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LilMtnCbn

05-17-2004, 06:26 AM

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml
&sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html

Romania to ban adoption by British couples
By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent
(Filed: 15/05/2004)

British couples will be banned from adopting Romanian children under a law
expected to be approved next week. The law, which effectively bans all foreign
nationals from adopting, comes despite protests from many Western couples.

Most children adopted from overseas by British couples now come from India,
Guatemala or China.

Romania, which hopes to join the European Union in 2007, has already imposed a
three-year moratorium on adoptions despite the large number of children in
care.

The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt has
been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian family.

Foreigners can adopt a child only if they are the grandparents - effectively no
Romanian children will be adopted abroad. The law will make the freeze on
adoptions already in place permanent.

Last week several American families who have already adopted Romanian children,
travelled to Bucharest to protest against being depicted as "child molesters".
Michael Guest, the US ambassador to Romania, said: "All of us recognise that
inter-country adoption is a legitimate form of child protection."

Nicolae Ceausescu, the Romanian dictator, banned contraception and abortion
and, when his regime fell in 1989, about 100,000 abandoned children filled
neglected homes and institutions across the country.

Television images of the children prompted many couples in the West to offer to
adopt them. Many others rushed to the country to take advantage of the chaos in
the aftermath of the Romanian revolution to pay for unwanted children.

About 40,000 children remain in the state system, which has been accused of
selling babies to the highest bidders.

Emma Nicholson, the MEP and a children's rights advocate, has campaigned to
stop foreign adoptions from Romania for fear that babies were ending up in the
human organ trade or with paedophiles.

The European Commission said Romania lacked the administration to carry out
inter-country adoptions and the ban should remain until laws complying with the
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child could be enacted.

-------------------------
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be sitting next to you saying, "Damn . . . that was fun!"
-----Unknown

Marley Greiner

05-17-2004, 07:01 AM

"LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message
news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html Romania to ban adoption by British couples By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent (Filed: 15/05/2004) The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt
has been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian
family.

Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague?

Marley

Marley Greiner

05-17-2004, 07:01 AM

Lynn Haire

05-18-2004, 05:35 PM

It would be in compliance with the Hague if it didn't go on to say that they
can only be adopted abroad by grandparents. This effectively prevents anyone
from adopting Romanian children internationally, whether or not an adoptive
family can be found in Romania.

"Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:mB3qc.75276$Ut1.1813497@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net... "LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html Romania to ban adoption by British couples By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent (Filed: 15/05/2004) The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt has been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian family. Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague? Marley

Lynn Haire

05-18-2004, 05:35 PM

megan

05-19-2004, 03:23 AM

"Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<mB3qc.75276$Ut1.1813497@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>... "LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html Romania to ban adoption by British couples By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent (Filed: 15/05/2004) The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt has been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian family. Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague? Marley

Where in the Hague Convention does it suggest that children are better
off in bleak inhumane orphanages than with families that want them?
Megan

megan

05-19-2004, 03:23 AM

Marley Greiner

05-19-2004, 06:50 AM

"megan" <megan14r-reps@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:d2fd18a3.0405190223.3e1401a4@posting.google.c om... "Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:<mB3qc.75276$Ut1.1813497@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>... "LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html Romania to ban adoption by British couples By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent (Filed: 15/05/2004) The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every
attempt has been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian family. Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague? Marley Where in the Hague Convention does it suggest that children are better off in bleak inhumane orphanages than with families that want them? Megan

Obviously, it doesn't. What it does say (and I'm paraphrasing) is that they
cannot be adopted cross boarder until attempts to place them domestically
have been exhausted. A huge majority of children in Romanian orphanages,
btw, are not available for adoption to start with.

Marley

Marley Greiner

05-19-2004, 06:50 AM

Lynn Haire

05-19-2004, 03:56 PM

Well according to this article in USA today there are 84,381 orphaned
children in Romania. Of course not all of them have parental rights severed
because many families use it as a way to make sure their children get food.
But there are many of these children who are available for adoption. Also
according to this article the number of domestic adoptions hasn't changed
very much, even since the moratorium (1,383 last year), so say if 50%
aren't available and less than one percent are adopted domestically, what
happens to all the rest?

http://www.usatoday.com/life/2004-05-17-romanian-adoptions_x.htm

"Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:ZCJqc.26458$hH.582348@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net... "megan" <megan14r-reps@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:d2fd18a3.0405190223.3e1401a4@posting.google.c om... "Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<mB3qc.75276$Ut1.1813497@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>... "LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com... > http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml > &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html > > Romania to ban adoption by British couples > By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent > (Filed: 15/05/2004) > > > > > The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt has > been made to place them with their natural family or another
Romanian family. Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague? Marley > Where in the Hague Convention does it suggest that children are better off in bleak inhumane orphanages than with families that want them? Megan Obviously, it doesn't. What it does say (and I'm paraphrasing) is that
they cannot be adopted cross boarder until attempts to place them domestically have been exhausted. A huge majority of children in Romanian orphanages, btw, are not available for adoption to start with. Marley

Lynn Haire

05-19-2004, 03:56 PM

Laura Lewis

05-20-2004, 02:39 AM

megan14r-reps@yahoo.com (megan) wrote in message news:<d2fd18a3.0405190223.3e1401a4@posting.google.com>... "Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<mB3qc.75276$Ut1.1813497@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>... "LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html Romania to ban adoption by British couples By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent (Filed: 15/05/2004) The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt has been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian family. Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague? Marley Where in the Hague Convention does it suggest that children are better off in bleak inhumane orphanages than with families that want them? Megan

It's not that simple. Adoption never is, especially when money is
allowed to change hands for children. The Romanians are taking good
care of their children and the people pushing hardest for
inter-country adoptions are the babybrokers there and elsewhere,
including the U.S., who stand to make megabucks exploiting these
children and their natural families. Di posted a good related article
here a few years ago about Americans and others who were cashing in on
the Romanian baby "rescue" and trying to blackmail Romania out of its
children by refusing it admission to NATO.

It's sickening that so many Americans think they're entitled to
anything money can buy, even children. Most American paps turn to
international adoption not to help children, but to help themselves.
They and their money are worsening the situation for children and
families. They're ignorant about adoption and want what they want,
regardless of the consequences. They equate parenting with owning
children. They are deliberately adopting overseas to avoid the
"threat" of natural parents, just as they did here in the U.S. when
they thought they were guaranteed lifelong secrecy and ownership
rights.

Parents from the Vietnamese baby scoop are still searching for their
children, adopted by Americans who tell self-aggrandizing stories
about how they rescued these babies. These children's parents had no
idea where their children went. Many thought they were being taken
into foster care until the war ended. They were wrong. A friend was a
helicopter pilot in Vietnam, and told me he'd never forget the image
of agonized, fear-stricken mothers handing up their babies to his
co-pilot so they could be taken to safety. Parents who survived and
tried to find their children hit brick walls if their children were
adopted, thanks to our inhumane adoption practices.

Where's the compassion and justice for these parents and children?
What sort of child rescue comes at such a cruel, unnatural price?
Many American mothers are asking that as well, and still haven't
gotten an honest answer.

Laura

Laura Lewis

05-20-2004, 02:39 AM

Lynn Haire

05-20-2004, 05:38 PM

Where in the Hague Convention does it suggest that children are better off in bleak inhumane orphanages than with families that want them? Megan It's not that simple. Adoption never is, especially when money is allowed to change hands for children. The Romanians are taking good care of their children

The Romanians are not able to take care of all those children. Many families
are living in squalor, gypsies are persecuted against and can't even get
papers to prove who they are in order to get a job. Babies are abandoned by
the dozens in maternity hospitals. Children live in underground tunnels.
Children are put in foster care and not checked on. Are you saying that this
isn't the case? And all this is better than to be adopted by terrible
adoptive parents who want to give a child a life.

It is absolutely true that children had become a commodity in Romania. It
was out of hand because corruption couldn't be stopped in a country that had
been poor for so long. Graft had become a part of the culture. Large
foundations managed to get all the children on the adoption lists, in
exchange for money that tipped the scales in the "point system" that had
been put in place to fight corruption. Other foundations who refused to use
money to tip the scales but preferred to work in the trenches and support
orphanages were given only children who were hard to place. There was even a
situation where just before an election, all the desirable children were
assigned to one particular agency that was rumoured to have political
connections so that they could raise money through adoptions for the
election.

This is all true. I don't think any adoptive parent with their eyes open
would deny it. But should children be denied a decent life in a forever
family because beauracrats can't get it together enough to put legislation
in place to prevent this? This is what this is all about. The EU officials
are saying that they don't think there should be a total ban on adoptions
forever, they just say that until there can be a tamper proof system, there
should be no adoptions.

There have been some very broad statements made about adoptive families and
their reasons for adopting internationally, you seem to think that we all
want to hide our children's culture and birthfamily from them.

I wonder why homeland visits are so popular? surely it can't be so that the
children can meet their birth families and understand the culture that they
came from. Why would adoptive families waste their time getting together so
often with families with children from the same country? why would we bother
to make Romania such a big part of our children's lives?

I really am amazed at how broad sweeping this hatred of adoption is.

Here is another article for your consideration:

By Brendan McDaid
newsdesk@b...

19 May 2004

LOCAL artist Marie- Theresa O'Neill is a woman haunted by the "vision
of hell" she experienced inside some of Romania's asylums and
orphanages.

After completing her one woman mission to introduce the idea of art
as therapy to the forgotten, Marie-Theresa, known as Mary-T, said she
will never be able to forget the human suffering she encountered.

"This is happening now and this is Europe," she stresses.

The 30-year-old Feeney woman, who now works locally with mental
health patients, spent two three month placements in the
Transylvanian city of Brasov.

"I was going out to work in the First Day Care Centre which was in
Brasov.

"When I got there I was on my own and networked with the psychiatric
hospitals which was quite simple to do as I was bringing the only
activity that existed in any of these hospitals.

"There was nothing in terms of therapeutic activity."

Mary-T divided her time between four mental health institutes and
children's homes.

"It was a rewarding experience but, and it is a big but, they are
just so poor their main aim in life is just survival.

"Art is something that is sheer luxury there, and these people
really, really needed food, not mental stimulation."

She said she was not prepared for what she encountered.

"Nobody could be. There were patients bullying patients, patients
being raped, there were children being tied up so severely their
limbs grew in that position."

Many of the stomach churning incidents she relates are too harrowing
to put in print.

Mary-T said that the abandonment of children was a common practice
throughout Romania.

These children are put in 0-3 Years institutes where the
psychological and physical condition of most deteriorates rapidly.

"For me, being a creative person, I know I would be one of the
children bouncing off the walls and pulling my own hair out.

"Children like that who cannot handle it get tied up. I saw one girl
who was 14-years-old and still tied.

"Her backside bones had become deformed and she could not stand up.

"And the skin from her stomach had grown on to the skin from her
legs. There are hundreds of children like her. This is Europe right
now."

In another incident she was horrified to find a child had bitten the
head of a kitten without having any idea that what he had done was
wrong.

Mary-T said that while staff were often immediately accountable,
there was little point in apportioning blame.

"They are working for no money with children who have very special
needs. There are 30 children to one adult. When I was doing the
workshops I found it practically impossible with three or four of
them."

Mary-T said that the image now emerging of a progressive, developing
Romania was a false one.

"You could be forgiven for thinking the situation is better than what
it was.

"I have seen when westerners arrive they put the kids in this special
room which has toys in it.

"The children don't know what to do with the toys.

"They still just rock back and forth. When the westerners go, so do
the toys."

She said that the contrast between the bleak existence of these
people and the beautifully ornate city centre with rich tourists in
the ski resorts nearby, brought home the full horror of what was
taking place just a few streets away in the children's homes.

The psychiatric hospital conditions she encountered were equally
harrowing.

"You could be there skiing and never know what is taking place a few
streets down from the city centre.

"Many of them are people waiting to die. They are malnourished, badly
abused. If children reach 30 it's a miracle.

"Some of the patients looked like those from the Michael Jackson
video 'Thriller' coming towards you. They were deformed, beaten.

"When I went back last year as I approached the buildings the smell
hit me again. They all smelt the same, of human waste, urine, sweat,
bad food and industrial cleaning products. It took me a while to
adjust again."

To cope, Mary-T devised a strategy of putting the horrific events she
saw each day to the back of her mind and then dealing with her trauma
later.

"There was a lot of sobbing."

Now, surrounded by first rate facilities in local institutions, she
cannot help but draw comparisons.

"When I am sitting working with patients in Gransha or other areas I
sometimes think back to Brasov. I was working with 35 adults at a
time at least.

"I had no space, no nothing. Many of the patients were drawing for
the first time. With the children the first thing they did was eat
the paint."

Many of the paintings completed by Mary-T and the children were
stolen straight away.

"Anything you leave gets lifted and sold. Everybody is poor there."

She said children would regularly break into her bag and take food
and anything else they could find."

As a result before she left she got the children and patients
involved in building mosaics and big pictures which were then nailed
to the walls to give them a focus.

Some native Romanians, Mary-T said, would in other societies be
awarded sainthoods for the work they were doing to try to rebuild
their country and protect its parentless children.

More needs to be done however by the international community, Mary-T
said.

Leaving Romania behind was never going to be an easy decision, but
for Mary-T she knows it is only a temporary parting. "Every day I
think about giving up art and working there full time.

"It's different when you know these children as individuals.

"I still get phonecalls asking me to come back.

"I will definitely be back, and if not Romania, then I will
definitely do this type of work elsewhere, maybe India.

"If I could get money to do that through sponsorship then I would do
that."

Recently Mary-T recreated her experiences at an art exhibition at the
Context Gallery in Derry.

Entitled 'Romania, Ward 120 Bed 32: An Emotional Response', the
blacked-out room showed only the tortured and fractured outline of
faces distorted almost beyond recognition. In the centre is a
hospital bed.

"Sometimes I would walk past that ward and there would be two people
strapped to it with leather straps lying in their own urine and
faeces.

"The darkness is like the asylum. There is very little natural light
in these places."

Extract from Mary-T's diary of a typical morning during her time in
Romania

"AUGUST 17 - Reliable as ever, the smell ends my morning and brings
me back with a cold, harsh reality of what my day has in store for
me. Inside the hospital I can smell stale layers of skin from the
inside of my nose.

It's a sensation like a razor blade screaming through my nasal
cavity. It shocks me to take a large intake of breath.

The smell and taste travel to the pit of my stomach and I feel it
violently contract. Sadly it's become a morning ritual. I walk under
the glorious Romanian sunshine, through the cobbled streets of
Brasov.

The sun dances and dazzles my eyes. It is a beautiful city, the 'gem
of Romania' the locals call it. It's very beautiful here.

Perhaps the juxtaposition between this devastating beauty and the
brutal assault on my every sense as I enter the hospital is what
makes it a continually brash and cruel surprise.

I've been here eight weeks and I still marvel at how these hospitals,
children's institutions galore all smell the same.

It includes whatever horrific cleaning product they use.

It competes commendably with the stench of sweat, urine and human
waste.

It feels impossible to describe yet my body knows perfectly as I
place my hand on my stomach and will my breakfast to stay put?

Each morning I prepare myself and each morning it is still a rude
awakening."

Lynn Haire

05-20-2004, 05:38 PM

megan

05-20-2004, 08:04 PM

LauraLewis1@msn.com (Laura Lewis) wrote in message news:<1a4c2bd3.0405200139.b6a20fb@posting.google.com>... megan14r-reps@yahoo.com (megan) wrote in message news:<d2fd18a3.0405190223.3e1401a4@posting.google.com>... "Marley Greiner" <maddogmarley@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message news:<mB3qc.75276$Ut1.1813497@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>... "LilMtnCbn" <lilmtncbn@aol.comnospam> wrote in message news:20040517092622.11380.00001728@mb-m18.aol.com... > http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/05/15/wrom15.xml > &sSheet=/news/2004/05/15/ixworld.html > > Romania to ban adoption by British couples > By Sarah Womack, Social Affairs Correspondent > (Filed: 15/05/2004) > > > > > The new law says children can be adopted abroad only after every attempt has > been made to place them with their natural family or another Romanian family. Gee, isn't that in compliance with The Hague? Marley > Where in the Hague Convention does it suggest that children are better off in bleak inhumane orphanages than with families that want them? Megan It's not that simple. Adoption never is, especially when money is allowed to change hands for children. The Romanians are taking good care of their children and the people pushing hardest for inter-country adoptions are the babybrokers there and elsewhere, including the U.S., who stand to make megabucks exploiting these children and their natural families. Di posted a good related article here a few years ago about Americans and others who were cashing in on the Romanian baby "rescue" and trying to blackmail Romania out of its children by refusing it admission to NATO.

Laura
You obviously have not seen the state of orphanages in Romania.
Children are subject to abuse and neglect on an horrific scale. Ask
the Gypsy children how well they are cared for in a country which
depises them. Ask the teenage girls who are raped and exploited when
sent for so called vocational training. Ask the disabled kids who are
confined to filthy cots with nothing to stare at all day but the
ceiling. Ask the kids in foster care who are put to work on farms like
animals.
What can possibly be wrong with foreigners want to adopt these kids
when their natural parents are clearly unable to parent them and their
own countrymen are not interested.
Yes I am against exploitation of families by agents who stand to make
a fortune, but isn't this why the Hague Convention was introduced?
It's not as black and white as you make out.
Megan

megan

05-20-2004, 08:04 PM

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