NEW YORK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - When Fatma Marouf and her wife Bryn Esplin decided to foster refugee children in their home state of Texas, being rejected because of their sexual orientation never crossed their minds.

But Catholic Charities Fort Worth, which finds foster homes for unaccompanied refugee children, told the couple in 2017 they were not even eligible to apply because they did not “mirror the Holy Family” of Jesus, Mary and Joseph.

“I just couldn’t believe it,” Marouf, a law professor at Texas A&M University who has worked with Catholic organizations across the country on immigration cases, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“It’s hurtful that they’re willing to work with me for immigration expertise, but somehow still think I’m inadequate as a person to take care of a child,” said Marouf - one of two gay couples suing the U.S. government for discrimination.

The cases reflect a growing tension in the United States between civil rights advocates opposing discrimination and religious groups seeking the right to operate according to their spiritual beliefs.

A prostitution camp in the Marshall Islands provided many of the birth mothers caught up in former Maricopa County Assessor Paul Petersen’s allegedly illegal adoption business, according to statements attributed to his co-defendant in a warrant to seize his assets.

When she was arrested in August, Lynwood Jennet, Petersen’s co-defendant in his criminal case and his fixer in the Marshall Islands, told police that the majority of women she had recently helped Petersen recruit came from a prostitution camp where girls as young as 15 or 16 did sex work in exchange for food and housing.

Jennet said when the girls at the prostitution camp would get pregnant, she would receive a call (the name of the caller was redacted in the documents) and she would contact Petersen.

“Lynwood was asked who runs the camp, Lynwood said it was the government or businessmen,” Department of Public Safety Detective Samuel Hunt, who interrogated Jennet following her arrest, said in the sworn affidavit, which was recently unsealed.

Jennet described the camp as a place where “young girls wait for fishermen to come and dock to do shopping and what not.”

Why was there no equality in the law of parentage with marriage for all?

The "marriage for all" has not changed the right of parentage. To this day, stepchild adoption is the only way for two-mother families to achieve common legal parenthood. However, same-sex couples were given equal status in terms of joint adoption law through the opening of marriage.

Opening of marriage and right of parentage

The "Law on the Introduction of the Right to Marriage for Persons of the Same Sex", which came into force on October 1st, 2017, has not changed the rules of parentage.

The mother of a child is still only the woman who gave birth to the child ( § 1591 Mutterschaft BGB ). For children who are born into a marriage, § 1592 No. 1 BGB determines that the husband is the second legal parent of the child, regardless of whether he is actually the biological father of the child or not. But this regulation has not been extended to include the “mother's wife”. To this day, stepchild adoption is the only way for two-mother families to achieve mutual legal parenthood and the associated security.

In 2016, Anjali Gupta and her husband drove 17 hours from the city of Bangalore to Pandharpur in the neighboring state of Maharashtra, to bring home their adopted baby boy. After a yearlong wait, Gupta had been matched with the 8-month-old boy through a digital adoption mechanism India has embraced to hasten and simplify the process for parents like her.

Nothing prepared her for the horrors that followed.

Soon after taking the child home, the then 40-year-old — whose name has been changed at her request to protect her privacy — was informed that she couldn’t adopt the boy just yet. He was “evidence” in an alleged rape case fought by his biological mother against the father. Three months later, with no signs of a settlement in the case, she decided to return her child to the adoption agency, worried about keeping him without legal rights and scared about the trauma of having to return him when he is older.

THE NEW SYSTEM HAS FAILED.

ALOMA LOBO, FORMER CHIEF OF CARA, INDIA’S APEX ADOPTION REGULATOR

In Edinburgh, Scotland, Eurochild member Together (Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights) launched their annual report the State of Children’s Rights in Scotland. At the same event, the Observatory for Children’s Human Rights Scotland - a collaborative of Scottish organisations working to drive implementation of children’s human rights in Scotland, with local impact and global learning – was launched.

Achievements were celebrated and solid plans for progress made at the double launch of Together (Scottish Alliance for Children’s Rights) State of Children’s Rights in Scotland report and the Observatory for Children’s Human Rights Scotland.

Scotland has, for many years, been exemplary for both political and non-governmental commitment to the implementation of children’s rights. Scotland has not only a Minister for Children and Young People (Scottish National Party MSP Maree Todd), but a Children and Young People’s Commissioner: Bruce Adamson. These roles, created to ensure children have a voice in political decision-making, show a government-level commitment to children’s rights in Scotland. 2019 proved no different: The Scottish government has committed to fully and directly incorporate the UNCRC and Optional Protocols into Scottish law by early 2021. This ground-breaking measure highlights the positive attitude of the Scottish government towards human rights as a whole. Before Together could even publish their recommendation for free public transport for children, the Scottish Government announced a scheme for free bus travel for under 19s.

However, Director of Together Juliet Harris noted that caution must be taken to ensure real change happens for children in Scotland. ‘Whilst there have been many legislative and policy developments – and high-level political commitments,’ she noted, ‘these have not always translated into real change in children and young people’s experience of their rights.’ In particular, child poverty remained a key issue that Together called on the Scottish government to tackle as a priority, with Juliet Harris noting that ‘the fact this is happening in Scotland today just isn’t good enough’. The potential loss of EU funding through Brexit added to these concerns.

Yet, commitments to ensure real change for the situation of children in Scotland are occurring. Speaker Maree Todd, Member of the Scottish Parliament and Minister for Children and Young People, celebrated the implementation of the UNCRC in Scottish law, as well as ‘our commitment to eradicate child poverty in Scotland, outlining concrete actions to make progress. Our plan to give £10 a week to families (the Scottish Child Payment) in most need will lift 30,000 children out of poverty. That is outstanding.’

The Centre has advised childcare institutions to send back home children in conflict with the law in view of the coronavirus crisis.

The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights, in an advisory dated March 28 said that this directive was in line with a Supreme Court order (writ petition (c) No 1/2020) asking all states to release prisoners on parole or interim bail to reduce overcrowding in jails, and said that a high-powered committee will be formed to implement this.

The NCPCR asked state governments to prepare a list of such children in observation and special homes so that they can be released.

In its advisory, the NCPCR has also asked states to take care of children of migrant workers making their way home.

“Some children may be moving with their families or alone or in group of migrant laborers from other States. In the best interest of the child, such families/children should remain in the same place where they are. In case of families, adequate measures may be taken as deemed appropriate by the competent authority,” the NCPCR said in its advisory.

MUMBAI: The fees that prospective parents pay to adopt a child is not

subject to Goods and Services Tax, the Maharashtra bench of the

Authority for Advance Rulings has said.

AAR gave the ruling after agreeing with the argument of a recognised

adoption agency from Nerul that children are not “goods” and the agency

Eighty-eight Romanian NGOs accused President Klaus Iohannis and MPs of making it harder to prosecute human trafficking and child pornography cases by adopting a controversial new law.

Romania’s President Klaus Iohannis in Bucharest in September. Photo: EPA-EFE/ROBERT GHEMENT

Eighty-eight Romanian NGOs published an open letter on Sunday criticising President Klaus Iohannis for promulgating on October 29 a controversial law that effectively reduces the statute of limitations for crimes related to human trafficking and child pornography.

“We note with deep disappointment that one week after the publication of the European Commission’s Human Trafficking Report in which Romania is presented as the state with the highest number of victims in Europe… the President of Romania enacted a law more favourable to defendants in crimes of child trafficking and child pornography,” the NGOs’ letter said.

The letter said that the new law unjustifiably removes references to child trafficking and child pornography from a paragraph of the country’s criminal code.

BALTIMORE (CNS) -- After more than 75 years helping form families through international adoption, Catholic Charities of Baltimore has closed its international adoption program.

The agency cited changing circumstances within other countries and a "negative stance" toward international adoption from the U.S. government.

Ellen Warnock, who has worked in the international adoption program for 36 years, called the Sept. 30 decision "heartbreaking" but necessary due to a dramatic decline in the number of children annually entering the United States for adoption.

In the early 2000s, more than 23,000 children came into the country each year for adoption. In 2019, that number declined to just 2,900.

"Some of the countries are either unwilling to send children overseas because it's a national pride issue or because the infrastructure that they have is such that it cannot meet the documentation standards of our government's immigration process," said Warnock, associate administrator at Catholic Charities' Center for Family Services.

JEJU, South Korea, Nov. 2 (Yonhap) -- A Jeju Island woman, who recently stunned Korean society after offering to sell her newborn baby for 200,000 won (US$175) in a mobile secondhand marketplace, will undergo a formal police investigation as a criminal suspect, police said Monday.

The island's Seogwipo Police Station said it has booked the 27-year-old woman, whose identity was withheld, on charges of attempting to traffic a child in violation of the Child Welfare Act.

Under the current law, anybody who sells a child is punished by imprisonment of up to 10 years. Even if a child is not actually traded, the perpetrator is subject to punishment.

The woman is accused of uploading two photos of her baby on the cyber marketplace on Oct. 16, saying a 36-week-old baby was available for adoption for the price of 200,000 won.

She reportedly uploaded the controversial post due to her physical and emotional difficulties after giving birth to the baby following an unwanted pregnancy. She had immediately deleted her online post after realizing her behavior was wrong and expressed remorse in a subsequent police questioning.