In Hungary and Bulgaria, disabled children and Roma often end up on lists for foreign adoption. Nevertheless, Flanders continues the adoptions from Eastern Europe.

On November 27, 2023, prospective adoptive parents throughout Flanders will be glued to their computer screens, waiting for a message from the Flemish Center for Adoption (VCA). The final decision will be made that day: can they continue their procedure? Due to reports of malpractice and fraud, the Flemish government decided to examine all its collaborations with the so-called sending countries.

We often associate intercountry adoption with Africa and Asia, but there are also European countries on that list of countries. In a joint study with the Dutch platform Investico, the TV program Zembla , the Hungarian medium Atlaszo and the Bulgarian newspaper 24 Chasa, Knack examined adoptions from Bulgaria and Hungary - the latter has become the second largest sending country to Flanders. , after Thailand. This shows dire situations with Roma children.

Discrimination

Everything revolves around children from Hungary and Bulgaria who were given up for adoption in the past ten years. Eighteen of them ended up in Flanders. The golden rule for adoptions is the principle of subsidiarity: if an adoption is in the best interests of the child, a new home must first be looked for at home, abroad is only the very last option. This is also the rule in Hungary and Bulgaria. There are plenty of candidates in both countries: there are more prospective parents on the waiting lists than children. However, the profile of those children does not necessarily match the preferences of the domestic parents. They prefer healthy, young children from the Bulgarian and Hungarian majority. Roma children, children with disabilities and older children end up on a list for adoption abroad.

Bringing an adopted child to the Netherlands has become difficult, but adoption from Hungary is still allowed. There the system would be organized responsibly. However, research shows that this is not true.

CHENNAI: On the date of adoption, the ties of the adoptive child with his biological family shall be deemed to be severed and replaced by those created by the adoption in the adoptive family, Madras high court has held.
“Thus, it is clear that the adoptive child is construed to be a member of the adopted family, all the ties of the child are replaced in the adoptive family created by adoption,” Justice G K Ilanthiraiyan said.

The judge made the observation while setting aside an order passed by Revenue Divisional Officer, Erode, granting legal heir certificate to biological siblings of an adopted son after the latter’s death.
According to petitioner V Sakthivel, his grandfather Sengota had three children Ramasamy, Varanavasi and Lakshmi. He is the son of Varanavasi.

Ramasamy married Sivakami. Since they had no children, they adopted one Kottravel Sethupathi in 1999. Ramasamy and Sivakami died leaving behind Kottravel Sethupathi as their sole legal heir, he said.
On Sept 6, 2020 Kottravel Sethupathi also died without any Class I legal heir as per the Hindu Succession Act. While the petitioner is Class II legal heir, Kottravel Sethupathi’s biological siblings obtained legal heir certificates to inherit the properties left behind by him.

Aggrieved, he has moved the present plea challenging the order.

Allowing the plea, the court set aside the order granting legal heir certificates to the biological siblings of Kottravel Sethupathi.


 

The case about the closure of international adoption to Denmark is characterized by deeply serious irregularities from both the Danish Appeals Board and the Ministry of Social Affairs. It is unacceptable.

In her response to our chronicle , written by a group of adopters from Danish International Adoption's waiting list on 15 June, Social Affairs Minister Pernille Rosenkrantz-Theil expresses sympathy for our situation , which we are happy about.

However, the minister refers to the Danish Appeals Board's criticism of Danish International Adoption from January this year, as well as the Norwegian authorities' recent recommendation to withdraw the permits to mediate adoptions from South Africa.

At the same time that Rosenkrantz-Theil refers to Norway's recommendation, the Norwegian authorities in their  report from June point  to the Danish minister's suspension from January as a contributing factor to their decision. Common to both the Danish and Norwegian authorities is that no one seems to have provided documentation that demonstrates serious errors or challenges in adoptions from South Africa.

Although the case currently concerns four people, there may be hundreds of similar cases.

Four Greenlanders are demanding a total of one million in compensation from the Danish state. This is done in a draft summons sent to the Danish state.

The case concerns four Greenlandic children who were previously adopted to Danish foster parents.

Lawyer Mads Pramming wants the state to pay DKK 250,000 in compensation individually to the four people. He believes that the persons were adopted from Greenland to Denmark on a legally questionable basis.

By strictly selecting adoption countries, outgoing Minister Weerwind wanted to secure international adoption by Dutch parents. But what does Hungary do on its list of selected countries?
 

What should happen next with international child adoption after the devastating conclusions drawn by the Joustra committee in 2021? It was a major political task for outgoing minister Franc Weerwind (D66, Legal Protection), so devastating was Joustra's assessment of the adoption world. The former top official had identified corruption, fraud and child trafficking in almost all adopted countries investigated. According to Weerwind, the only option to prevent large-scale abuses in the future as much as possible was a completely new adoption system. A system with 'important guarantees' and a strict selection of adopting countries.

In order to be able to choose from which countries adoption should remain possible, Weerwind had an 'analysis' drawn up for each country. This meant that one adoptive country after another was eliminated, leaving six. And so, in November 2022, it was announced that Hungary passed Weerwind's test. The 'country report' of the Central European country covers just over two A4 pages and is predominantly positive. Justice therefore concludes that there are 'reasons to continue the adoption relationship'.

Major supplier

And that's a good thing, because Hungary has been a 'major supplier' of children to Dutch parents for ten years. Almost a quarter of the adopted children are now of Hungarian descent, 79 came to the Netherlands in the past five years. They are often a bit older and often come at the same time as a brother or sister. Sometimes they have medical conditions or psychological problems. They come from a Hungarian foster family or from a children's home. And many children come from poverty-stricken Roma families.

Another five hundred Dutch parents could adopt a child from abroad. An adoption freeze has been announced, but ongoing procedures will not be terminated.

Another five hundred Dutch parents have a chance to bring an adopted child here, the Ministry of Justice confirms to Investico and TV program Zembla . Outgoing Minister Weerwind has not yet terminated these ongoing procedures, despite the adoption freeze he decided on last month.

Two hundred of these parents already have permission in principle, the last step before they are linked to a child. The other parents are not yet that far in the procedure. In recent years, approximately fifty adopted children came to the Netherlands every year. If all procedures continue, this means that adoption will continue for years to come.

Because some parents are allowed to adopt multiple children at once, the numbers can increase even further. Two or even three children regularly come to the Netherlands at the same time to grow up here in a family.

Vulnerable procedures

A group of Greenland-born people have sought compensation from Denmark over allegations the state facilitated their illegal adoption by Danish families starting in the 1950s, their lawyer said on Friday.

Greenland was a colony of Denmark but has been autonomous since 1979, and relations between them are shadowed by their past.

Lawyer Mads Pramming told radio P1 that four of his Greenland-born clients have sought compensation of 250,000 kroner ($35,800) each on accusations the Danish authorities knowingly facilitated their adoptions.

"These Greenlanders thought they had placed their children in foster care, but they had not realised that was for life and they would not see their children again," Pramming said in the P1 interview.

In a 2020 interview, former head of Greenland's social services Alfred Dam compared the situation on the island in the 1960s to "self-service."

Julienne Mpemba from Namur is currently being prosecuted for child trafficking. But two years ago, she was ordered to repay €84,363 to Maurice Luca, a former professor at UNamur. He hasn't received anything yet, but he's giving her a chance.
 

Julienne Mpemba , a 47-year-old Belgian-Congolese woman living in Namur, is currently being prosecuted for adoption fraud, human trafficking, kidnapping of minors, hostage-taking, fraud, corruption, forgery and use of forged documents. After eight years of investigation, the case was argued two weeks ago before the criminal court. From the beginning, Julienne has denied the evidence against her. However, the public prosecutor is requesting a 12-year prison sentence.

After some research, we learned that Julienne Mpemba had already been convicted in another case. We contacted Maurice Luca, a philosophy professor at UNamur who has been retired for two years. She actually owes him the sum of €84,363 since a judgment handed down on 20 December 2022 by the Namur Court of First Instance.

Before telling us his story, this former teacher indicates that he wants to respect the principle of presumption of innocence for the case in which Julienne Mpemba is currently charged. But as far as his story is concerned, Julienne has in fact been convicted. "We met in 2012 and she told me about her project for the "Tumani" orphanage in Kinshasa (Editor's note: an orphanage through which the stolen children passed). We got on well and she quickly asked me for €2,500 for her project. I decided to help her because I trusted her," believes Maurice, who has faith in human beings.

For two and a half years, however, he had no news from Julienne. It turns out that she had spent some time in prison for fraud in the context of adoption fraud, a case that is currently being argued. “Then around 2018, when I had no news, I showed up at her house. She was at rock bottom and was taking a lot of medication. I listened to her. She told me she wanted to relaunch a legal consultancy firm in Congo. But she had no money. I offered to help her again.”

As of this week, adoptees can view their adoption files at the National Archives, but contrary to expectations, access is limited.

Maurice Timmermans June 19, 2024, 08:29

Adoptees will be able to view their adoption files at the National Archives from Monday and will no longer have to contact the Child Protection Council. However, there is disappointment among adoptees now that it appears that the archive will black out sensitive data, such as names of half-brothers and sisters and information about genetic diseases.

This is evident from an appeal to the Open Government Act (Woo) by the foundation Verleden in Zicht, which stands up for the interests of adoptees. Archive staff will weigh the right to information about the descent of the 'children' against the right to privacy of the biological parents.

“We were always told that the National Archives would provide full access to the files,” says Barbalique Peters, board member of Verleden in Zicht. “And that the archive would not black out anything, as the Child Protection Council used to do. We were fooled.”