Real Support for Unwed Moms

Volunteers take care of babies born to unwed mothers at a welfare center in Yeoksam-dong, southern Seoul, on Jan. 8. Many of unwed mothers have to send their babies to adoption agencies because of a lack of support and difficulty with child care. / Korea Times File

By Jennifer Kwon Dobbs

In today's adoption world, South Korea is no longer the largest sending country. Yet, why does it remain the world's oldest sending country in modern adoption history?

To address this undesirable legacy, the South Korean government has attempted to promote domestic adoption with mixed results.

Though domestic adoption statistically surpassed overseas adoption in 2007, the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs has reported problems with disrupted domestic placements where adoptive parents have returned children to the system.

More significantly, domestic adoption is not a valid solution primarily because it ignores an unwed mother's human right to give birth to and to raise her child.

Surf the web in Korea for unwed mothers' assistance. The top links connect you to adoption agency sponsored sites that promise help. Yet what is the quality of this help when there's a conflict of interest?

Seventeen of South Korea's 25 unwed mothers' maternity homes are adoption agency owned and operated. As reported by Choe Sang-hun for the New York Times, ``Nearly 90 percent of the 1,250 South Korean children adopted abroad last year, most of them by American couples, were born to unmarried women."

Current adoption agency practices encourage mothers to surrender their children.

News Trace 60 Minutes (Chujeok 60), a weekly news show of the state-run KBS TV, reports that adoption agencies cover expecting mothers' medical expenses and typically bring paperwork for a mother to sign relinquishing her child while still in the hospital bed.

A hospital discharge usually occurs 72 hours after delivery. A social worker will arrive at the maternity ward during this window to take the child.

Consequently, many children are unregistered to their mothers and lack identifying paperwork, therefore preventing future attempts for family search and reunion.

In response to instances where mothers have changed their minds and wanted to keep their children, agencies have charged mothers for the cost of their hospital stays. However, agencies receive government subsidies that offset these and other operating costs.

It is also a common agency practice to bill mothers for foster care provided between a child's birth and placement in an adoptive home. Many mothers, however, cannot pay and end up surrendering their children. The children of unwed mothers are not orphans, nor are they unwanted.

In my interviews with expecting mothers at Doori Home, a maternity home operated by the Salvation Army in Seoul, I learned that each mother who intended to surrender her child did not fully know her options nor have realistic expectations even though Doori Home, which has one of the highest rates of child-rearing motherhood, had provided counseling.

Each mother had named her child. Mothers who chose overseas adoption expected that their children would learn English, become globally and economically mobile, and find and return to them.

This assumption motivated mothers to prefer overseas adoption. However, reunion is the exceptional, not the usual outcome. From 1995-2005, the ministry reported that only 2.7 percent of 78,000 overseas adoptees who initiated a birth search successfully reunited with their families... > read complete article <

Asian-born surgeon becomes German health minister

Philipp Rösler, who was born 36 years ago in Vietnam and adopted as a nine-month-old baby by a German couple, becomes health minister in the government of conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Berlin -- A surgeon of Vietnamese birth was appointed to the German government Saturday, the first person of non-European origin to serve as a minister in Berlin.

Philipp Rösler, who was born 36 years ago in Vietnam and adopted as a nine-month-old baby by a German couple, becomes health minister in the government of conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel.

A rising star in the liberal Free Democrat party (FDP), Rösler was until now the German state of Lower Saxony's minister for the economy and deputy premier.

A heart and chest surgeon by training, Roesler, will have his work cut out as he seeks to get the German health system back on a sound financial footing.

He was the FDP's point man over the past three weeks in negotiating a government programme for health reform with Merkel's Christian-Democrats.

The reform is expected to lead to higher health insurance premiums as the government struggles to keep the system viable.

Adopted from a Vietnamese orphanage, he was brought up only by his adoptive father, a career military officer, as the couple split up when Roesler was aged four.

After studying medicine, Roesler, who spent much of his youth in and around barracks, became a medical officer in the German army.

He joined the FDP in 1992 and was elected to the Lower Saxony regional parliament in 2003. He was only this year appointed regional minister for the economy.

Roesler is married to a doctor and the father of one-year-old twin girls called Grietje and Gesche.

Asked recently by Stern magazine if he had been bullied in his youth because of his origin, Roesler suggested tongue-in-cheek that he had never had any trouble "because people always think that all Asians are karate experts."

Here follows a list of the main players in Merkel's cabinet:

CHANCELLOR: Angela Merkel (CDU), 55, became in 2005 Germany's first chancellor from the former communist East Germany, its first female leader and its youngest. A physicist by training and the daughter of a pastor, she rose to power first as a protégé of former chancellor Helmut Kohl. Forbes magazine's most powerful woman in the world four years running.

FOREIGN MINISTER: Guido Westerwelle, 47, takes the foreign ministry as is traditional for leaders of the FDP in coalitions with the CDU/CSU. A lawyer by training, he has little experience in foreign affairs but says he will stand by "basic tenets" of German postwar policy. He will be Europe's first openly gay foreign minister, having publicly "come out" at Merkel's 50th birthday bash.

FINANCE MINISTER: Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU), 67, moves from interior minister to finance minister, charged with balancing the books amid sharply rising debts. Wheelchair-bound since a 1990 attack on his life, the veteran conservative was a close ally of former chancellor Helmut Kohl.

DEFENCE MINISTER: Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, 37, from the CSU, the Bavarian sister party of Merkel's CDU. The baron with the slicked-back hair raised eyebrows when he was named economy minister in February, but he has shot past Merkel to become Germany's most popular politician. His main task will be overseeing Germany's unpopular mission in Afghanistan.

ECONOMY MINISTER: Rainer Brüderle (FDP), 64, deputy chairman of the pro-business Free Democrats since 1998. The wine buff, silver-haired veteran was touted as a possible economy minister under Kohl in the late 1990s but missed out before the FDP was consigned to 11 years in opposition in 1998.

INTERIOR MINISTER: Thomas de Maizière (CDU), 54, Merkel's trusted lieutenant since 2005 as her chief of staff, has been rewarded for his loyalty with the post of interior minister. His main tasks will be tackling the threat of Islamic extremism and fostering better integration of ethnic minorities.

FAMILY MINISTER: Ursula von der Leyen (CDU), 51, a popular mother of seven, will continue as family minister. In the previous government she introduced a raft of measures aimed at lifting Germany's traditionally low birth rate including increased benefits for stay-at-home parents and more kindergartens.

LABOUR MINISTER: Franz Josef Jung (CDU), 50, switches from defence to labour at a time of growing unemployment brought on by the economic crisis.

HEALTH MINISTER: Philipp Rösler (FDP), 36, a surgeon of Vietnamese birth, is the youngest member in the cabinet. He was adopted as a nine-month-old baby by a German couple and brought up in Germany. A rising star in the FDP he is currently minister for the economy and deputy premier in the state of Lower Saxony around Hanover.

AFP/Expatica

How Much Does Finding My Family Cost?

By Jennifer Kwon Dobbs, Ph.D.

The upstairs file rooms at Eastern Social Welfare Society, the agency that facilitated my overseas adoption to the United States, contain the records of adoptees stored in rolling bookcases to maximize space. Cranking one bookcase open reveals rows and rows of manila folders numbered in order of processing.
A folder is a life. A life is a folder.

What is inside each folder is a mystery to many adoptees who request copies of their files but are denied or who receive partial contents or blacked out documents. Some adoptees are told that their files have been lost to fires, while others are shown their files but are not allowed to copy, photograph, or touch them.
Because the files are the adoption agencies' private property, they lack governmental oversight determining how much information the agencies are required to share or are restricted from sharing.

The result is a cottage industry of post-adoption services facilitating family meetings. Yet what price does finding family cost?

Adoptees begin searching from where they're located, and that means outside of Korea. Overseas adoption agency fees range anywhere from 29,400 won just for copying an adoption file (Holt Adoption Services) to 88,190 won per hour to talk on the phone with family (Dillon Adoption Agency).

These fees add up. For example, Dillon Adoption Agency, which brokered my adoption, charges 94,090 won just for responding to an adoptee's intitial request to search. A visit to Dillon's website reveals that a completed search costs 735,100 won should it prove successful.
This figure does not include 29,400/page for translating Korean documents into English, or 17,600 won/page for English to Korean. Furthermore, this amount does not include the cost of airfare, lodging, food, and translation should an adoptee attempt to find out more information in Korea or actually meet family in person.

I have yet to find my family, but I have looked for them every summer since 2007. I estimate that I have spent at least 6,470,000 won, and this is a conservative amount, which lacks food costs, transportation in Korea, overseas medical insurance, and incidental expenses.
The Ministry reports that 75,646 adoptees (almost half of the entire government documented overseas adoptee population) sought counseling for birth family search between 1995-2005. Only 2.7 percent successfully reunited with family.

I am one of the 97.3 percent still waiting.

How much did losing my family cost?

When my adoptive mother gave me my English-language documents in 1996, I found stuffed inside an envelope a receipt for my adoption fee. In 1976, losing my family cost 529,000 won.
In 1976, 6,597 babies were sent overseas to 14 receiving nations in Europe and North America. In terms of cost (529,000 won), that's 3,490,000,000 won or 13,270,114,000 won(adjusted for inflation) in 2009.

My loss and the loss of other overseas adoptees is whose gain? No study as of yet has been conducted to answer this question, but it's an urgent one that will clarify intercountry adoption as a global industry.

Adoption is oftentimes characterized as a loving decision. Though this might be the intention, adoption is still a business.

As an infant, I was an exported product for which my adoptive parents paid 529,000. In the context of post-adoption services, I am the customer who returned again and again and spent at least 6,470,000 won for nothing.

What could at least 6,470,000 won help my family and I gain together? This money could pay for a semester at university to help me speak Korean so that my family and I can laugh together. It could purchase a year's worth of food for us.

According to another global company, McDonald's, the customer is always right, but I am not a customer. I'm somebody's daughter, sister, and niece. I don't care about the money. After all, what price can one place on love?

Jennifer Kwon Dobbs is assistant professor at St. Olaf College in Minnesota, U.S. and the author of Paper Pavilion (White Pine Press 2007).

> Earlier Korean Version was published in the Pressian <

Adoptions plagued by racial bias

By Enrique Rangel | A-J AUSTIN BUREAU

Sunday, October 25, 2009

AUSTIN - Over the years a good number of childless American couples have traveled to China, Guatemala, Romania and other faraway countries to adopt a child.

But children in Texas' Panhandle and Southern Plains as young as a few weeks old and as old as 20 may wait three years to find families - longer than the state average of two years



Data from the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services shows that in 2008 there were 6,375 children waiting to be adopted in the state. Of those, 174 lived in Lubbock County, 64 in Randall County and 26 in Potter County.

Romanian Orphans, ready for export to the EU

Source: Jurnalul National of 20 October 2009 – translated article

See also

• Romania - For Export Only
• "Don't punish the children"
• The Romanian battlefield for children
• Italians finally give back stolen Romania children
• High Level external pressure
• Romania for Export Only
• Search a Child, Pay Cash - The Adoption Lobby

European Commission and Romanian Office for Adoptions quietly force to reopen international adoptions

- REPORTING FROM BRUSSELS - Romanian Office for Adoptions prepares since almost 3 months to modify law 273 of 2004, the law that stopped the trafficking of children from Romania to other countries, under the guise of international adoptions.

ORA officials have not acted on their own, but with the support of interest groups in the U.S., Italy, France and other countries.

By Mircea Opris
20/10/2009

These groups were used by a Directorate of the European Commission, which will hold a conference for the reopening of international adoptions from Romania, on 31 November and 1 December in Strasbourg.

The European Commission requires changing of the law, imposed by itself as a condition of our entry in the EU. Jurnalul National was able to look into the corridors of these international operations, with the help of a source inside the European Commission, whose identity we will protect for understandable reasons.

ROMANIANS WAITED FOR THE RESIGNATION OF THE GOVERNMENT

The Romanian Office for Adoptions paved the way for amendments to the law prohibiting international adoptions since the summer, when they organised two conferences, both held in Timisoara. The first took place in early September and referred to the rights of the adopted child. Here were assembled all the directors of the child protection directorates in the country for a central database for the adoption process, data about the number of adoptable children and of adoptions in process. A second conference was also held in Timisoara, away from the eyes of the EU mission in Bucharest.

In the period 27-30 September 2009, UNICEF Romania and the National Authority for Child Protection (ANPDC) organised the National Conference which opens the series of events dedicated to celebrating the 20th anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Attending were representatives ANPDC, DGASPC sites, UN agencies in Romania and other government institutions and NGOs.

Here, Romanian and international institutions, together with NGOs involved in adoptions have finalized, in order to promote later, by legislation the Integrated National Action Plan on Preventing and Combating Violence against children. Coordinators were Ileana Savu, Secretary of State at the ANPDC, and Edmond McLoughney, UNICEF Representative in Romania.

With only one day before the predictable failure of the Boc 2 Government, ORA proposes, through a Memorandum sent to the Government, to reopen international adoptions. The document prepared by ORA shows that during the four years of implementation of Law 273/2004, concerning the legal status of adoption, it was found that there are some categories of children who are "hard to adopt" because the regulatory framework in force does not identify appropriate solutions with a permanent character. The initiators of the document state that such a measure should be taken, having regard to provide equal opportunities for all children separated from their natural families, who can not be reintegrated and can not be adopted in Romania.

The role of "soldier of sacrifice" was for Secretary of State of the Romanian Office for Adoptions, Bogdan Panait, who said the reopening of international adoption will be done only in cooperation with accredited authorities of the respective States, in order to avoid corruption. He fails to convince why this memorandum was submitted to the government at a time when Romania has no government.

"I submitted the memorandum Monday morning before the vote of the motion (the fall of the government - sic). I do not know what will happen to it. I am in a hurry, it's one thing we wanted to submit for political debate and decision, and I think that this Government could discuss this Memorandum, "said Bogdan Panait. Clearly, ORA took advantage of political turmoil in Bucharest to demand a change of the law, to negotiate it with the next government to be appointed.

Approval of this Memorandum means practically the amendment of Law 273 on the rules of adoption. Some of negotiations with representatives of U.S. and EU countries, interested in adoptions from Romania could be possible to adopt the memorandum and adoption law. "When I came here, I had a discussion with the Prime Minister (Emil Boc - Sic). Of course, there were many complaints from families and international fury, but the discussion was to value and change the law.

Sure, he was not clear if it was about international adoption. I have taken up this mission. The modification was made. The law is ready for 99 percent, in the coming weeks it will be subjected to public debate and will be posted on the website. But from the context in which we made the changes to the law, I have concluded - and because of international protocols - that we can go ahead with the idea and start procedures for international adoption.

Sure, this is not a decision which I can make. And that’s why I made this Memorandum, a memorandum which is very neutral. It is up to the Government to decide to what extent it is the political moment, we have statistics, I mentioned the commitment of Romania in the field and the decision will be entirely to the government," said Bogdan Panait a few days ago. Interestingly, in early September, in an exclusive interview to Jurnalul National, the same Secretary of State said that "As long as I am the director of ORA, if the government will ask me to find a solution to the international adoptions, for the moment at least, such thing is excluded".

Once more it will create the image that again we will trade, traffic and other dealings with children. In three or four years perhaps, but it is the responsibility the Romanian State must bear." Powered by internal and external pressure or not, Bogdan Panait had no patience for three or four years and urged the reopening of international adoptions as soon as possible.

SLAP FROM THE GOVERNMENT

Subtle movement to amend the Law 273, which became a mandatory condition of Romania’s accession to the EU, was dismantled by the Government that gave its last breath. On October 16, the Romanian Executive announced officially that it does not support the memorandum initiated by the Romanian Office for Adoptions, which proposes reopening the international adoptions. The Memorandum represents the point of view of the institution and is not endorsed by the Emil Boc Cabinet Emil, still in office. The Government had no discussion about this Memorandum and therefore has not taken any decision on this document.

Prime Minister still in office, Emil Boc, believes that current legislation in the field of international adoptions is in accordance with international law and European standards. The same view was exposed by former PSD Foreign Minister, Cristian Diaconescu.

ADOPTION MAFIA WORKS THROUGH THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION

The European Commission and the Council of Europe have prepared the international conference "Challenges of the procedures for adoption in Europe", which originally was to be held on 26 and 27 November in Strasbourg. Beyond discussions of principle, the ultimate aim of the conference is to develop a joint recommendation that Romania should follow the Bulgarian model, which is to reopen international adoptions. Those of the European Commission and NGOs who oppose this idea immediately came into conflict with the organizers.

The website announcing the conference and where one could register was suspended and amended several times, and those interested to participate could not register. Subsequently, only NGOs approved by the organizers were informed by e-mail, and not at the official site of the conference, that the dates had changed and the conference would be held between November 30 and December 1. The worst thing is that the team of the European Commission in charge of organising the conference is not legally allowed to do so.

Specifically, the Directorate General for Justice, Freedom and Security of the European Commission, the unit E2 - Civil Justice, headed by the Finnish Salla Saastamoinen organises the conference. The coordinator of the organisational team is the Italian Patrizia De Luca, working in that directorate. According to the organigram of the European Commission, the Rights of the Child are part of the D1 of Directorate D of the European Commission, led by the Romanian Aurel Ciobanu-Dordea. Sources in the EC Directorate D told National Journal that this structure has no involvement in organising the conference in Strasbourg, although it is the only unit that has competence in children's rights in the European Commission.

The same source says that Directorate E2 violates the official regulations of the EU, more precisely the European Union anti-corruption policy, which states that a Directorate can not organise actions on issues that do not fall within their powers, conform the Communication on Anti-Corruption Policy, number 317 of 2003, addressed to the European Council and the European Parliament.

HOW TO SUBSTITUTE THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION

The organisational team E2 of the Directorate of Justice has hired a private firm that bought an Internet domain,www.adoptionprocedure.net, announcing the upcoming conference. Normally, the conference should have been officially announced on the Internet pages of the European Commission and the Council of Europe. Subsequently, the team only had contact with organisations and NGOs who are in favour of reopening international adoptions and ignore all others and international media interested in this subject. Many last-minute changes were only announced on the website of the conference at the last minute, or not announced at all.

Jurnalul National managed exclusively to unveil the secrecy around this so important conference, even at the European Commission in Brussels, from a source working in the Directorate of Justice caught offside, ie unit E2. This source claims that postponing the conference has nothing to do with the submission of the Government memorandum of ORA in Bucharest, but that the new government which will be installed until the conference, November 30, could give a favourable opinion of the proposed change of Romanian Office for Adoptions.

To the conference no nongovernmental organization from Romania or from another country that is hostile to reopen international adoptions was invited, the ultimate goal of the meeting in Strasbourg.

"We invited to the conference those organizations that have a closer connection (they coincide with those that oversaw international adoptions in Romania until 2004 and continued lobbying for the reopening them – Sic.) and we can not invite everyone who registered or the press because the conference hall has only 150 seats. The website does not work all the time, because it is under construction, because the conference agenda and guest list is not yet complete.

From Romania only three guests will participate from State institutions. One of them, Bogdan Panait, director of ORA. I do not remember the name of the other two. We pay to participate, just travel and accommodation, for participants approved by us, with whom we worked, a total of 10 NGOs. Among them the Nordic Adoption, an umbrella association of 15 adoption agencies, very important in northern Europe and other organizations from France, and SERA, SERA whose leadership has moved to Geneva, International Social Service, and Amici dei Bambini in Italy.

So, from Romania will come only three guests from the State and Edmond McLoughney, UNICEF representative in Romania, who will speak on behalf of Romania, told us the source of the European Commission. Interestingly, the last topic of the conference will be "Towards a European policy on adoption ", where the case and experiences of Romania and Bulgaria will be analysed, and Frenchman Jean-Marie Cavada, Member of the European Parliament and a close associate of French pro-adoption lobby in Romania, will talk about a common adoption policy, because other countries have opened adoptions, only Romania has not done this, though is part of the European Union.

We will have a Hungarian adoptive parent who lives in Britain, who will speak about the problems he had when he adopted a child in Hungary. This conference is a sequel, a follow-up to the conference in 2006, when it was tried also to make Romania to understand how necessary it is to reopen international adoptions, as well as other EU countries. We will not solve the problem immediately, but the conference has to convince Romania that international adoption can be resumed, like in other EU countries, such as for example Bulgaria, which has responded positively to this request for international adoptions.

The fact that Romania has a law against international adoption is the fault of former European rapporteur for Romania, Baroness Emma Nicholson, who said that international adoption means trafficking in children. She used his influence to halt all adoptions and make the entry of Romania into the EU to stop adoptions. Now we try to convince Romania to re-open adoptions, like other countries in Europe,” our source in Brussels told us.

Source: PPL and Journalul Romania

Illegal Adoption from Philipines raises questions in House of Representatives

United Adoptees International has been active to address the on going acceptance of the Dutch government of so-called 'illegal' adoptions which seems the most of the time, cases of pure child-trafficking for adoption.

After many cases last few years also this year cases appeared into the open.The most recent case is a couple from Leeuwarden (Friesland) which trafficked a child from the Philippines to adopt. The wife, self from Philippine descent, and a policeman, where travelling in the Philippines and where told by an woman, that she wanted them to have the baby, which she said, she was the mother.

Arrived in the Netherlands, the policeman actually tried to embezzle the birth-certificate of the child as was it his own.

Even-though this case was a clear example of child-trafficking for adoption and embezzlement of status of the child, done by an government official, the public prosecutor lost his case in court and both suspects where free to go.

The judge declared in court, that it was in the best interest of the child to be adopted. But the real issue is, that according international criminal law, (accomplishment) abduction and theft or child-trafficking in order to obtain a child for adoption as prospective adoption parent is still not punishable.

One of the reasons why prospective adoption parents still try several routes to adopt children and act as receiver fully innocent.

Nevertheless, the UAI addressed this issue again and the SP party was willing to look into this issue and asked questions to the ministry of Justice regarding this Philippine-Dutch case. The UAI is not very hopeful that the questions will lead to an end of 'illegal' adoption while the House of Representatives in the Netherlands did not care about these issues before and where not willing to close the gap in the law to prevent practices like this. Which can only lead to one conclusion, that States and Nations are not cooperating to protect children and mothers in need. Because it is in the best interest of children that adoption will be continued....?

Canada queries China on child abduction claims

By Richard Foot , Canwest News ServiceOctober 18, 2009

The Canadian government has expressed formal concerns to China about claims that Chinese babies are being kidnapped and sold to orphanages for adoption in Canada and other western countries, Canwest News Service has learned.

Canadian Embassy staff in Beijing have asked the chief of the China Centre of Adoption Affairs (CCAA) — the state agency that oversees China's international adoption program — to investigate.

"Chinese authorities are looking into this question," says Janet Nearing, the director of adoption services for the government of Nova Scotia, who says federal officials in Ottawa informed her that embassy staff have held meetings on the subject with Chinese officials.

"(CCAA's) director general has assured the embassy staff that the agency is looking into this matter," says Nearing. "He added that no children adopted by Canadians were (illegally obtained). I don't know what his source of information would be, but that's the information we were given."

Newspapers in China reported in July that dozens of baby girls in the southern Chinese province of Guizhou had been abducted from their families and sold for $3,000 U.S. per child to local orphanages, which in turn adopted the babies out — for similar fees — to couples from North America and Europe.

Last month, the Los Angeles Times also published an investigative article quoting parents in the provinces of Guizhou and Hunan, who said their babies had been stolen, sold and adopted overseas.

"It raises serious concerns, no doubt about it," says Nearing.

Although China levies fines against citizens that have multiple children, it is illegal to seize a child without the parents' consent, or to buy and sell babies.

Reports of corruption in China's international adoption program first surfaced in 2005, but China said it was an isolated incident. New allegations this year prompted one Canadian parent — a mother in Nova Scotia who adopted a Chinese baby in 2006 — to go public this fall with fears that her daughter may not have been a legitimate orphan.

Although Cathy Wagner's child came from the province of Chongqing — where claims of abduction and baby-trafficking have not arisen — Wagner says she was required to pay a $3,000 adoption fee, supplied to her daughter's orphanage in crisp, new U.S. bills.

Nearing, who oversees all adoptions in Nova Scotia including those from overseas, calls this year's allegations "very troubling," and says they prompted her to ask Ottawa to look into the matter.

Although adoption is a provincial responsibility, Nearing says provinces have no means of investigating alleged corruption in other countries, or of dealing with foreign governments.

Those matters are handled by the Inter-Country Adoption Services, a branch of the federal Department of Human Resources and Skills Development.

Officials from the department did not respond to requests for details about what embassy staff asked of the Chinese, but Nearing says officials in Ottawa acted quickly this fall to seek information from China.

In the past, China has not responded kindly to questions about alleged corruption within its state-run adoption system.

When the Dutch government raised similar concerns in 2008, China warned the Dutch that ongoing questions would result in trade retaliation against Holland, according to government documents obtained by the Dutch adoption agency, World Children.

Canada's own queries of the Chinese government come at an awkward time for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who is seeking an invitation from China for an official visit to Beijing, possibly during a scheduled trip to Asia next month.

Nearing says Ottawa and other governments are virtually powerless to verify what Chinese authorities might tell them, calling the foreign-adoption program a matter of "trust" between countries.

She also says she has no way of telling parents who have adopted from China whether their child was abducted, trafficked, or legally obtained.

Despite such problems, Nearing says Canada should wait for more information before imposing a possible moratorium on adoptions from China.

© Copyright (c) Canwest News Service

Faith moves families to adopt children from overseas

The 2-year-old girl was living in an Ethiopian orphanage, facing poverty, malnutrition and disease. Her birth parents were dead and she was alone.

That was six months ago.

Today, she is smiling and playing at LifePoint Church in Smyrna, and pointing at the preacher.

"That's my daddy,'' said Alyza Kate Hood.

Then she and her 3-year-old sister, Jadyn, from China, ran off to play under the watchful eyes of their parents, the Rev. Pat Hood and his wife, Amy.

The Hoods, like a growing number of Middle Tennessee families, say their faith motivated them to rescue the orphans. They have adopted children from overseas, not because of infertility, but because they believe God wanted them to do it.

The interest in faith-based adoption comes when the number of international adoptions is declining. In 2004, there were 22,911 overseas adoptions in the United States, with 448 in Tennessee, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Last year, there were 17,229, with 367 in Tennessee.

Most of the change is because countries like China and Russia are allowing fewer children to be adopted. Currently, the wait for a child from China is about five years. That's prompted couples to turn to countries like Ethiopia.

"Not everyone is called to adopt," Pat Hood said. "But everyone is called to care for orphans."

Caring for orphans

The idea of rescuing orphans through adoption comes from several factors. First is the sheer numbers. By some accounts, there are 143 million orphans in the world.

Second, there's the Bible. The Old Testament and New Testament teach believers to care for orphans.

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this," reads the book of James, "to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."

Then, there's the mission trip factor. The Hoods cite their experience overseas when talking about their decision to adopt.

Amy Hood says she first began thinking about adoption in 2002. At the time, her husband was not interested. "I told Amy I wasn't even going to pray about it," he said.

> read the article <

Group tries to aid Vietnam adoptions

A high-level delegation from the Adoption Board is in Vietnam to try and expedite 20 adoptions from the country.

The 20 couples involved in the adoptions received letters informing them of the trip. They were told the delegation would be headed by Adoption Board chairman Geoffrey Shannon and include the board’s chief executive, registrar and principal social worker.

‘‘In the situation where these adoptions proceed, it will be the function of the Adoption Board to determine in each case, on the basis of the facts presented, whether to grant that adoption an entry in the register of foreign adoptions," the letter stated.

Ireland’s bilateral adoption agreement with Vietnam lapsed on May 1 after five years in existence. The failure to establish a new agreement has left hundreds of people in an uncertain position. The 20 applications that are the subject of this visit were received in Vietnam before the agreement lapsed.

In total, almost 300 people have been approved to adopt from Vietnam by the Adoption Board, after going through a lengthy approval assessment process.

Minister for Children Barry Andrews has said that Ireland did not renew the adoption agreement with Vietnam because of concerns about adoption procedures there.

While adoption groups and opposition politicians accused Andrews of leaving it too late to reach a new agreement, two UN reports have since raised concerns about the adoption process in Vietnam.

If the government decides against pursuing a new agreement with Vietnam, adoptions will not restart until the Hague Convention on intercountry adoptions is ratified by the Vietnamese government.

It is unlikely to be ratified before 2011,which would leave many Irish couples in limbo. The government said it would consider the reports before making a decision about an agreement with Vietnam.

NETHERLANDS - IRELAND (INTERNATIONAL)

EXCLUSIVE ARTICLE © UAI 2009

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Ieder voor zich en God voor ons Allen ?

Under the disguise of gods love,mothers where forced to give up their babies to the Church



For many decades, if not centuries, people thought and believed that the church and their congregations would be the centre of pure Christianity where their sins would be washed of. Premature pregnancy before marriage, even after rape and incest, where seen as acts of sinners. Even though many women where victims of the situations. But the punishment of their deeds in society itself was not enough. Even in monasteries and convents young women where abused, mistreated, even raped. Also young boys and men who ended up in by nuns and priest run schools where the victims of the Catholic orders.



But what many people do not know is, that baby theft and forced relinquishment was part of the catholic scheme of pressure and punishment. Mothers where forced to give up their babies in monasteries for adoption. Centuries women lost their children under supervision of the church and their leaders.



The issue is, that is not an old history alone. It gave birth to export these practices to new catholic orders and missionaries in new countries outside the west. With the decline of members in the western world, the new members in the East and middle Asia became victims of the same practices. South Korea, Vietnam and India are well known examples of these practices and the first waves of children for intercountry adoption with help of congregations and new missionaries.



The stories of the European victims are getting into the open, when will the stories of the other continents follow their tragic and dramatic truth. Interesting detail is that, even though feminism was introduced and equal rights for women was enforced, that at the point of children, some women feel more capable to have children then others and did and do not really care of other mothers loose their babies to them. This astonishing development is not only shocking but also reads that feminism was hiding also a system of class sensitiveness. Meaning, some women are more equal than others.

Kerken al eeuwenlang leverancier van adoptiekinderen

Door Hilbrand W.S. Westra

Het schokkende Ierse‘Ryan Report’ onthult wanpraktijken in kloosters en scholen. Het zwijgt inhoudelijk echter over de ontvreemding (childtrafficking) van duizenden kinderen naar de Verenigde Staten, Engeland en Australië. Tevens wordt er met geen woord gerept over hoe overheden en kerken moedwillig meewerkten aan grootschalige identiteitsfraude en valsheid in geschrifte om deze kinderen ongezien weg te sluizen en op te nemen in ambtelijke bestanden. Het lijkt erop dat de Ieren hun kinderen liever kwijt waren dan rijk. Opvallend in dit perspectief is dan ook, dat momenteel juist Ierland, binnen de Europese Unie, de druk opvoert om sneller grote aantallen interlandelijke adopties te forceren. Met name uit risicolanden als Vietnam. Een land dat recentelijk opnieuw werd geconfronteerd met kinderhandel voor de internationale adoptiemarkt.

Ruth Hopkins beschrijft in dagblad Trouw van 29 juli 2009, over het drama van de ‘Maggies’. Beter bekend als de “Magdalene Sisters” door de gelijknamige film van Peter Mullan. De film, gebaseerd op waar gebeurde feiten, laat een schokkend relaas zien van jonge vrouwen en kinderen die onder het onverbiddelijke regime van nonnen terecht kwamen. Hoe zij werden misbruikt, mishandeld en onder dwang hun kinderen moesten afstaan aan de kerk. Vergelijkbare situaties deden zich ook voor in veel andere Europese landen, de Verenigde Staten, Canada en Australië. Relatief nieuw zijn de berichtgevingen over experimenten met kinderen in deze context.

De gedwongen afstand van kinderen om ze tot wees verklaren of ongeboren te beschouwen, om zodoende te kunnen fungeren voor medische experimenten onder het dak van de Kerk, maar ook staatskindertehuizen, is een terugkerend verschijnsel gebleken in samenhang met de adoptiehistorie. Zo is bekend, dat ten tijde van de massale adopties uit Roemenië, eind jaren negentig, begin deze eeuw - tot waarschijnlijk op de dag van vandaag - zogeheten ‘weeskinderen’ als proefkonijnen werden misbruikt voor wetenschappelijke experimenten die verdacht veel parallellen vertonen met Nazi praktijken gedurende tweede wereldoorlog. Recentelijk kwam een dergelijk bericht ook uit Noord Korea. Een gevluchte Noord Koreaanse officier klapte uit de school over hoe hij zijn geestelijk gehandicapt kind, door de staat tot wees werd verklaard, om te kunnen dienen voor wetenschappelijke experimenten. Het werkt dan ook bevreemdend om te vernemen, dat Amerikaans grootste adoptiebemiddelaar Holt, heimelijk al in Noord Korea actief is, om als ‘preferred supplier’ , de positie die zij al decennia lang inneemt in Zuid Korea, te bestendigen. En dat in een dictatuur die zich niets aantrekt van mensenrechten laats staan die van kinderen. Holt, een christelijk gefinancierd miljoenen bedrijf, heeft haar zinnen gezet op een nieuwe adoptiemarkt wegens de teruggang van het aantal adoptabele kinderen uit China en Zuid Korea.

Opvallend is de samenhang en invloed van christelijk organisaties en adoptie. Wetenschappers als Tobias Hubinette uit Zweden maar ook Kim en Henderson uit de Verenigde Staten, schreven al eerder, dat de grootschalige adopties uit Zuid Korea nooit hadden kunnen bestaan zonder organisaties als Holt en de invloed van de kerken.

Zo schreef ook Carine Hutsebaut, gerechtsdeskundige gespecialiseerd in daderprofilering, in haar boek; ”Kleine zondaars, Kerk en Kinderhandel”, over hoe, met name de katholieke kerk, een goed geoliede machine was waar vrouwen uit België, Nederland en Frankrijk, vaak ongewild, naar afgelegen kloosters werden gebracht om te bevallen om daarna gedwongen afstand te doen van hun kinderen. Deze kinderen, onder andere geboren uit seksuele escapades van paters, pastoren en andere leden van de clerus, werden ´gedistribueerd´ onder de leden van de eigen parochies of die van andere. Deze geheime kinderen werden dan bijgeschreven als eigen kind door de desbetreffende ‘illegale ouders´ waardoor er sprake is van grootschalige fraude in de bevolkingsregistratie. Zo werd Frankrijk enige jaren geleden opnieuw geconfronteerd met verdwenen kinderen door een oproep voor militaire dienst. Doordat de jongens die niet kwamen opdagen, stuitte men op vele zogeheten vermiste of onbekende kinderen, beter bekend onder de naam ´Sous X´. Allen ‘weggeadopteerd’ naar elders. Over het aantal onbekende meisjes maar te zwijgen.

Het is opvallend dat deze onderwerpen slechts altijd voor even opduiken waarna het vaak snel een stille dood sterft. De hoop is nu, dat door de Ierse kwestie, deze zaak ook in de rest van Europa aan het rollen komt. Maar het lijkt erop, dat de mythe van de heiligheid van adoptie en de kerk onaantastbaar is. Het probleem is echter, dat door het verzwijgen van deze praktijken, dergelijke activiteiten gecontinueerd worden. Is het niet onder de vleugels van de kerk, dan wel door die adoptiebemiddelaars die gelieerd zijn aan religieuze organisaties en/of kerkgenootschappen die op hun beurt weer gefinancierd worden door instellingen en banken die direct en/of indirect betrokken zijn bij de farmaceutische en/of medische industrie.

Het is juist deze lobby, hand in hand met het christelijk gedachtegoed, die van grote invloed is gebleken op de grote aantallen geforceerde kindermigraties wereldwijd en de gewelddadige breuk tussen ouders en hun kinderen. Juist deze laatste groep krijgt structureel onvoldoende aandacht. Onder deze duizenden, zo geheten ´gevallen vrouwen´, zitten ongeveer 25.000 Nederlandse moeders die ooit hun kinderen afstonden in kloosters in België, Frankrijk en aan het beruchte Nederlandse instituut, Valkenhorst. Het wordt hoog tijd dat het taboe over de rol van de kerken, de maatschappelijke druk, en daarmee haar mede verantwoordelijkheid - dat verder reikt dan katholieke reflexen zoals Hopkins onterecht stelt in haar artikel – voor de verzwegen geschiedenis van gedwongen afstand in Nederland en elders in de wereld, wordt doorbroken. In de eerste plaats om het leed wat deze vrouwen is aangedaan te erkennen. Maar ook voor de geadopteerden waarvan velen nooit zullen weten dat ze ooit geadopteerd zijn. Tevens is het van groot belang om inzicht te krijgen hoe deze praktijken nu worden voortgezet in veelal niet westerse landen. Waarbij onvrijwillige afstand door moeders, in de context van maatschappelijke en/of socio-economische redenen, door de westerse adoptielobby wordt vermarkt als zijnde een vrije keus.

De noodzaak om deze schrijnende adoptiegeschiedenis recht in de ogen te kijken en een halt toe te roepen aan het gesol met kinderen en diens ouders is hoog. Niet alleen in westerse landen maar ook in de huidige, meer dan honderd, zendende landen. Want uiteindelijk zijn het de getormenteerde geadopteerden en hun ouders die de hoogste prijs betalen voor de hartverscheurende gevolgen van deze bizarre praktijken waarvan de symptomen op persoonlijk niveau steeds meer zichtbaarder worden.

Opvallend in deze, is de doodse stilte van de zogeheten ‘gezegende partij’ die deze kinderen ´adopteerden´. Alle solidariteitsprincipes, die vrouwen vaak zeggen te hebben met hun seksegenoten, gaan plotseling mank. De praktijk, dat de solidariteit van veelal westerse vrouwen en het feminisme ophoudt bij de eigen landsgrenzen en zelfs binnen de eigen gelederen, zonder enig begrip voor met name deze moeders, is ronduit schokkend. Wat uiteindelijk leidt tot de verbijsterende conclusie, dat in de wedloop om kinderen, ogenschijnlijk slechts een leus telt namelijk; “ieder voor zich en God voor ons allen”.

Search a Child, Pay Cash - The Adoption Lobby

Search a Child, Pay Cash - The Adoption Lobby, the documentary shows the preparation for a world market of children.

Because, a European Adoption Policy would lead that European children will be made available for the international adoption industry. Whereas the European Union asked from Romania to become like other EU countries, and not to export children, now the Adoption Lobby wants to reverse that and to have the whole of Europe to become like Romania was....

The Story looks into how the system of intercountry adoption work and how political pressure is applied to ease the business in children.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3:

Part 4

Part 5

INTERNATIONAL ADOPTION Child Protection or a Breach of Rights?

BY ROELIE POST

Author Roelie Post wants to distance herself from pro and anti-adoption labels and direct the discussion back to the heart of the matter: whether intercountry adoption is a child protection measure, if children have rights in their own country, and if intercountry adoption is ultimately a breach of such rights?

Cherche un enfant, paie cash. Le lobby de l'adoption.

o Un film de Golineh Atai sur la WDR.]

o Lundi 7 septembre 2009. 22h.

o Jeudi 10 septembre 2009. 14h15.

o Samedi 12 septembre 2009. 22h. ARD Digital TV.

Marineta Ciofu a perdu toute trace de son enfant. Il y a presque 10 années, la femme roumaine issue d'un milieu pauvre avait laissé sa fille illégitime dans une pouponnière - avec la ferme intention de la ramener dès que elle-même serait dans une meilleure situation. Mais soudainement, la jeune fille avait disparu. Presque dix ans plus tard, Marineta apprend la vérité. Son enfant avait été adoptée. En faveur d'une famille américaine.

merci à copie par Abandon & adoption

„Suche Kind, zahle bar - Die Adoptionslobby“

Ein Film von Golineh Atai

Montag, 07. September 2009, 22.00 - 22.45 Uhr

Donnerstag, 10. September 2009, 14.15 - 15.00 Uhr (Wdh.).

Marineta Ciofu mit ihren drei Söhnen

Marineta Ciofu hat jede Spur von ihrem Kind verloren. Vor fast 10 Jahren musste die Rumänin aus ärmlichen Verhältnissen ihre uneheliche Tochter in einem Babyheim zurückgelassen – mit der festen Absicht, sie zurückzuholen, sobald es ihr selbst besser ginge. Doch plötzlich war das Mädchen verschwunden. Fast zehn Jahre später erfährt Marineta die Wahrheit. Ihr Kind war adoptiert worden. Von einer amerikanischen Familie.

Roelie Post, EU-Beamtin, auf Recherchereise durch Rumänien

Die Geschichte hatte im Grunde 1989 begonnen. Damals kamen die ersten Bilder aus Rumänien - Bilder aus Kinderheimen, die Folterkammern glichen. Halbverhungerte, psychisch gestörte Kinder. Der Westen stand unter Schock, und wollte helfen – egal wie. Zehntausende rumänische Kinder wurden zur Adoption ins Ausland gegeben. Die internationale Kinderwohlfahrt schuf die Mär von den Niemandskindern, die niemand haben wolle in ihrer Heimat.

Rumänien 1989 war der Beginn der „Adoptionsindustrie“ reicher westlicher Länder und für Fälle, wie dem von Marineta Ciofu, deren Kind ohne Ihre Einwilligung verschwand. Sie hat nicht mal das Recht zu erfahren wohin.

die story verfolgt, wie das System der Auslandsadoptionen funktioniert, und wie politisch Druck ausgeübt wird, um das Geschäft mit den Kindern zu erleichtern.

Redaktion: Barbara Schmitz

KYRGYZSTAN: PRIME MINISTER CHUDINOV PLEDGES ACTION ON STALLED ADOPTIONS

KYRGYZSTAN: PRIME MINISTER CHUDINOV PLEDGES ACTION ON STALLED ADOPTIONS

Laurie Rich: 10/07/09

Kyrgyz Prime Minister Igor Chudinov has promised US legislators that he will urge his country's parliament to expedite the adoptions of 65 Kyrgyz orphans by American families.

The 65 cases have been held up for more than a year amid a Kyrgyz government effort to overhall the legislative framework covering foreign adoptions. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Chudinov met with US Senators Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Bob Casey (D-PA) in late September in Washington to discuss the pending adoptions. The Kyrgyz prime minister was receptive to the legislators' requests that the cases be processed, according to the offices of both senators.

"It is my hope and belief the Prime Minister will work to grandfather in these adoption cases and the families in the United States will be able to proceed with their adoptions," Brownback said in an e-mailed statement to EurasiaNet. "I thank the PM for his willingness to work with us, and I stand ready to help as the process continues."

Chudinov told the senators that upon returning to Kyrgyzstan, he would meet with the members of the Kyrgyz parliamentary committee that is in charge of overhauling adoption procedures. Chudinov pledged that he would tell committee members that there is no need to keep holding up these 65 cases, senator Brownback's office reported.

The Kyrgyz prime minister also agreed to put this pledge in writing, although Senator Brownback's office had not received any documents regarding this as of October 5. The senators said they would follow up on the status in the next few weeks.

Chudinov introduced a moratorium on international adoption in Kyrgyzstan last February, amid allegations of corruption in the system. The Kyrgyz parliament has been working since then to draft new regulations, providing no timeframe for the completion of the process. In-country UNICEF officers who are working with the government on the issue said on October 6 that the legislation and amendments are finished and are under review by different ministries. As soon as the ministries sign off on the amendments, officials promise to allow for public debate on the proposed changes. Only after ample time for public discussion will the legislation be submitted to parliament. That process could take another six months, according to UNICEF.> read more <

Group Resists Korean Stigma for Unwed Mothers

Group Resists Korean Stigma for Unwed Mothers

By CHOE SANG-HUN

SEOUL, South Korea — Four years ago, when she found that she was pregnant by her former boyfriend, Choi Hyong-sook considered abortion. But after she saw the little blip of her baby’s heartbeat on ultrasound images, she could not go through with it.

As her pregnancy advanced, she confided in her elder brother. His reaction would sound familiar to unwed mothers in South Korea. She said he tried to drag her to an abortion clinic. Later, she said, he pressed her to give the child up for adoption.

“My brother said: ‘How can you be so selfish? You can’t do this to our parents,’ ” said Ms. Choi, 37, a hairdresser in Seoul. “But when the adoption agency took my baby away, I felt as if I had thrown him into the trash. It felt as if the earth had stopped turning. I persuaded them to let me reclaim my baby after five days.”

Now, Ms. Choi and other women in her situation are trying to set up the country’s first unwed mothers association to defend their right to raise their own children. It is a small but unusual first step in a society that ostracizes unmarried mothers to such an extent that Koreans often describe things as outrageous by comparing them to “an unmarried woman seeking an excuse to give birth.”

The fledgling group of women — only 40 are involved so far — is striking at one of the great ironies of South Korea. The government and commentators fret over the country’s birthrate, one of the world’s lowest, and deplore South Korea’s international reputation as a baby exporter for foreign adoptions.

Yet each year, social pressure drives thousands of unmarried women to choose between abortion, which is illegal but rampant, and adoption, which is considered socially shameful but is encouraged by the government. The few women who decide to raise a child alone risk a life of poverty and disgrace.

Nearly 90 percent of the 1,250 South Korean children adopted abroad last year, most of them by American couples, were born to unmarried women, according to the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs.

In their campaign, Ms. Choi and the other women have attracted unusual allies. Korean-born adoptees and their foreign families have been returning here in recent years to speak out for the women, who face the same difficulties in today’s South Korea as the adoptees’ birth mothers did decades ago.

One such supporter, Richard Boas, an ophthalmologist from Connecticut who adopted a Korean girl in 1988, said he was helping other Americans adopt foreign children when he visited a social service agency in South Korea in 2006 and began rethinking his “rescue and savior mentality.” There, he encountered a roomful of pregnant women, all unmarried and around 20 years old.

“I looked around and asked myself why these mothers were all giving up their kids,” Dr. Boas said.

He started the Korean Unwed Mothers Support Network, which lobbies for better welfare services from the state.

“What we see in South Korea today is discrimination against natural mothers and favoring of adoption at the government level,” said Jane Jeong Trenka, 37, a Korean-born adoptee who grew up in Minnesota and now leads Truth and Reconciliation for the Adoption Community of Korea, one of two groups organized by Korean adoptees who have returned to their homeland to advocate for the rights of adoptees and unwed mothers. “Culture is not an excuse to abuse human rights.”

In 2007, 7,774 babies were born out of wedlock in South Korea, 1.6 percent of all births. (In the United States, nearly 40 percent of babies born in 2007 had unmarried mothers, according to the National Center for Health Statistics.) Nearly 96 percent of unwed pregnant women in South Korea choose abortion, according to the Ministry for Health, Welfare and Family Affairs.

Of unmarried women who give birth, about 70 percent are believed to give up their babies for adoption, according to a government-financed survey. In the United States, the figure is 1 percent, the Health and Human Services Department reports.

For years, the South Korean government has worked to reduce overseas adoptions, which peaked at 8,837 in 1985. To increase adoptions at home, it provides subsidies and extra health care benefits for families that adopt, and it designated May 11 as Adoption Day.

It also spends billions of dollars a year to try to reverse the declining birthrate, subsidizing fertility treatments for married couples, for example.

“But we don’t see a campaign for unmarried mothers to raise our own children,” said Lee Mee-kyong, a 33-year-old unwed mother. “Once you become an unwed mom, you’re branded as immoral and a failure. People treat you as if you had committed a crime. You fall to the bottom rung of society.” > read more <