"In India, Stefia doesn't stand a chance"

Paul Vandenhoven and Christel Van de Voorde, a married couple from Sint-Niklaas, tell their experiences as adoptive parents in the One Adoption program. She follows the program to India, where Christel is about Stefia, their fourth child.

With four adoptive children, two of whom are physically disabled, the couple is extremely suitable to participate in the TV program. ,, When the people from Adoptie asked us if we ...

Michaël Temmerman

With four adoptive children, two of whom are physically disabled, the couple is extremely suitable to participate in the TV program. ,, When the people from Adoptie asked us if we wanted to cooperate, we immediately agreed. We want to tell everyone how difficult it is sometimes to adopt and raise a child, "says Christel Van de Voorde. "It is not just rose scent and moonshine."

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.”

Shareable link: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1s4S955pfFj4UmM9y5DIJcKO6kEKGyTgj

Additional info about the history/documents (as far as I know - and I think you know at least part of this history as well):

· There were allegations by Preger, they landed at BIA office in NL as well as with the Ministry of Justice in NL.

· This was “researched”, in two parts:

o The Dutch parents were asked to write statements/reports about how the children ended up in proper families and were taken well care of. I believe that all the parents responded, all very worried about that poor man who had helped them so much with getting their beloved children, and who was now accused of such terrible things.

Shareable link: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1N9SUTBHDiVDwHG6Bzh-bWtOyLgELazub

Shareable Link: https://drive.google.com/open?id=10AWv5hEB6ee85PmLEBAMlWG5DAykkjVL

Every parent’s worst nightmare happened to an American couple a week ago in Kenya. Matt and Daisy Mazzoncini became the legal guardians to a three-year-old boy in April 2017 after he and his twin were abandoned in a plastic bag outside of a prayer center in Kiambu, run by a friend of Daisy Mazzoncini. After caring for him and paying for medical treatment, the couple was awarded joint legal guardianship.

On the night of Friday, April 5, eleven alleged DCI officers raided their home in Westlands and took the boy with no explanation or documentation. The couple still does not know where their son has been taken, and Americans are rallying behind them as they work to use habeas corpus to get the child back.

According to The Star, the real trouble began when the Mazzoncinis applied for adoption after they were told it may be possible to “get an exemption from the moratorium on adoption.” They had to do many interviews with the Child Welfare Society, where they were ultimately accused of child trafficking and creating false records to make it look like the child was sick. However, the boy had continuous epileptic seizures in September 2018 and was advised to go abroad for specialized treatment.

Right before they were due in children’s court to apply for permission to take him to the United States, a group of people dressed as government officials came and demanded to take the boy. After the abduction, the DCI sent out a tweet claiming responsibility for the kidnapping and credit for the boy’s “rescue.” The tweet has since been removed.

The couple still does not know where their son has been taken, and Americans are rallying behind them as they work to use habeas corpus to get the child back.

The DNA-MATCHING Association

Do you know your roots and do you know where you are from?

Our work and goal

The DNA matching association works to unite families and bring them together through DNA matching.

We have experience with Bangladesh which has been our first starting point for meeting families who have experienced that their child disappeared suddenly in the 1970s and 1980s. Many children in Bangladesh were adopted away to families in Europe at that time, and many adult adopters now miss their roots and biological families and do not know where to look.

TERRE DES HOMMES RESPONDS TO ADOPTION STORY IN TROUW

14/10/2017

In response to the article today in the Dutch national newspaper Trouw about the possible involvement of Terre des Hommes in illegal adoptions from Bangladesh in the seventies, Terre des Hommes wants to emphasise its appreciation for ex Terre des Hommes employees making their voices heard. Terre des Hommes is looking into the matter and is in contact with the adoptees.

Diffuse situation

Terre des Hommes appreciates that former employees as Elly and Mart van den Berg step forward to provide a better understanding of what happened concerning intercountry adoptions from Bangladesh forty years ago. Currently Terre des Hommes searches for all relevant information within the organisation that can provide clarification about the diffuse period back then.

THE HAGUE (AFP) - A Dutch doctor at the centre of an IVF scandal fathered at least 49 children, an organisation representing parents and children born through his now-closed clinic said on Friday (April 12).

Jan Karbaat, who died in 2017, is the father of 49 children born after women visited his Rotterdam clinic where he used his own sperm instead of sperm from a chosen donor to inseminate them, Defence for Children said.

Results of DNA tests conducted on Friday at a hospital in the southeastern city of Nijmegen "showed that 49 children in the case are direct descendants of the late Karbaat," the organisation said in a statement.

"The results confirm serious suspicions that Karbaat used his own sperm at his clinic," Defence for Children added.

The controversial case became public after a Dutch court ruled in February that the results of Karbaat's DNA test should be made available to parents and children to conduct their own comparisons.

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. (KNWA)-- Around Arkansas, certain adoptions could now be criminalized as human trafficking thanks to a bill heading to the Governor's desk.

This bill aims at helping expecting moms and stop adoption crimes from happening right here in Northwest Arkansas.

An attorney in Rogers says he's personally worked with women who have been taken advantage of through the adoption process and fell target to empty threats of jail time and deportation if they didn't cooperate.

"It's a tough road to walk along when you have no support," said Michaela Montie, the Executive Director of the non-profit Shared Beginnings.

Montie is the mother of three adopted children.