Were you adopted from Sri Lanka and are you considering a search for your biological family or your origins? Through the SOYAMU project, INEA, in collaboration with Fiom/ISS and SERVE, supports adult adoptees in a careful, people-centered, and adoption-sensitive manner in their search for their origins. 

In July 2026, INEA traveled to Sri Lanka as part of the preparation and implementation of the SOYAMU pilot. The purpose of this trip was to further shape the collaboration with the local partner organization SERVE, make agreements regarding implementation, and jointly explore how search requests from adoptees can be supported in a careful and responsible manner. 

During the project trip, INEA spoke extensively with SERVE about the practical implementation of SOYAMU. This once again highlighted the extent to which local knowledge and involvement are required for search processes in Sri Lanka. With SOYAMU, INEA, Fiom/ISS, and SERVE are establishing a program for adult intercountry adoptees from Sri Lanka to collect, verify, and interpret available information regarding ancestry, identity, and adoption history. 

This is important because adoption records from Sri Lanka, particularly from the period of the 1960s to the 1990s, are not always complete or reliable. Some records contain conflicting information. Sometimes documents are missing, names are spelled differently, or birth dates and places are difficult to verify. As a result, a search can raise many questions, and every record requires careful assessment. 

An important part of the project trip was a two-day training session for involved professionals. The following themes were covered: adoption sensitivity, the process of searching for biological family in Sri Lanka, DNA testing within searches, and intercultural communication. For INEA and SERVE, these training sessions underscored once again that for an adoptee, the search is not only a practical or legal matter, but also an emotional and personal process. 

‘Jennifer’ by Nandita Puri recounts the true story of a little girl who was trafficked to America under the pretense of adoption.

The story starts with an Indian American named Jennifer in jail. After a quick hearing, she is deported back to India for having no papers confirming her to be an American. Shocked and alone in a strange land, she struggles to make a life for herself. Once you’re hooked as a reader, you hear her harrowing backstory, of how she was sent to America for adoption and how she was removed from adopting families for sexual abuse and then how she gets stuck in the American foster care system. With few prospects, she starts hustling to earn and when she’s caught, she’s sent to India against her will, leaving two children behind.

The book is both gripping and informative. Using simple words, the author captures the roller coaster of emotions Jennifer felt as she went through her life, with gentle insights on how some incidents would shape her. Interspersed in the first half are some informative chapters on international adoption laws and the history of child trafficking. They’re not too long and help provide context to the story, rather than taking the focus away from it. The book is hard to put down and offers a good look into how some bleaker parts of the world function.

Those arrested are the child's parents and those seeking to gain unauthorized custody of her

The National Police have arrested four people over the alleged irregular adoption of a two-year-old girl in Murcia, in a process arranged outside ...

Social services at Totana town hall picked up on the case, which involved two families of Honduran origin and, subsequently, the Regional Ministry of Social Policy, Families and Equality of Murcia alerted the National Police's Minors Unit.

The girl was born in 2024, and the Directorate-General for Families, Children and Work-Life Balance had been monitoring and assessing her family circumstances since her birth, putting measures in place to protect her welfare.

As an unmarried teenage mother, Will had to give her newborn to Sebille (77).
give up son. She had no choice. The recent apologies of the
Cabinet addresses birth mothers coming up for adoption too late for her: "No one takes
real responsibility.”
Judith Evertse
August 10, 2026
You could hear a pin drop in the packed hall in early July in the
The Hague theater Amare. There, State Secretary Claudia van Bruggen offered
on behalf of the government, apologize for the suffering that Dutch
birth mothers, fathers and relinquished children for almost thirty years
is affected.
For many, the apology felt like recognition, but birth mother Will
van Sebille, who grew up in Eindhoven, believes that
apology came very late. "We have for years at the
government asked for attention and requested apologies, for a long time
without result.”
15,000 women
The 77-year-old Van Sebille is the founder and former chairman of the
The Dutch Birth Mother Foundation (DNA). This foundation
represents the interests of approximately 15,000 mostly unmarried women who
between 1956 and 1984 had to put their child up for adoption under great pressure
give up.
"Everyone was convinced during that period that we were unsuitable and too
were unstable to raise a child,” says Van Sebille at home in
The Hague. The church, social organizations and the government
they all acted according to this ideology.
Parents of unmarried pregnant daughters often went along with this. "There
It is nowhere stated in writing that the surrender of the children in those
The period policy was that of the Dutch government. But it did turn out that way.
out."
Van Sebille was 17 when she was in Catholic Eindhoven in 1967
discovered that she had become unintentionally pregnant by her boyfriend. After
after a doctor's visit she was sent to the Bureau for Maternal Assistance,
where aid workers made it clear that there was only one option: her
The baby had to be removed as soon as possible after birth.
Her own wishes and needs were never taken into account. "I was there
I am convinced that I could indeed be a mother to my baby.
be. I could also receive benefits as a young mother, but that is
never told me.”
I went to Switzerland for the outside world, supposedly because I
had to recover from burnout
Will van Sebille
She was too overwhelmed to oppose the decision. "One day I was sitting
I was still in high school, where I was following the MMS. The other day
I was in the car on my way to an aunt in Switzerland, where I was
was sent to my parents to stay out of sight during the pregnancy
to be. I was a young, unmarried mother. That was a disgrace in
that time, and that had to be hidden, my parents thought too. Everything
The assistance provided was aimed at preserving their status and honor.”
The pretense was kept up to the point of absurdity. "I went for the
outside world to Switzerland, supposedly because I had to recover from
Burnout. They even put me on skis for a nice snapshot,
while I can't even ski.”
A shockwave of happiness
As the due date approached, she went to Leiden, where she in
a host family stayed. Within that family, it was openly discussed about her
pregnancy spoken, causing Van Sebille to for the first time
dared to feel pregnant. "'Something is growing inside me, I don't want that
"Lost!", I wrote to a friend at the time.
From the birth of her son in a Catholic care institution in Leiden
she can barely remember anything anymore. "It was very dark." She was
accompanied by a nun and a midwife. "At one point I heard
The moment the crying of my baby. Then a shockwave of happiness went through me.
through me.”
But even a few minutes of cuddling with her baby was not for her
granted. Her baby, a son, was immediately taken away from her.
I kept walking past those rooms to see if I could find him.
Will van Sebille
Secretly, she still hoped to see him for a moment: "I knew that she
left newborn babies in enclosed rooms for a while longer,
before they were picked up to go to their adoptive families. And
So I kept walking past those rooms to see if I could find him.
Only later did I find out that my son went to immediately after the birth
he was taken to the hospital because he was six weeks early.
born."
Her work? Making cards for baby goods
Her son eventually ended up in an adoptive family as well. Once home
her parents urged their daughter back to the thread of life quickly
to pick up: there was no room for grief and trauma.
Sebille lost not only her child, but also the opportunity to
to finish her school. "Within fourteen days after the birth, she became
I was put to work at a textile wholesaler. Go back to
High school was no longer an option.”
At work, she was bitterly reminded of her motherhood.
“I had to write cards there for baby goods that were coming in... Every
day after day I felt the loss.”
That feeling continued to 'fester' for a long time with Van Sebille. Yet she fought.
She worked her way up and made her dream of becoming a teacher come true.
In the evenings, she obtained her HAVO diploma and followed various courses.
teacher training programs.
At one point, we were both standing with a glass of wine in our hand.
and then I realized: we look alike!
Will van Sebille
She stayed with her son's father and later married him as well.
Together they had two more girls, but the marriage did not last.
Later she told her daughters about their older brother. "I was afraid
that they would react negatively, but my eldest daughter said
immediately: 'Maybe he's a handsome guy?' Then I fell silent from
relief."
My son stayed the whole day right away.
At the age of 50, she finally taught her relinquished son, then 33 years old.
know. Something she is enormously grateful for. Her eldest daughter
eventually brought them together. "He was an 'unknown' at the time
'known' to me. I thought this first meeting was very charged.
would be and that he would only stay an hour.” With a modest
with a smile, she adds: "But in the end, he stayed the whole day."
At one point, we were both standing with a glass of wine in our hand.
and then I realized: we look alike! We even went out for dinner
went, with my daughters too. I saw us all sitting at the table.
and suddenly thought: now my family is finally complete.”
——
Recovery measures fall short
- Heavy criticism of limited access to files:
Representatives of birth mothers and relinquished children believe that
the recovery measures offered by the government fall short. There is
They believe that the needs of victims were not listened to sufficiently.
In particular the continued limited access to all files regarding the
Adoption is a sore point. "In that way, our history is being
kept us away to protect the privacy of other people who in
prevent the files, for example care providers, parents or
clergy. But the interests of relinquished children are greater,” said
Frans Haven, from the Verleden in Zicht (ViZ) foundation, who represents the interests
looks after the interests of relinquished children.
- Limited reimbursement for appropriate psychosocial care:
The government is also not meeting the wishes of Verleden in Zicht.
and Stichting De Nederlandse Afstandsmoeder (DNA) for mothers and
to let children choose appropriate psychosocial help themselves.
Incomprehensible, says DNA Chair Ellen Venhuizen. "We are getting
not even priority on waiting lists in the mental health sector
healthcare. There are very few healthcare providers who have sense.
of this issue, which is very complex. We often have
benefit from help other than that available in regular care.”
- Assistance to involved organizations with file inspection: 'serious'
The foundations DNA and ViZ call it 'serious' that the cabinet is going
examine whether the Child Protection Council professional
can provide assistance with the inspection of the files. Haven: "We
They are quite willing to receive guidance, but certainly not from the Council for the Judiciary. For many
for the victims, that is too painful, because the Council for the Judiciary was one of the perpetrators.”
This organization was involved in the execution of the adoptions.
——
Yet the yearning for recognition of the suffering that her and others suffered remained.
Mothers was affected. Van Sebille sees the cabinet's apologies.
rather as a 'beginning' than as a 'completion' for the birth mothers
and their relinquished children. After all, several requirements are still being met
not fulfilled.
Choose your own help
As a result, psychosocial support outside regular care is still not
reimbursed, but many mothers and children want to decide for themselves what
is appropriate help. "I can tell my story well, I already have that
Done that so often. But then I don't get in touch with my feelings. It helped me.
well to talk about my dreams with a therapist, and more
to follow body-oriented therapies. But I've always had all of that
have to pay for it yourself.”
What also bothers her is that unlimited access to the Council's files.
of Child Protection and other involved agencies due to
privacy rules are still not possible. This is for many children
often the only way to trace their ancestry or for the mothers
to know where their children ended up.
'Surviving' changed into 'living'
The government will look into whether the Child Protection Council and the
FIOM can professionally guide the birth mothers and children
when searching through documents. But: those are precisely the authorities
who were involved in carrying out the adoptions at the time.
To Van Sebille, this feels like patronizing. "The government and agencies
We used to determine what was good for us, and emotionally, that is happening now.
again. No one is really taking responsibility.”
Van Sebille eventually managed to build a bond with her first child.
The guilt and shame remained. Only when she for the first time
every time she became a grandmother, 'surviving' changed into 'living'. "Even though April is, the
The month in which my son was born, still a difficult month
for me. For a year now, I have had a great-grandson who four days after
My son's birthday has been born. Because of that, I have a again
a bright spot this month.”
——
Will van Sebille
- Will van Sebille (77) became a figurehead of the foundation
The Dutch Birth Mother (DNA) whom she together with Barbara
founded Kluijtmans.
- She wrote a book together with Liesje de Leeuw (Opgestaan ​​is plaats)
perished) in which various birth mothers had their say.
- A poetry collection also appeared from her hand, in which she the reader
shares her feelings and experiences as a birth mother.
She is currently engaged in scientific research into the
ask how birth mothers are described in scientific
literature, books, and autobiographies. She is going to write about that subject.
writing a dissertation.
—— See less

South Korea's President Lee Jae Myung promised Friday to "fully uncover the truth" about the nation's dark history of forced overseas adoptions, months after apologising for the state-sanctioned malpractice.

South Korea was once one of the world's biggest exporters of babies, sending more than 140,000 children overseas between 1955 and 1999, according to official figures.

International adoptions began after the Korean war, sending away stigmatised mixed-race babies fathered by US soldiers and infants born to women ostracised out of wedlock in a conservative society.

It morphed into big business, generating millions of dollars for adoption agencies in South Korea's booming 1970s and 1980s.

Last year, the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission said the government was responsible for abuse in the practice by fabricating records and obtaining inadequate consent from birth parents.

State Sen. Aisha Wahab speaks to the crowd gathered during the Ramadan Iftar on Monday, April 10, 2023, at the state Capitol in downtown Sacramento. Wahab authored a bill that would allow people adopted in California to receive their unredacted birth certificates from the state. Sara Nevis snevis@sacbee.com Lori Schultz moved to Sacramento a few years ago with a goal in mind: To convince California legislators to pass a bill that would allow adopted people to access their original birth certificates. Senate Bill 381 would do just that.

Currently, people adopted in California can only get the record once they are adults and if they can convince a judge that they have a “good and compelling cause” for it. Those requests are often denied. Instead, many adoptees are only able to receive an amended version of their record from the state, which does not list their birth parents. 

Supporters of the bill say that type of restriction is terribly outdated. The widespread use of DNA testing has made finding long-lost relatives a greater reality. They see California’s continued withholding of their unredacted birth certificates as an affront and violation of their rights. Some have waited 70 or more years to get the document and have spent decades advocating for the law to change. 

“I’m a human being like everybody else who was kept at birth,” said Schultz, who co-founded a group called California Alliance for Adoptee Rights. The organization is the lead supporter of the measure, which is currently awaiting a key vote Thursday in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. Schultz, 66, grew up in the Central Valley and more than 40 years ago was able to figure out who her birth parents were using the few details the state will release about them. But she still does not have the original record documenting her birth. State Sen. Aisha Wahab, D-Hayward, who authored the bill, calls it a “tragedy” and “shame” that Schultz and other California adoptees can’t easily access their birth certificates. 

Wahab was placed into foster care as a child and later adopted. She was born in New York, which has allowed adoptees to access their original birth certificate since 2020. “There’s so much tied to adoption and your birth certificate because it exposes so much who you were,” she said, “or who you assumed you were.” Long history The practice of sealing original birth certificates in California dates back in the 1930s, and the state is not alone in its secrecy around them. Adoptees in only 17 states give people the right to have their original birth certificate without restrictions, according to the Adoptee Rights Law Center. Virginia became the most recent state on that list on July 1. 

We denounce the total absence of the voices of adopted people and
their first families.

Last month, the Journal de Montréal examined the political parties'
positions on the moratorium on international adoption. The article
reported that the Parti Québécois and MNA Marwah Rizqy criticized the
Coalition Avenir Québec for "dragging its feet" by extending the
suspension for over a year and a half. To support the idea that it is
urgent to end the moratorium, they highlighted the "touching" story of
an infertile couple who, despite several years of waiting, had still
not been able to realize their dream of becoming parents. For his
part, Minister Lionel Carmant emphasized the risks of child
trafficking and the need to wait for the report currently being
conducted by the responsible officials, which is expected to be
released this fall.

Who is speaking for whom here?

Although all these positions seem to diverge, they are based on a
common blind spot: the total absence, in the public debate, of the
voices of those directly affected by international adoption, namely
adopted persons and their first families.
Since the early 2000s, adoptees who have become adults, from various
European countries and the United States, have criticized the
monopolization of the narrative by individuals who have not
experienced the situation and who claim an expert stance based on a
pretense of objectivity and neutrality. In Quebec, this epistemic
background continues to hinder the voices of those most directly
affected and contributes to the perpetuation of harmful consequences
for them, while diminishing the value of the knowledge derived from
their lived experience.
Why is Quebec lagging so far behind?
Adoption is complex, and the diversity of experiences among adopted
people does not form a monolithic block that can be fixed once and for
all. When one truly pays attention to the lived experience of uprooted
people, as well as that of the communities from which they were taken,
some testify to positive experiences, sometimes even expressing
gratitude towards adoptive parents and host societies.
But by questioning the power relations underlying international
adoption, what appears to be "touching" radically changes its meaning
and reveals a completely different reality.

It is primarily the stories of assimilation, suicide, addiction,
incest, and psychological suffering among adopted people that become
visible when we stop reducing them to exotic trophies from the Orient,
supposedly rescued from wild and distant lands. Behind this rescue
narrative lies the structural violence of a deterritorialization that
no material "gift" from the West can fully compensate for. This
violence tears the child from their original lineage and disrupts the
construction of their identity, exposing them to an existential
ambiguity that could haunt them for their entire lives.
Several experiences of coercion, manipulation, and the precariousness
of the material and social conditions of first mothers in the Global
South, manifested in particular by the inaccessibility of
contraception, are brought to light when one seeks to take
reproductive justice seriously. These experiences are part of a
colonial continuum and continue to influence family separation, both
before and long after adoption.
All this shows that reducing adoption to its illicit dimension alone
or to the alleged right to have a child, without putting the testimony
of the first people concerned at the forefront, prevents us from
grasping the full depth of the issues it raises.
It takes profound sensitivity and intellectual honesty to expose the
numerous forms of violence rendered invisible by the rhetoric of
benevolence and moralizing that surrounds international adoption. In
this debate, both the opposition parties and the government lack these
essential qualities.

The impossibility of being heard

In the context of preparations for the review following the moratorium
expected by Minister Carmant, the Secretariat for International Child
Services has set itself the objective of consulting adopted persons to
discuss the modalities.

We, the Upper House of Adoptees, had the opportunity to speak with the
responsible officials. This time, the problem was no longer silence,
but the impossibility of being fully heard.
Aware of what we have experienced, bearing in our bodies the delicacy
with which a subject such as adoption must be approached, and faced
with the government's eagerness to publish its report, we sought to
slow down the process in order to ensure that things are done with
dignity.
The response we received was: "The train has left the station." Then:
"The entire adoption ecosystem has already been mobilized."
What "touching" stories does this emergency help to highlight?
Why aren't the people directly affected being consulted as a priority?
We argued that adopted people have historically been disadvantaged and
that this reality required special attention in the consultation
process. However, the Secretariat maintained that the analysis of the
data collected during the workshops would be entrusted to the National
School of Public Administration to ensure its neutrality.
What kind of neutrality are we talking about?
The choices made in the very composition of the interviews, however,
call this neutrality into question. The Secretariat was prepared to
base its report on more testimonies from adoptive parents than from
adoptees, before we pointed out this imbalance: 66 adoptive parents
versus 40 adoptees. Yet, nearly twenty thousand adoptees live in
Quebec today.
As for the first families, no consultation is planned.
A subject of such complexity demands a methodological approach
commensurate with the challenge. This is an assessment whose
conclusions will directly guide policies surrounding international
adoption.
We did not choose to come to Quebec. Yet, from our birth to adulthood,
decisions concerning our existence continue to be made without us.

Lisa grew up in Sweden, and her adoptive parents were always open about her background and fully supported her desire to locate her birth family.

A heartwarming family reunion took place in eastern China's Anhui province when a 23-year-old woman met her biological parents for the first time since infancy on July 25, 2026, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported. The emotional story went viral across Chinese social media platforms. Born in 2003 in Huaiyuan county, the woman named Lisa, who is known in China as Gao Jianquan, was handed over shortly after birth to a midwife by her parents, who believed they could not afford to raise her. Four days later, the midwife abandoned the newborn near a sports stadium in another city.

Local authorities found the infant suffering from an inguinal hernia and transferred her to a children's welfare home. Staff named her Gao Jianquan, meaning "in good health," before a Swedish couple officially adopted her at one year old.

Lisa grew up in Sweden, and her adoptive parents were always open about her background and fully supported her desire to locate her birth family.

In March 2026, Lisa registered with Baby Come Home, a Chinese non-profit organisation helping families find missing relatives. And around two months later, DNA testing successfully matched her with her biological family.

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Delhi Police arrested two men from Bareilly for running an online child adoption fraud. The action followed a complaint by a 30-year-old woman who said she was cheated of Rs 1.37 lakh after being promised a baby boy.

Delhi Police has busted a cyber fraud racket that targeted people seeking to adopt children and arrested two men from Uttar Pradesh's Bareilly, officials said on Monday. The action followed a complaint by a 30-year-old woman who said she was cheated of Rs 1.37 lakh after being promised a legal child adoption.

According to police, the woman had searched online for child adoption services and contacted a mobile number where the caller identified himself as Sachin, claiming to represent an organisation that facilitated legal adoptions.

He assured her that a baby boy was available for adoption and persuaded her to transfer money in multiple instalments under the pretext of registration, booking and transportation charges.

"To make the process appear genuine, the accused sent forged NGO receipts, fabricated ultrasound reports and other fake documents," a senior police officer told PTI.