Do we have to stop adopting foreign countries? "I wish everyone such a beautiful life''

The number of adopted children from abroad who end up with Dutch parents keeps falling. A logical consequence of the adoption scandals, better reproduction techniques and more prosperity for former adopting countries, says emeritus professor of adoption René Hoksbergen. He argues for a further reduction of foreign adoptions, but not everyone agrees.

Last year, 156 children from abroad were placed in a Dutch family through adoption. A year earlier, 210 children from abroad were adopted. A big drop that in any case is no surprise to emeritus professor of adoption René Hoksbergen.

In the daily newspaper Trouw, Hoksbergen explains why: because IVF treatments are increasingly successful and the chance of having their own child with prospective parents increases. Moreover, the adoption scandals from the 70s and 80s that have come out in recent years did not help either. A third reason is that things are going better with countries such as South Korea, India and China where many adopted children came from before.

Hoksbergen therefore advocates a further reduction of foreign adoptions. "The impact of an adoption is large and despite the fact that there are very good adoptive parents, you remove a child from a large part of his or her identity," he says in Trouw.

BRUSSELS and WASHINGTON, DC, March 21, 2019 — Arnold & Porter announced today that Dr. Alexander Italianer, former Secretary-General and Director-General for Competition of the European Commission, has joined the Firm as Senior International Policy Advisor in the Firm's Global Law and Public Policy practice. Dr. Italianer will be a consultant, resident in the Brussels office and provide strategic insight to clients on a range of global and European Union business issues including competition, international trade, foreign investment and regulatory issues.*

Dr. Italianer spent over 30 years at the European Commission eventually rising to the position of its top civil servant—Secretary-General under President Juncker. As Secretary-General, he provided policy advice to the President and his Vice-Presidents, organized the coordination of economic policies among member states, promoted improved regulation, devised the structure for Brexit preparedness, and supervised preparations for the multiannual EU budgetary framework proposals through 2027. From 2010-2015, Dr. Italianer served as Director-General for Competition, handling key antitrust, merger, and state aid cases across all critical economic sectors.

During his distinguished career at the European Commission, Dr. Italianer touched many other key issues. He assisted in the negotiation of the Maastricht Treaty, one of the most significant agreements in the EU's history, and, from his post in the Private Office of then President Santer, oversaw the introduction of the euro, and relations with the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Italianer later served as Head of the Private Office of Enlargement Commissioner Günter Verheugen and as Director for International Economic and Financial Affairs before joining the Private Office of then President Barroso as Deputy Head, responsible for overall strategic planning and institutional and interinstitutional issues. In 2006, Italianer was appointed Deputy Secretary-General of the European Commission, responsible for Better Regulation, Programming and Coordination. In this role, he was closely involved in regulatory cooperation with US authorities.

Arnold & Porter's Bill Baer, former US Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust, said: "During a critical time in Europe, where Brexit, trade, foreign investment and competition are front and center, Alexander brings extraordinary insight into the key issues facing today's global economy and an unparalleled knowledge of the workings of the European Commission. I have worked closely with him over the years and I know our clients facing business challenges in Europe will greatly benefit from his experience. We proudly welcome him to our team."

Added Dr. Italianer: "I am delighted to affiliate with Arnold & Porter. Over the years, initially through working with former competition enforcers Bill Baer and Luc Gyselen, I have come to admire the firm's consistent quality and its effective advocacy on behalf of private and public clients. I look forward to joining their Global Law and Public Policy team."

The man said that he was transporting the embryo to a fertility clinic in the city and that he was doing this for the seventh or eighth time

Mumbai—A Malaysian national has been detained at the Mumbai International Airport after it was discovered that he was carrying live human embryos inside a canister. Authorities found the canister to be suspicious-looking. The man said that he was transporting the embryo to a fertility clinic in the city.

Indian officials said that they apprehended Partheban Durai on March 16. The Malaysian acknowledged that it was not the first time he had illegally brought in this type of material into India. He told authorities it may actually be his seventh or eighth time.

The man named the clinic where he is supposed to be bringing the human embryos—Indo Nippon IVF clinic in Bandra—and led the authorities there.

Legal representatives for Dr Goral Gandhi, the clinic’s scientific and laboratory director, denied the Malaysian’s accusations. They allege that Dr Gandhi is the victim of a set-up.

Today, Lumos and the British Embassy in Panama brought together global and regional child protection experts to discuss strategies to tackle the institutionalisation of children across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). It comes as Lumos, the international children’s rights organisation founded by J.K. Rowling, expands its work within the LAC region, where an estimated 240,000 children continue to live in institutional care. [1].

Hosted in partnership with the British Ambassador to Panama, His Excellency Damion Potter, the event highlighted emerging good practice across the region, and outlined what steps must be taken to transform care for the most vulnerable children.Speakers and panellists in attendance included youth advocates, academics, civil society representatives and delegates from regional and global child rights agencies.

Georgette Mulheir, CEO of Lumos, said:

“Institutional care puts children at an increased risk of violence, abuse and neglect. However, examples from around world show that reform is possible, cost-effective and delivers better outcomes for children, even in the most challenging of circumstances.

We are delighted to welcome today’s esteemed group of experts and advocates to share progress, strengthen ties, and consider how we can collectively build upon recent successes in transforming care across the region.”

Growing up in the Netherlands, Linde Welberg knew she had the most loving parents a child could ask for. Yet she had always felt something was missing from her life.

Long before her father and mother told her she was adopted, she instinctively knew it.

“I felt a part of me was missing,” she says.

On the other side of the Atlantic, in the US city of Philadelphia, Lianna Fogg was going through similar turmoil. “I shared the same dream of every adoptee,” says Fogg. “Not just to find my birth parents, but to be accepted by them.”

The two young women have never met, but share a common experience. Put up for adoption as a consequence of China’s now-abandoned one-child policy, both have lived lives far removed from the circumstances of their birth.

CHILD SNATCHERS Inside the ‘abduction to order’ rings ‘blamed for snatching’ Maddie McCann where ‘attractive British children can fetch more than £10,000’

Around 1.2 million children are trafficked globally every year

NEW Netflix documentary The Disappearance of Madeleine McCann has suggested the missing girl - who would now be 15 - may still be alive.

It's been suggested by the McCanns' private investigator, Julian Peribanez, that Maddie - who was just three when she vanished on holiday in Portugal - could have been 'abducted to order' by a child trafficking gang.

It may sound far-fetched, but if Peribanez's claims are accurate, Maddie could be a victim of a sick global trade known as ‘child laundering’ - in which children are sold into the sex trade, illegally adopted or even killed for their organs.

Het aantal adopties uit het buitenland loopt gestaag terug

SAMENLEVING

Barbara Vollebregt– 2:59, 18 maart 2019

© Getty Images

Het aantal adoptiekinderen uit het buitenland dat in Nederland een thuis vindt, is in een paar jaar gehalveerd en blijft dalen. Net als het aantal wensouders.

Amy wants to cancel her adoption. At the age of ten, the Ethiopian Tigist, as she is still called, is adopted by a Danish family. Girl in Return follows Amy from the age of fourteen to her eighteenth and shows her struggle with the Danish and Ethiopian authorities. Director Katrine Kjaer previously made a documentary about the dark side of adoption, Mercy Mercy (2012). Unlike her younger sister who also moved house, Amy is unable to settle in her new family. The situation becomes untenable and she ends up in a foster home. The bond with her foster mother is loving and she has nice friends, but Amy cannot get used to Danish culture. A deep longing for and intense sorrow for the lack of her family, language and culture in Ethiopia dominate her life. She makes a trip to the country to visit her biological mother and other family members, but there too it is noticeable that there are major cultural differences. With this film, Kjaer shows the personal consequences of the international adoption system.

Dutch:

Amy wil haar adoptie ongedaan maken. Op tienjarige leeftijd wordt de Ethiopische Tigist, zoals ze dan nog heet, geadopteerd door een Deense familie. Girl in Return volgt Amy van haar veertiende tot haar achttiende en toont haar strijd met de Deense en Ethiopische autoriteiten. Regisseur Katrine Kjaer maakte eerder al een documentaire over de schaduwkant van adoptie, Mercy Mercy (2012). Anders dan haar jongere zusje die ook mee is verhuisd, lukt het Amy niet om te aarden in haar nieuwe gezin. De situatie wordt onhoudbaar en ze komt in een pleeggezin terecht. De band met haar pleegmoeder is liefdevol en ze heeft leuke vriendinnen, maar toch kan Amy niet wennen aan de Deense cultuur. Een diep verlangen naar en intens verdriet om het gemis van haar familie, taal en de cultuur in Ethiopië beheersen haar leven. Ze maakt een reis naar het land om haar biologische moeder en andere familieleden op te zoeken, maar ook daar is merkbaar dat er grote cultuurverschillen zijn. Kjaer laat met deze film de persoonlijke consequenties van het internationale adoptiesysteem zien.

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Her previous film about adopted Ethiopian children caused a lot of commotion in her own country. In Mercy Mercy (2012), Danish filmmaker Katrine Rijs Kjær provided insight into how an adoption can go completely wrong. With only victims: Masho's biological parents in Africa, her Scandinavian adoptive parents and the orphaned girl herself, who eventually became entangled in youth care. Kjær herself also came under fire: should she not have intervened?

A few years later there is now a sort of sequel, Girl In Return (55 min.).

Another girl, the same song: it does not clash with adoptive parents, contrary to all agreements, contact with biological parents has been rigorously broken and this child is also in danger of becoming a plaything for social workers and the associated authorities. She is just a little older and already puberty. The adopted child in question is called Amy Rebecca Steen. At least, that's the name she got from her adoptive family. Her real name is Tigist Anteneh. And she is trapped between her biological, adoptive and foster parents.

Her story is utterly sad: she came to Denmark with her sister at the age of ten, was placed out of the house just two years later, ended up in a foster home and taken away again. She is now back with foster mother Hanne, with whom she seems to have a warm bond, but her adoptive parents who have official custody are bothering. Do you still get it? And could the girl herself, longing back to Ethiopia and her biological mother and sister, understand it? In the meantime, her younger sister Buzayo is still in the adoptive family (and not in this film).

Kjær follows Amy / Tigist from the age of fourteen to eighteen and also films her biological family in Addis Ababa, who continues to attract her. Whereas in Mercy Mercy she still claimed a role as omniscient narrator, the documentary maker in this again very poignant film remains completely out of the picture. Every now and then she only asks the orphaned girl a question, who now wonders whether the adoption can be reversed. However, the Danish authorities do not allow her to travel to Ethiopia to re-establish bond with her family. It is a hopelessly stalemate. Who feels called or forced to break it?

Bangladeshi authorities have arrested a senior member of football's world governing body Fifa for allegedly defaming the country's prime minister.

Mahfuza Akhter Kiron, a Fifa Council member, was detained after she had said that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was neglecting football.

A defamation claim was then filed by a local sport official, alleging that the comments embarrassed the entire nation.

On Saturday, Ms Kiron was denied bail and sent to jail, her lawyer said.

"We sought bail for her after she was taken to the court. But our prayer was rejected," her lawyer Liakat Hossain said.