"It is an overwhelming phenomenon to contemplate the same beautiful full moon here, in Addis Ababa, as in Madrid or anywhere in the world!" Alfredo thought upon arriving in the Ethiopian capital and following the established process to adopt a child (a girl , in this case) in the immense African country. Alfredo had to undertake the journey in Paris before, since Ethiopia did not have an embassy in Madrid. He narrates that his first experience with Ethiopian officials was not very spirited: "Correct for the resolution of his efforts, but cold."

Alfredo and his wife, Stella, decided to spend those Christmases of 2005 in their house in the coastal town of Vera with friends, and there they received the news that they had a life to adopt. It is then when Alfredo decides to start writing "The Moon of Addis Abeba" (Letrame Editorial; Almería, 2020) and in which he recounts over almost 400 pages the real journey of an adoption by a Spanish marriage of a happy Ethiopian girl four-year-old, who in adolescence emanates from within a volcanic fury in search of his own identity.

According to LA RAZÓN, “it is not until February 2006 that Asha's face appears before us. It was only a first meeting, because the girl would remain in a House of Transition, where she would learn Spanish and would be prepared for the home that awaited her with open arms. The parents set out for Addis Ababa to pick up their daughter Asha after the court ruling. Memories, as Alfredo confesses, of a very poor country, of some officials at the airport used to "keep the change", of a merciless orphanage.

The first days in Spain, which coincided with the Easter holidays, were a real test of effort for the parents, with a girl who was looking for the breast of her adoptive mother, suffered nocturnal enuresis and attacks of rage . Alfredo, the biological father of a young woman who had become independent from a first marriage, was often struck by serious doubts as to whether he would know how to cope with the new situation of a loving and challenging girl in equal measure.

He says that his little girl was very intelligent, she quickly learned correct Spanish, but she did not stop evoking memories of her biological family that she must have carried deep inside. "For her it must have been a great detachment, a painful uprooting of its deepest roots , of which at that time we were not aware," he admits.

ASSIGNMENT REVIEW · On Tuesday, the Riksdag decided that the government should as soon as possible investigate how Swedish authorities and adoption organizations have handled international adoptions to Sweden. The decision comes after several revelations about historical irregularities with adoptions to Sweden from, among others, Chile.

In 2018 , SVT together with Chilean journalists revealed how adopted children from Chile in the 1970s and 80s may have been taken without the consent of mothers. In the spring of 2021, Dagens Nyheter also reviewed adoptions to Sweden - and last week, Assignment Review published the series "The Stolen Children" , about the Chilean adoptions.

Now the Riksdag has decided that the government should as soon as possible investigate the international adoptions to Sweden from the middle of the 20th century until today. The decision comes after a proposal from the Social Affairs Committee and will, among other things, look at how Swedish authorities and adoption organizations have handled the adoptions.

Martina Johansson (C) thinks that Sweden should have appointed an investigation much earlier.

- I think it's a great pity. We have lost three years investigating what Sweden has played a part in this, she says.

INTERVIEW WITH BENOIT VAN KEIRSBILCK, Director of DCI-Belgium

Benoit Van Keirsbilck, Director of DCI-Belgium and former President of the DCI Movement, has been elected as a member of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC), in November 2020. He is the first-ever Belgian to be elected to this Committee. Mr. Van Keirsbilck has a 35-year career dedicated to the promotion and protection of children’s rights at the national, European and international levels.

He has been a leading force for campaigns to release children deprived of liberty and advance access to justice for children. He was a member of the Expert Group in charge of the drafting of the Council of Europe Guidelines on Child-Friendly Justice. In this interview, Gemma Cavaliere, from the International Secretariat asks Mr. Van Keirsblick the current challenges and future perspectives as newly elected member of the CRC.

In your opinion, what are the most pressing issues for children’s rights in 2021?

I do not think I will be very original here. We know that COVID-19 will affect children’s rights in 2021 and the years to come. Nevertheless, it is important to stress the fact that children’s rights have not always been considered a priority during the COVID-19 pandemic. In national lockdowns, for instance, the right to education was easily sacrificed in many countries, with the closure of schools and leisure centers for children and youth.

The Minister of Health, Social Services and Equality, Dolors Montserrat, has appeared in the new Commission on the Rights of Children and Adolescents created this legislature in the Congress of Deputies, where she has announced her will to launch "a Pact of State for Children "that addresses, from the political and territorial consensus, the necessary protection of children.

For the minister, this pact should be established based on three lines of action, which could be framed in the three categories of children's rights enshrined in the Convention and known as the "three pes": promotion, protection and participation.

Likewise, to work on this Pact, the minister proposes "to constitute a study subcommittee that addresses the state pact for childhood in the" three pess "and analyzes the needs of the different models and family situations to which we have to respond as shared custody and custody, the delimitation of the concept of a single-parent family and aid for large families.

Promotion and support of the family

Minister Dolors Montserrat has begun her intervention defending the role of the family in the protection and promotion of childhood. "This Government is clear that protecting and supporting families is the main way to protect children and provide them with greater present and future well-being." For this reason, he has underlined the need to support families, which each one forms, so that they can fully assume their responsibilities.

In our series of letters from African journalists, Ismail Einashe learns how a Nigerian mother who had been trafficked to Italy nearly had her son taken away - an experience that many African woman in Italy have gone through.

One sultry afternoon in the main city of the Italian island of Sicily, a Nigerian mother is intensely watching her two-year-old son play.

They are in the courtyard of a housing block they share with other African families in a run-down corner of Palermo.

The woman is content sitting on a worn plastic chair enjoying her son having fun in the sunshine while a meat stew cooks in the kitchen with heady aromas of Nigerian food wafting through the air.

But the 25-year-old is haunted by dark memories. Not so long ago, she says she came close to having her son taken away by the authorities in the shelter for migrant women and children where she once stayed.

For filmmaker Sun Hee Engelstoft, who was born in South Korea in 1982 and sent to Denmark for adoption when she was 4 months old, it was shocking to witness the reality facing unmarried mothers in Korea.

“In the West and where I grew up in Denmark, there is this idea that all Korean women just easily give away their children because there are so many adoptees,” Engelstoft said during an interview with The Korea Herald.

Korea has sent more than 200,000 children abroad since the 1950-53 Korean War.

In the process of creating a documentary film, Engelstoft visited the Aesuhwon shelter for single mothers on Jeju Island and came to see that the decision to give a child away is not made solely by the child’s mother.

Her film, “Forget Me Not -- A Letter to My Mother,” shows how Korean single moms are pressured into giving their babies up for adoption even if they don’t want to.

For the first time, in Sibiu County , on the National Adoption Day, on Wednesday, June 2, the Campaign to promote adoption is launched. Sibiu residents are expected on Tuesday, at 13.30, in Tineretului Park to send to the sky the greatest desire of any child, to have a family, by launching helium balloons for every adoptable child in Sibiu County, hoping that soon the dream their will be fulfilled.

"'Saved through adoption' is the message of the campaign which shows that, YES, adoption is for the child but it also saves everyone around it, gives the child the opportunity to enjoy childhood, gives meaning to adoptive parents and gives communities the opportunity to be in solidarity with the most vulnerable of their members. We want to emphasize, thus, the positive impact of adoption on all factors involved in the process: parents, siblings, grandparents, family, school, community ", say the representatives of DGASPC Sibiu.

This campaign aims to make information about adoption accessible to the public, no longer a taboo subject, to dispel myths or preconceived ideas about this subject, emphasizing that all that matters is to raise a happy child, to enjoy the love that you receive it and you can offer it. In it, stories of adoption, love and altruism of wonderful people who gave hope and a family to children who wanted it most will be presented.

"It is a campaign in which we invite the whole community to contribute because everyone can do something. So far, we have been joined by public authorities with responsibilities in the field of child protection, artists, actors, journalists, priests, NGOs, etc. so that together we can find a family for each child ", explains the deputy director of DGASPC Sibiu, Olimpia Indrie?.

The campaign is organized by DGASPC Sibiu together with the Romania Without Orphans Alliance with the support of the National Authority for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, Children and Adoptions.

This WOB was wrongly called 'Ketenoverleg', it is about these:

FIOM, Stichting Adoptievoorzieningen

(SAV), Terre des Hommes, Unicef en Zunderdorp Beleidsadvies & Management.

A decision was made on 1 September 2020 on a request under the Government Information (Public Access) Act. The request concerns information about chain consultation on adoptions. The decision and the annexes provided with the decision are now being made available for public access.

Download 'Wob decision ACT'

Dealt with letter from Ina/WK about RP

Former employer

DG Competition

Former function

Personal adviser to Commissioner Neelie Kroes (for 2 years)

Melbourne-born man Russell Moore has died in a US prison following a three-decade fight to be returned to Australia.

Moore, also known by his adoptive name James Hudson Savage, died at Apalachee Correctional Institution in Florida on June 2.

Russell Moore died in Florida on June 2.

Russell Moore died in Florida on June 2.CREDIT:DANIELLE SMITH

His US lawyer Richard Bourke, who spent decades working to help return Moore to his birth country, said the 58-year-old had a medical emergency.