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CoE signed by 13 States: the tragic situation of Romania

Despite the tragic situation of over 80 thousand minors without a family, international adoptions in Romania are at a standstill. The conclusion was drawn in the Conference “Challenges in Adoption Procedures in Europe. Ensuring the Best Interests of the Child” that closed in Strasbourg December 1st on the joint initiative of the Council of Europe and the European Commission. In the introductory address at the Palais de l’Europe, Maud de Boer-Buquicchio, Deputy Secretary General of the Council of Europe declared: “Parents don’t enjoy the right to adoption while the child has the right to have a family. This is why the major objective of adoption plans should be that of giving the child a family, giving priority to best interest of the child”.The “case” of Romania. During the conference Bucharest’s government confirmed its band on international adoptions despite the request of the Romanian Office for adoptions (ORA) representative Bogdan Panait, to lift the ban “in order to promote the adoption of children “with special needs”, notably minors over seven, “Roma children with more than one sibling or with health problems”. In the entire world only two States banned international adoption, these are Burma and Romania. Nonetheless these are Countries with high abandonment rates and poorly developed national adoption systems that are scarcely supported by local institutions. Melita Cavallo, President of the Juvenile Court of Rome and former President of the Commission for International Adoptions (CAI), denounced the condition of Romanian orphans on the Italian territory, who, she said, are as many as “4300, some of whom very young, forced to live on the street”. “Romania open your eyes. Now you’re in Europe!”, was the appeal of former MEP Claire Gibault, who in the past legislature conducted a cultural battle against the international adoption ban with the support of a European lobbying network. “Romania now is in Europe. It ought to integrate its child welfare policies with those of the EU”, said Gibault. Hence, it is necessary “to look ahead in order to guarantee a future to young Romanians, the new European citizens”.The Convention. On December 1st also Spain and the Netherlands ratified the Council of Europe Convention on Adoption, thus bringing to 13 the number of signatory States along with Armenia, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Island, Montenegro, Norway, the United Kingdom, Romania, Serbia and Ukraine. In 2008 the Convention was revised, acknowledging the changes occurred across societies. The Revised Convention provides for the father’s consent in all cases, even when the child was born out of wedlock and for the child’s consent if the child has sufficient understanding to give it. It strikes a better balance between adopted children’s right to know their identity and the right of the biological parents to remain anonymous. Moreover, the Convention extends to heterosexual unmarried couples who have entered into a registered partnership in States which recognise that institution. It also leaves States free to extend adoptions to homosexual couples and same sex-couples “living together in a stable relationship”. A hot debate was centred on this last point of the Convention. “No” to adoption by gay couples. Marco Griffini, President of the Italian Association “AIBI – Friends of the Children” claimed, “A minor without a family was given no choice. He was given no choice to be born and to be abandoned. However, this child has the right to be adopted by parents who will be his life models and points of reference. While it’s true that each person can freely choose the companion he/she wants to share his/her live with”, it’s “also true that this choice cannot reverberate on a traumatised abandoned minor”. “Saying no” to adoption by same-sex couples, Griffini said, “does not infer that a homosexual parent is less capable or that he/she is less sensitive to the child’s needs. Indeed, concerns refer to the best development of the child’s personality especially as pertains to the question of identity. Who am I the child of? This is the child’s first major question requiring an answer. In order to become a serene and responsible adult the child needs role emotional models that reflect clear and codified roles. The child ought to have a mother and a father”. “If the purpose of the Convention is to reaffirm the priority of the best interest of the child – concluded Joan Ahnsink from The Netherlands, representative of United Adoptes Internationals (Adopted children association) – I wonder how a regulation could possibly envisage adoption by homosexual couples”.

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Ukraine academic: Israel imported 25,000 kids for their organs

  • Published 02:02 03.12.09
  • Latest update 19:50 03.12.09

 

Ukraine academic: Israel imported 25,000 kids for their organs
Jews and Israel have become a major motif of the presidential election campaign in the Ukraine.
By Lily GaliliTags: Ukraine Israel organ harvesting Israel news anti-Semitism

 

International adoption: Romania and Bulgaria, two countries in comparison

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Date: 03/12/09

International adoption: Romania and Bulgaria, two countries in comparison

" Bulgaria has shown that it is possible to fight the market for children without close international adoptions , "said Krassimira Natan, Lawyer and representative staff Ai.Bi. in Bulgaria, speaking at the Conference "Challenges in adoption procedures in Europe" held Tuesday, December 1 at the Palais de l'Europe in Strasbourg.

The Bulgaria is a country that, unlike Romania, has chosen to promote adoption of a policy geared to transparency and rigor, thus avoiding the extreme decision to block international adoptions. After a period of gradual slowdown, the government in Sofia has decided, at the end of 2007, to give a new impetus to international adoptions. He did so from a change of the members of the Central for adoptions and intensifying the number of sessions of the body, introducing new criteria for the combination of adoptable children with prospective adoptive families, creating an ad hoc regulation for children with "special needs" (ie, belonging to ethnic minority health problems or over the age of seven years).

Ukrainian kids, new victims of Israeli 'organ theft'

Ukrainian kids, new victims of Israeli 'organ theft'

Thu Dec 3, 2009 2:35PM

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An international Israeli conspiracy to kidnap children and harvest their organs is gathering momentum as another shocking story divulges Tel Aviv's plot to import Ukrainian children and harvest their organs.

The story brings to light the fact that Israel has brought some 25,000 Ukrainian children into the occupied entity over the past two years in order to harvest their organs. It cites a Ukrainian man's fruitless search for 15 children who had been adopted in Israel. The children had clearly been taken by Israeli medical centers, where they were used for 'spare parts'.

JCICS Stake Holders Initiative

Joint Council on International Childrens Services - Stakeholder initiative

Submitted by Kerry and Niels on Fri, 2009-12-11 14:29.

On December 3, 2009, the Joint Council on International Children's Services (JCICS) presented to its members a proposal to change the organization. It seems, if nothing changes, JCICS will have to close is doors somewhere in the year 2010.

The proposed plan is confidential and intended for JCICS members only, but was leaked to the internet earlier today. Since it contains interesting information about the workings of JCICS, we decided to republish it on PPL's website.

The document establishes two distinct problems JCICS is facing. First of all the trade association of adoption service providers is in dire straights and needs to seriously cut back its activities to remain financially sustainable. The document is not all that specific how financial sustainability can be achieved without eliminating their core activity "advocacy, awareness and public policy initiatives".

Introduction of a draft resolution entitled “Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children” (A/C.3/64/L.50).

II. Consideration of proposals

A. Draft resolution A/C.3/64/L.50

6. At the 40th meeting, on 10 November, the representative of Brazil, on behalf

of Argentina, Austria, Brazil, Chile, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala,

Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Panama, Peru, Portugal, the Republic of Moldova,

Woman hopeful as adoption agency revived

Woman hopeful as adoption agency revived

Last Updated: Wednesday, December 2, 2009 | 12:58 PM AT Comments4Recommend6

CBC News

A New Brunswick woman says her dream of adopting two children from Ethiopia has been revived along with the international adoption agency she had been dealing with.

Debbie Thomas, of New Maryland, was one of hundreds of people who had filed mountains of paperwork and paid thousands of dollars to Ontario-based Imagine Adoption when the company suddenly shut down last summer, leaving them in the lurch.

Adoption row: No progress report on Jennifer Haynes

Adoption row: No progress report on Jennifer Haynes

2009-12-01
By: Mayura Janwalkar

Mumbai: After spending more than a year without an identity in India, the case of Jennifer Haynes, 28, who was deported to India 20 years after her foreign adoption, may be set in motion.

The Bombay high court on Tuesday directed the inspection of the progress report filed with the court after Haynes's foreign adoption was allowed in 1989.

As a procedure, the foreign adoption agency that processes the adoption of a child is supposed to file a progress report of the child with the court from time to time until the child attains adulthood.

But Haynes's advocate Pradeep Havnur said, "We have examined the records pertaining to Haynes's adoption. Neither the Indian adoption agency nor its American counterpart has filed any progress reports in all these years since her adoption."

Additional solicitor general DK Khambata told the court that the Central Adoption Regulation authority too has called upon the Americans for International Aid and Adoption, the agency that processed Haynes's adoption in 1989 for the progress reports filed by it.

Haynes was deported to Mumbai in July 2008 owing to incomplete formalities at the time of adoption as a result of which she did not gain American citizenship in spite of having been adopted by an American family and lived there for the past 20 years.

Justice Ranjana Desai and justice Mridula Bhatkar will hear the case on December 10.

Adoptive Parents Worry Their Babies Were Sold

Adoptive Parents Worry Their Babies Were Sold

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 9, 2009

filed under: family

Over the last several years, numerous reports have revealed that kidnapping, coercion, fraud, and money have also played a role in how some of these children ended up in orphanages.

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