When Nicole Koman is a few months old, she is adopted from a home. Although she ends up with loving foster parents, her adoption always plays a role. Sometimes in the foreground, then again in the background.

Nicole wrote a book about her adoption. The discovery of my other history has been in stores since this spring.

Nicole: 'Loving youth'

“There was never any secrecy about my adoption. My parents, as I prefer to call my adoptive parents, always talked about it openly.” But Nicole didn’t really know much about her biological father and mother. “Not much was known about it and I never really felt the need to know. I had my parents, family and friends. My childhood was very loving.” Nicole was therefore never ‘bothered’ by the fact that she was adopted. “People were sometimes surprised about my adoption. Many people think that it always concerns children from abroad. But Dutch children are also adopted.”

PART 1: CHANGES TO INSTITUTIONALIZATION IN EUROPE

In Bulgaria as with other European Union countries, there is a movement which has been funded by the European Union’s Structural and investment Funds (ESIF) since 2014 to close orphanages and institutions in eight EU Member States (Bulgaria, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania). The goal is to close all governmental institutions by 2022, including those for children with disabilities, by promoting the transition of youth from institutionalization to family-based care.  A pan-European campaign with Eurochild, the Opening Doors for Europe’s Children Campaign has played a key role in securing funding for such child protection reform across Europe and supporting economically disadvantaged families. The reforms will prevent the separation of children from their families and offer high quality alternatives where separation is in the child’s best interests. It is also expected to demonstrate an expenditure to the government that is equal to or less than the current cost of running institutions while providing improved overall outcomes for families and children.

Why is this important to you, a prospective adoptive parent?  Because change bubbling up in the institutionalized orphan population of Europe can mean eventual advantages for your adoptive child in experiencing a more home-like environment while in care, reducing the sometimes ill effects of institutionalization, allowing those children with disabilities more opportunities for social inclusion and focused development, and allowing economically disadvantaged children who should never have to be placed in an orphanage to begin with to reside with their biological parents who can begin to capably support them.

This particular funding is designed to address the plight of hundreds of thousands of children who are growing up in institutional care across Europe and runs through 2020.  Considered a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” for these European nations, deinstitutionalization (DI) is considered “the core of building more inclusive, resilient societies.” [February 2015, Opening Doors for Europe’s Children] This EU focus on DI is also active in two Candidate Countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia) and two Neighbourhood Countries (Moldova and Ukraine). Additionally, also involved are 4 additional member states of the European Commission: Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia, and Croatia who also assisted in adopting the EC Recommendation on Investing in Children in 2013.

The Dutch child protection system uses the term 'acceptable period'. This concerns the supervision order (Article 1:255 paragraph sub b BW: period in which work can be done on home placement after a supervision order) and the termination of parental authority (Article 1:266 BW: period before the authority of a parent can possibly be terminated). The 'acceptable period' is associated by some with intercountry adoption. It is claimed that this period has its origins in the UN Guidelines for Alternative Care of Children from 2009. These guidelines, which are not legally binding, are said to have been influenced by the international pro-adoption lobby, in order to stimulate the intercountry adoption of children.

The Guidelines for Alternative Care elaborate in particular, but not exclusively, the right to special protection and assistance for children in alternative forms of care as included in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (Article 20). The starting point is that every effort should be made to have children grow up with their biological parents or caregivers, in their own environment and culture (see also Article 30). If this is not possible or not in the best interests of the child, stable and permanent solutions must be sought within an appropriate period (elsewhere in the guidelines referred to as a 'reasonable period'). The guidelines mention adoption and kafalah under Islamic law. If this is not possible, other long-term options, such as foster care, appropriate residential care or informal care ( extended family ), must be considered.

Those who link the 'acceptable period' to intercountry adoption believe that the emphasis in the guidelines on an 'appropriate period' and 'stable and definitive solutions' is the result of the international pro-adoption lobby. Whether and, if so, to what extent this lobby has influenced the text of the guidelines is unknown to us at Defence for Children Netherlands. It is important that the guidelines state that if (domestic or intercountry) adoption is not possible, other appropriate solutions must be considered. In doing so, Article 21 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child must be observed. According to this article, there are various reasons why adoption is not possible. For example, countries may not recognise and/or allow domestic and/or intercountry adoption. It is also possible that the subsidiarity principle included in Article 21(b) of the Convention on the Rights of the Child is not being met (for more information about this concept, see the answer to the question 'What is the subsidiarity principle').

The guidelines do not state anything about the duration of the 'appropriate period'. However, the implementation guide 'Moving Forward' published in 2012 does state that sufficient time must be spent and every effort must be made to return the child and reunite him or her with his or her family. According to the guide, this process could take up to two years. The Dutch articles of law on supervision and termination of parental authority deliberately do not provide precise terms. This is stated in the explanatory memorandum to those articles dating from 2009. Since the introduction of the articles in 2015, guidelines from the Netherlands Youth Institute (NJi) and three professional associations have advised using terms of six months to one year. There is currently a lot of commotion about this. That is why these guidelines are now being examined.

The Guidelines for Alternative Care for Children do not interfere with the provisions of Article 21 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. They also do not elaborate on the concept of 'appropriate period'. As such, they do not form the basis for the interpretation of the Dutch legal term 'acceptable period'.

The end of China’s international adoption program has left adoptees with mixed emotions

This decision has affected not just families who wanted to adopt from China but also Chinese adoptees.

For Aili Montague, being a Chinese adoptee makes up a significant part of their identity.

Montague was adopted from the city of Huainan, China, in the Anhui province at around two and a half years old.

A now 18-year-old man has been charged with the murder of a 13-year-old girl in Hjallerup on 11 March. 

The North Jutland Police write this in a press release.

The defendant's defender, Mette Grith Stage , also confirms to Nordjuyske that the 18-year-old pleads guilty to murder.

Quickly arrested

The 13-year-old girl was found seriously injured at the heating plant in Hjallerup around 10 p.m. 

Catherine Irene Jacqueline Meyer, Baroness Meyer,[1] CBE (née Laylle; born 26 January 1953), is a British politician and businesswoman. She is the widow of Sir Christopher Meyer, the British former Ambassador to the United States. In 1999, she founded the charity PACT, now Action Against Abduction. In October 2020, she was appointed as the Prime Minister's Trade Envoy to Ukraine.[2]

Background

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Meyer was privately educated at the French Lycée in London, the School of Slavonic and East European Studies and the London School of Economics. She began her career in financial services and became a licensed commodity broker in 1979, working for Merrill Lynch, Dean Witter and E.F. Hutton.

Biography and child advocacy

Mysuru: The state govt's adoption initiative helped 33 children from the Chamarajanagar adoption centre find loving homes between 2018 and Oct 2024.
Among the adopted, 15 children were adopted by families within the state, 13 by couples from other states and five were taken in by families abroad, including five physically challenged.
The govt-introduced adoption scheme appeared as a boon not only for childless couples, but also for orphaned, abandoned, surrendered and destitute children to find families. Of the 33 children adopted, 21 were girls and 12 were boys.
According to the Chamarajanagar District Child Protection Committee, 28 children were surrendered by their parents unable to take care of them due to poverty, health and other reasons. All the children adopted by parents are below two years old.
Most of these adopted children were rescued by the District Child Protection Committee, when newborn girls and boys were abandoned by their mothers in dustbins, bus stands, temple premises, markets and other crowded places fearing social stigma, poverty, and other reasons.
Officials in the women and children welfare department attributed child marriage as one of the main reasons for abandoning children in hospitals and other places after giving birth, fearing legal problems, social stigma and other issues. The department also rescued several children found orphaned after the death of their parents.
Speaking to TOI, Chamarajanagar District Child Protection officer Cheluvaraju said that once these children were rescued, the state govt not only took care of their health but also looked after their upbringing and education with the help of non-govt organisations like Jeevan Jyothi Trust of Kollegal, which runs an orphanage exclusively for such children and takes care of rescued abandoned children. It also facilitates childless couples to adopt children under the adoption scheme.
As per the Adoption Scheme 2022 Act, childless couples who want to adopt children rescued by the child welfare department must register their names through an online portal launched by the Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA). The couple must be economically, mentally, and physically sound. They must play a crucial role in the well-being of the adopted child and must take care of the future of the child.
Once they apply online, a team from the department inspects the house of the applicant to verify their economic and social status, study their background and will submit the report to the respective deputy commissioner, who is also chairman of the district adoption resource authority, for approval. The department will keep the names of the couple secret after adopting children under the scheme. The department will also keep a tab on adopted children's parents for two years to verify they are taking care of the child.
Once the department officials rescued abandoned babies, and parents who surrendered their children to the District Child Welfare Committee, there was a provision for the mothers and family members to take back their children. Six months will be given for such parents to take back their children. If they do not turn up, then details of all orphaned, rescued, and abandoned children will be uploaded to the CARA website portal to facilitate adoption under the scheme, he said.

DR documentary wins Amnesty's Media Award 2024

Recipients of Amnesty's Media Prize. From left: Lisbeth Dilling, Søren Klovborg, Karoline Engelund and Nikolaj Venge (far right). Number two from the right is David Kildendal, who features in the documentary. Mikkel Inumineq Jørgensen

Amnesty's Media Prize 2024 goes to Søren Klovborg, Karoline Engelund, Lisbeth Dilling and Nikolaj Venge from DR for the documentary series 'Det store adoptiontyveri', which uncovers one of the biggest adoption scandals in Denmark. It investigates and exposes the trafficking of children to Denmark.

It has just been announced in Øksnehallen in Copenhagen, where DJ's Fagfestival 2024 will be held.

How did we move from the first international recognition of children's needs in the 1920s to the signing of the Convention on the Rights of the Child? How did the imperative of protecting the youngest gradually become linked to that of their emancipation, and therefore the consideration of their opinions and capacities for action? Historical insight.

This year, 2024, we commemorate the centenary of the first statement of the rights of the child, through the Geneva Declaration, and the 35th anniversary  of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989).

From the regulation of labor to the progress of schooling, from the development of pediatrics to the "invention" of early childhood, including state intervention within the family unit when necessary, there were certainly many advances in the 19th century  to improve the fate of children in Europe. But it was in the 20th century  , in the aftermath of the Great War, that the transnational movement for the adoption of a declaration of the rights of the child achieved a tangible result.

Looking back at this story helps shed light on contemporary issues surrounding young people's voices, on an international scale.

The Karnataka High Court recently quashed a criminal case against a woman booked for human trafficking, who allegedly sold her minor daughter for Rs 15,000 to a couple in Maharashtra as she was unable to maintain herself and her child.

In doing so the court noted that the woman had a "bonafide intention" to get the child adopted, even though the procedure was not followed adding that ingredients of the offence of trafficking were not made out. 

Justice K Natarajan allowed the petition filed by one Mandara and quashed the proceedings registered under Section 370 (Trafficking of a Person) read with Section 34 (common intention) IPC and Section 81 (Sale and procurement of children for any purpose) of Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015.

The FIR registered by the police on March 13, 2019 was based a complaint filed by the one Punith Kumar E., District Child Protection Officer alleging that the petitioner woman had sold her child to accused Nos.2 and 3. 

It was alleged that the petitioner is said to have married to one Girish and out of the wedlock, they begot a male child and the petitioner's husband deserted her and the child. Thereafter, it was alleged that she became intimate with another person named Venkatesh and out of that relationship, she delivered a female child on February 24, 2019.