Parents forced to give up their babies for adoption in the 1950s, 60s and 70s are being asked to come forward to give evidence to a new investigation.

The Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights is to hold an inquiry into the forced adoption of babies of unmarried mothers during those years.

Committee chair Harriet Harman says it is a matter that affects the human rights of thousands of women.

One mother said she was told: "You won't be seeing this baby again."

The affected mothers said they were made to hand over their babies by doctors, nurses, social workers and churches.

An adoption break proposed by Minister of Welfare Wouter Beke , in which the intercountry adoption system had to be thoroughly revised, has not materialized. What will remain of the package of recommendations that should make adoption fraud-free remains to be seen.

Tens of thousands of foreign adopted children

What once started as an act of charity soon derailed into outright child trafficking.

Since the 1950s, tens of thousands of children have come to Belgium through international adoption. Their exact number is unknown. Until 2005, children with whom parents do not share a genetic link could be registered as 'own children'. Many adoptions also happened with the help of an uncle father in Verweggistan and were therefore not registered. How many adoptions took place will therefore always remain a mystery. What once started as an act of charity soon derailed into outright child trafficking.

In the 1970s, those first adopters were joined by pacifist hippies whose lifestyle suited them to save colored children. It was the backpackers who returned home with a load of didgeridoos under their arm after a trek through India.

On Friday, September 24, 2021, the District Court of The Hague heard the proceedings on the merits of Trudy Scheele-Gertsen and Bureau Clara Wichmann against the State. During the at times emotional hearing, the Court offered several women the opportunity to tell their stories. The Court expects to rule in this case on December 15, 2021.

This case concerned the question of whether the State acted unlawfully towards Mrs Scheele-Gertsen and other mothers who renounced their child in the years 1956-1984. Distance mother Trudy Scheele-Gertsen held the Dutch State liable for the harm caused to her . Trudy says she was forced to give up her child for adoption in the 1960s, while she wanted to take care of him herself. Interest group Bureau Clara Wichmann supported the case by standing up for the interests of all women who have been separated from their child.

Invocation of statute of limitations

The State invokes the limitation period because this concerns a civil procedure.

The State says the case is time-barred because it happened so long ago. In addition, there is no evidence of wrongful conduct. In particular, the role of the Child Protection Board was often discussed. 'At the time, the Child Protection Board acted in good faith', says state lawyer Mette van Asperen. She refers to the existing renunciation and adoption files as objective evidence.

I give birth to myself through creation. (Amandine Gay)

Starting from an intimate testimony concerning her birth under X and her adoption, Amandine Gay draws the thread of a large, historical phenomenon with multiple challenges: transnational and transracial adoption. In A Chocolate Doll (La Découverte, 2021) , an essay crossed by Afro-feminist and decolonial theories, she addresses not only the historical context of international adoption but also its political context.

It is easier to get into political subjects that are sometimes very controversial by going first into the lived experience. (Amandine Gay)

Adoption cannot be considered a detailed subject over time. (Amandine Gay)

Looking back on her childhood and adolescence, Amandine Gay discusses the challenges that adoption poses to adopted people and their adopting families: dealing with uprooting, the search for identity that results from it, systemic racism and sometimes contradictory belonging. to two different communities.

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TAGS:SREF - Social Affairs--Refugees | US - United States | VS - South Vietnam Concepts:ADOPTIONS | CHILDREN | REFUGEE RESETTLEMENT | TRANSPORTATION

I was adopted as a young child and as a teenager, I would like to share a few things for adoptive

parents to keep in mind:

1. Remove the taboo:

Adoption should not become a taboo subject around your child or family. A factor that always

hinders the chance of a smooth adoption conversation is that people tend to think of adoption as

A Brazilian couple has given a whole new meaning to the term sister-wife.

Adriana, 39, and husband Leandro, 37 – who didn't want to reveal their surnames – have been together for seven years and have a 6-year-old daughter. Now, thanks to a shocking revelation on a radio show, the happily married pair found out that they are even closer than they thought – like brother and sister close.

The two had both spent their lives searching for their respective mothers, both named Maria, and had both been abandoned when they were still babies. Seeking some closure on the issue, Adriana went on Radio Globo's “The Time Is Now” program, which specializes in finding lost relatives, and was reunited with her birth mother.

During the heartfelt reunion, the mother also revealed that Adriana also has a younger brother and guess who that was? That’s right, it’s Adriana’s husband, Leandro.

Obviously, shocked by the news of her incestuous marriage, Adriana broke down on the set and began to cry uncontrollably.

CHALCO, Mex., (EL UNIVERSAL) .- A woman who gave her daughter for illegal adoption was sentenced to 18 years and four years in prison by a judge from the Chalco Judicial District.

The agent of the Public Ministry of the Special Prosecutor's Office for Trafficking in Persons accredited the participation of Erika Janeth Juárez González in the crime of trafficking in persons , in the form of who, in his capacity as a person who has authority over whom the conduct is exercised, delivers in illegal adoption to a minor .

The judge also imposed fines of 575 thousand 580 pesos and 86 thousand 880 pesos to repair the damage.

According to the accusation of the Attorney General's Office of the State of Mexico, on September 13, 2020, Erika Janeth handed over to a subject her minor daughter of 2 years and seven months of age, along with a birth certificate of the little girl for the illegal adoptions.

The woman, accompanied by the victim, appeared on Calle Sur 1, in the Santa Cruz neighborhood, in the municipality of Valle de Chalco, where she handed the little girl over to an individual, who paid her 5,000 pesos.

Today a bicameral meeting was held on the rights of children and adolescents whose objective was to carry out an informative meeting about the Single Registry of Aspirants to Guard for Adoptive Purposes , that is, they were in charge of analyzing and debating the alignments about the processes and records that are needed to finalize an adoption .

Paola Vessvessian , national deputy for the province of Santa Cruz, began by announcing that within that meeting there was the presence of the National Director of the single registry of aspiring guardians for adoptive purposes , Gustavo Herrero , whose purpose was that that person can tell about the situation of the adoption system in Argentina. Therefore, she gave the floor to him.

"We have proposed to work from now on fundamentally to improve the process, that is the intention we have," Herrero began by saying. And he explained that they promoted different meeting spaces for several years where they give informative talks for families or interested people who have not had contact with adoption "to dispel myths and clarify doubts."

"We make available to the community a program of counseling and accompaniment to families in a period of bonding, custody, and adoption, because many times they need it and we as a State must assume that responsibility," he continued. And he added that a data that is fundamental is the reduction of half the files in the database: "we believe that it is due to multiple factors, economic, the pandemic, among other reasons."

He also commented that adoptive availability is "wide", that is, people already approach the adoption system with a lot of prior information. "In the public calls, we asked ourselves if they worked, in addition to the adoption issue, on the different family models that we have in our society," he added.

A series of hearings with specialists is being carried out by the Constitution, Legislation, Justice and Regulation Commission , within the framework of the general study of the project that proposes a complete reform of the adoption system in Chile.

The initiative is in its second process in the Senate and the instance agreed to know the opinions of lawyers, law professors, psychologists, foundations and social organizations linked to the issue, before voting on the initiative in general.

Along these lines, he has already heard the representatives of MOVILH and Fundación Iguales, who have expressed themselves in favor of homoparental adoption ( See related note ).

He also heard the opinions of the representatives of the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef); from the Pro Acogida Foundation; of the Chilean Association of Foster Families and of the Childhood Commission of the College of Psychologists ( Check the session here ).

During the last day, the academics Rommy Álvarez Escudero, from the Universidad Católica de Valparaíso; Leonor Etcheberry, from the Diego Portales University, and Irene Salvo; the representative of the Pro Bono Foundation, Constanza Alvial, and the lawyer and former director of Sename, Francisco Estrada.