functions. If you do not experience love when you are growing up, you will never be able to give love,” she says.

Abstract

In 2018, the Ethiopian government banned intercountry adoptions due to detected irregularities. This paper draws from the experiences of Spanish adoptive families, providing evidence of these irregularities and other abuses substantiated by adoptive families during their “search for origins” or reconnection with their children’s birth families. We argue that these searches and contacts within the adoptive triad represent informal reparative initiatives among Spanish adoptive families.

SEOUL, May 10 (Yonhap) -- The government plans to establish a state-led adoption system to better ensure the well-being of adoptees and reduce the number of children adopted overseas, health ministry officials said Friday.

The announcement of the adoption system reform comes ahead of the scheduled implementation of laws on overseas and domestic adoption in July next year, aimed at enhancing the rights and well-being of adoptees and adoptive families.

In the envisioned system, the central and the regional government will take over the adoption process, currently managed by private agencies, to facilitate the placement of adoptees with new parents and provide support for adoptive families.

Under the measures, local governments will permit adoption only when it is determined to be in the best interest of the child, and the heads of regional municipalities will assume the role of official guardians to safeguard the adoptees until the adoption process is completed.

The health ministry, meanwhile, will be responsible for selecting candidates for overseas adoption and verifying the qualifications of prospective adoptive parents.

When Christina and Maria were small, their mother was hospitalized and the police found two starving girls. Against advice, an officer nursed both girls to life and they were adopted to Denmark. But a feeling of emptiness came with it.

- They said I shouldn't breastfeed you. But I feared you would die if I didn't.

Maria and Christina are in Bolivia, where they face the woman who found them as children. She was a police officer. The two sisters have traveled to their country of birth in an attempt to find their biological mother and get answers to what happened back then. What it was that led to them being adopted.

The officer says that she had just returned from maternity leave when she was called to a house where she found two malnourished girls. Those girls were Christina and Maria.

Tears well up in the twins as they listen to the story of themselves as children. Because it quickly becomes clear to them that the woman in front of them is one of the reasons they are alive.

https://www.beobachter.ch/magazin/gesellschaft/noch-gibt-es-geld-fur-suche-nach-leiblichen-eltern-und-dann-708548?utm_source=linkedin&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=article_traffic&fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR2UsMdXnKjYqUPWPoJCIWJ85oO1B3teQ8mmeb-Vbg7-qcA9_RU-B6tt4XE_aem_AfJydAgcMVbVqp0izUMvC4wDtgzZhzju0BP5a0lc54sWyidTvHp_JCQgXtFwXwHNrmQaNn08CUnKQ8byyRLvtvbd

The project to trace origins is being extended by a year. But the federal government and the cantons cannot reach an agreement.

For decades, Swiss couples adopted babies from abroad  - often under questionable and illegal circumstances. Now the Back to the Roots association can  temporarily continue to support those affected in their search for their origins in Sri Lanka.