SaveAdoptions.org

…And today nothing has change aside from more and more countries are buying into this tragic and misguided child welfare practice, and our own Department of State stands by without refuting their efforts or championing the rights of orphaned children to permanent families. 

In the early 90’s the First Lady of Georgia, Nanuli Shevardnadze, shocked the world with her claim that “It is better for a Georgian child to die in Georgia, than to leave Georgia and grow up in another country through Adoption!” 

If you believe children can keep their cultural identity-pride and be raised in a safe and loving family elsewhere, that our Department of State should do everything possible to keep Adoptions affordable and accessible to all American Families, that our Department of State should be promoting intercountry Adoption as a viable option OVER permanent foster care,and want to learn more about what’s happening to end your right to adopt a child though intercountry Adoption, visit:

www.saveadoptions.org

Tag yourself and share if you agree!

UNICEF Fostering Success Comes With A Price: Pemanency Denied to Unparented Children

Source: http://www.unicef.org

Having seen great foster care provided to children in Serbia, I can personally attest to how great this is for kids… EXCEPT…. UNICEF holds solidly to the goal for every unparented child is to have a “family environment” rather than making permanency planning the end goal for every child – a forever family – not just a family “environment”.

Read more.

When UNICEF 'Kool-Aid' is Served at Your Next Dinner Party

We Love Katie Jay!

Source: http://childrendeservefamilies.com/profit-motive-international-adoption

Assisted reproductive technology is a multi-billion dollar industry. But no one ever questions the value or proposes that doctors start doing IVF for free. Sometimes people complain that insurance companies should cover the costs, but no one argues that the reproductive technology industry should not be allowed to profit off their work.

Why? Let’s imagine that starting tomorrow, doctors and everyone involved in the reproductive technology industry were no longer allowed to profit from their work. Not a single dime could be made. What would happen?

Read more.

The Real Reason Some Charities Abandon Orphans

Source: http://childrendeservefamilies.com/real-reason-charities-oppose-international-adoption/

An activist who opposes international adoption just wrote a post that is breathtaking in its honesty. She openly confesses her anger toward international adoption because it hinders her organization’s attempts at fundraising.

It is a striking admission because child welfare advocates have long argued that the real reason NGOs like UNICEF and Save The Children oppose international adoption is because of their focus on fundraising. But NGOs never admit that because fighting adoptions means condemning children to early death (or a life in the sex or drug trades at best) and that’s bad for their reputation as child savers, clearly. They usually fight adoption by grossly exaggerating concerns about adoption ethics, so it is refreshing to see anyone admit the real, underlying self-interest so openly.

So the NGOs actively work to keep all the kids in orphanages because they think the money families spend on adoption fees should go to the NGOs instead.

Continue reading.

75,000 Orphans and Counting…

Source: http://childrendeservefamilies.com/75000-orphans-counting/

By Kelly Ensslin

Kelly Ensslin has an insightful new blog post on the Both Ends Burning website about the newly released State Department adoption numbers, showing a drop for the ninth consecutive year in a row. The numbers over the past decade represent at least 75,000 orphans who have been deprived of permanent, loving families due to failed U.S. policy.

“Last Friday, the Department of State released its long-awaited annual international adoption statistics. As we had predicted, for the ninth straight year the number of children internationally adopted into permanent loving US families has fallen. In fiscal year 2013, only 7,094 children entered the United States on orphan visas. This number represents an 18% drop from the prior year and a 69% reduction since 2004, when international adoptions peaked at 22,884.

Read more>

International Adoption’s Drastic Decline: Why US Government Policy is Significantly To Blame

Source: http://childreninfamiliesfirst.org/international-adoptions-drastic-decline-us-government-policy-significantly-blame/

By Diane Kunz

U.S. government policy is significantly to blame for the drastic decline in international adoption.  The US  government views international adoption as something to protect children from rather than a form of protection for children.  Let me explain.

Over the last five years the USG has taken a consistently negative approach on international adoption. The Department of State has adopted UNICEF’s policy which is that international adoption is to be shunned.  It is DOS and UNICEF which advance the proposition that countries should reject international adoption as a method of family formation.   When speaking at international forums such as the  Fifth International Policy Conference on the African Child:  Intercountry Adoption:  Alternatives and Controversies (May 29-30, 2012; http://www.africanchildforum.org/ipc/), DOS and UNICEF speak with one voice,  defining  international adoption as cultural genocide,  a sign of national failure or as a cover for fraud.   As the USG has funneled billions of dollars of aid through UNICEF in the last five years, it is no surprise that developing countries are following this prescription.

The USG has not usefully aided countries which wish to join the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption.  DOS, our Central Authority, has not given the level of technical advice and training that could bring good programs into existence.    Instead we criticize other countries’ efforts and find them unacceptable (The record of our interactions with Vietnam is relevant here.)  We have not accorded appropriate respect to countries which have joined the Hague.  Being a member of the Hague Convention should give foreign Central Authority decisions an analogous  level of status as under the Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction and Enforcement Act.   DOS has taken the opposite approach, telling the Chinese what their laws mean, questioning the Ethiopians on their legal practices etc.  Contrast the approach taken by DOS in Hague Abduction cases.

DOS has not used timely and appropriate diplomacy with other international adoption partners.  Chinese officials have repeated told stakeholders that DOS is the worst central authority with which they have programs.  We could probably not have prevented the Russian ban on international adoption to the United States but had DOS taken a more active role during the negotiations over the U.S.-Russian Bilateral Adoption Agreement, that treaty would have been effective, with regulations promulgated when the Russian ban was enacted.  This would have most likely meant that Russian children (including biological siblings of children previously adopted here) who were already near the completion of their adoptions, would have come home to their American families.

DOS often uses fear of fraud as an explanation for its actions.  Yet when USCIS examined over 2000 Ethiopian cases, its officials could find no case that should not have been approved.  The Center for Adoption Policy has repeatedly asked DOS to require specific anti-fraud measures, with no results.  It is almost as if DOS wants fraud to exist as an excuse to end all international adoption.  Of course there are bad adoptions which call for specific bad actions to be ended and specific bad actors to be excluded from international adoption work.  But instead of this proper focus, DOS is weaponizing these wrongful practices and targeting all international adoptions. Is there trafficking through adoption?  There are a tiny number of documented cases and they are heinous.  But the number is miniscule when compared to child trafficking done through illicit immigration schemes, and child snatching.

DOS has repeatedly been dilatory and lax in its efforts as the Central Authority.  There have been numerous times over the last five years when I have contacted DOS with news of changes in various countries’ programs.   I glean my information from online research.  Surely DOS could have better information if it so chose.  This lack of information causes true pain and suffering to potential adoptive parents.  Just as bad are the continued flawed processing and the consistent burying of adoption cases under reams of paper.  No wonder we have seen the pool of potential adoptive parents shrink because families, understandably, shy away from international adoption when they learn of these unnecessary pitfalls.

There is another way.  The USG could take the opposite path and embrace international adoption as one legitimate method of family creation for unparented children.  This is the goal a number of supporters are attempting to reach through the Children in Families First Act (CHIFF; S. 1530, H.R. 4143).  As CHIFF directs:  “All options for providing appropriate, protective, and permanent family care to children living without families must be considered concurrently and permanent solutions must be put in place as quickly as possible. Solutions include family preservation and reunification, kinship care, guardianship, domestic and Intercountry adoption, and other culturally acceptable forms of care that will result in appropriate, protective, and permanent family care. Preference should be given to options that optimize child best interests, which generally means options which provide children with fully protected legal status and parents with full legal status as parents, including full parental rights and responsibilities.”

In practice this policy would direct DOS, USCIS and USAID to use both money and soft power influence to promote policy which puts the goal of children having families first, including the use of international adoption as a legitimate option for unparented children, as well as advocating for other available solutions.  Our government would allocate our foreign aid to help countries create child-centered solutions which would have general similarities but also take account of  national differences.  We would provide monetary and technical assistance to countries that were joining the Hague Convention  and we would measure progress to make sure that best practices  were put into place in a timely fashion.  With our Hague partners we would take the position that once you have joined the Hague club, we respect and accept your domestic procedures.  The USG position would aim to get to yes, rather than find ever more creative ways of saying no.

We would assure countries that in our multicultural nation, a child who comes here will be brought up with the greatest respect for her culture and will grow up as a citizen of the world.  Nationalism has not increased in the last twenty years; one of the courses I taught at Yale (in my previous career as a diplomatic historian) traced the trajectory of nationalism, and I can vouch for that assertion.  If you look at the number of immigrants who wish to come here and the lengths that they go to do so, one understands that nothing ideological stands in the way of the hope for a better life, for oneself, and for one’s children.

Currently, despite falling birth rates, millions of orphans and vulnerable children are at risk around the world.  The USG can and should work with governments and international bodies to create permanent solutions for these children without families.  Take China, for example.  In Guangzhou the local government this year set up a child safe haven box where parents could leave children they could not care for.  In ninety days 260 children were left there, completely overwhelming officials who closed down the facility because they had no room in the city’s orphanages.    On an annual rate, the number of children abandoned in that one safe haven in that one three month period is 45 percent of the entire number of adoptions from China to the United States in FY 2013.  Under our new approach, the USG would, together with Chinese officials, ameliorate difficulties so that these children could find permanent, loving homes.

In FY 2008, our first year as a Hague nation, there were 17, 456 adoptions into the US.  Last year there were 7,094.  Tens of thousands of children have been abandoned to the direst of fates.  We must do better.

Dr. Diane B. Kunz, Esq. is Executive Director of the Center for Adoption Policy, a 501 (c) 3 corporation that has become a pre-eminent legal and policy institute engaged in adoption issues. The Center for Adoption Policy was honored in 2008 by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute as an Angel in Adoption. Dr. Kunz has consulted with government agencies such as the Department of State, the Centers for Disease Control and USCIS and has been actively involved in helping deal with issues pertaining to the Haitian children who came to the United States under the humanitarian parole program. From 1976 to 1983 Dr. Kunz practiced corporate law with the firms of White & Case and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett (Cornell University, J.D. 1976). She left the practice of law and studied diplomatic and economic history at Oxford University (M. Litt. 1986) and Yale University (Ph.D, 1989). From 1988 until 1998 she was Assistant, then Associate Professor of History at Yale University. While at Yale she wrote extensively on twentieth century history, including the prize winning book, The Economic Diplomacy of the Suez Crisis and Butter and Guns: The Economic Diplomacy of the Cold War. From 1998-2001 she taught history and international relations at Columbia University. In 2001 she and Ann Reese founded the Center for Adoption Policy. Dr. Kunz is a member of the New York bar. She is an honorary fellow of the American Academy of Adoption Attorneys and the American Academy of Assisted Reproductive Technology Attorneys. She is also the mother of eight children, four of whom were born in China through the non-special needs and waiting children programs.

The Foster Care Model: Compliments of UNICEF

NGOs gloss over the high level of abuse in kinship care, as well as the instability and vulnerability that is inherent in any temporary care.

UNICEF vs UNPARENTED CHILDREN

UNICEF's Unethical War Against International Adoption

Source: http://ethicsalarms.com

There are few things more harmful than a trusted organization associated with good will and good deeds that uses its influence irresponsibly, and there are few organizations with more accumulated trust than UNICEF, the United Nations organization dedicated to children's rights, safety and welfare. That UNICEF could be promoting policies that actually harms children seems too awful to contemplate, but that appears to be what is occurring. The problem is that most people have grown up thinking of the organization as the epitome of international virtue. UNICEF doing something that hurts kids? Impossible. Since the group's impressive moral authority seems to be focused in an unethical direction, the damage it can do before public opinion turns is substantial.

Hearing on a Review of US Foreign Assistance for Children in Adversity

May 21, 2013: View the "Hearing on a Review of US Foreign Assistance for Children in Adversity" chaired by Senator Landrieu (D).  This hearing is in regards to a new National Action Plan for Children in Adversity which is setting the stage for children in foreign countries to have strong beginnings, families first through all possible options, and protection from violence, abuse and exploitation. 

Forward to the 1:03:03 mark of the video to hear the Dr. Susan Bissell, Chief of Child Protection, Program Division for UNICEF respond to Senator Landrieu's pointed and thought provoking questions. Senator Landrieu asks questions about UNICEF's budget allocation toward permanency efforts for unparented children, methodology and inability to account for the true number orphans living outside of parental care, narrowly defined as a single orphan (one parent living) or a double orphan (both parents living). 

Thank you to Chuck Johnson, President and CEO of the National Council For Adoption (NCFA), for sharing the link and keeping us informed. 

U.N. Urges Morocco Crackdown on Child Labor

The U.N. children's fund on Thursday called for "major mobilization" in Morocco against the phenomenon of child labor after a young house maid died from burns in the southern coastal resort of Agadir.

The Moroccan teenager died after suffering serious burns to her hands and face, an NGO said on Tuesday, adding that her employer is in police custody.

The case "relates to a girl, aged between 15 and 17, who worked as the house maid of a couple and who died on Sunday," said Omar el-Kindi, president of the NGO Insaf, confirming media reports.

"This drama adds to a series of similar terrible events," UNICEF said on Thursday.

It recalled its "strong condemnation of child labor" and urged "major mobilization for an end to this phenomenon of 'little maids.'"

"We consider young girls doing domestic work to be one of the worst forms of child exploitation," said Morocco's UNICEF representative, Aloys Kamuragiye.

Last November, Human Rights Watch called on Moroccan authorities to put an end to the recruitment and exploitation of child domestic workers.

It said girls as young eight were being recruited as maids, frequently beaten, verbally abused and sometimes refused adequate food by their employers.

A bill outlawing the employment of minors as domestic workers has been proposed but not yet been voted through parliament.

"The draft law on domestic labor could offer a beginning in legal protection to end children working as maids," the UNICEF statement said, and encouraged "the government and parliament to speed up its adoption."

The U.N. body also urged Moroccans themselves to change the practice. Reports say that between 60,000 and 80,000 young girls work as maids in the north African country.

Source: naharnet.com

24 Abandoned Babies Per Day in Morocco, 153 Are Born Out of Wedlock

moroccoworldnews.com | New York, October 9, 2012

According to the study “The Morocco of single mothers” of the association Insaf, 153 babies are born out of wedlock every day and 24 babies are abandoned.

Kafala (a form of adoption according to Moroccan and Islamic jurisprudence) stands today as the best alternative to ensure a decent life for abandoned children, said Béatrice Beloubad, the national Director of SOS Children’s Villages on Saturday in Casablanca,, MAP news agency reported on Monday

“In Morocco, orphanages are overcrowded and more than 700 children are accommodated in five villages of our association,”  she told MAP on the occasion of the opening of the third exhibition of early childhood and kafala, calling for greater coordination of efforts to provide quality support for the benefit of abandoned children, whose numbers are increasing.

“Today’s children are tomorrow’s citizens, the foundation of society and a true small capital in search of support, training and assistance. They have the right to a full and decent life to aspire to contribute in the near future in the development of their country, “she said.

“Twenty-four babies are abandoned every day and this number tends to increase,” said, for her part, Asmaa Benslimane, founding president of the Association of Morocco Babies, who highlighted the importance of early actions to prevent the abandonment of babies, including working schoolgirls and school dropouts.

An earlier study conducted jointly by the Moroccan League for Child Welfare and UNICEF in 2009 revealed that the number of abandoned children in 2008 was 4,554, or 1.3 per cent of total births that year.

Orphan Statistics: Can You Make a Difference in One Child's Life?

• Total estimated number of orphans worldwide: 153 million 
•  Estimated number of orphans that have lost only their mother: 34.5 million 
• Estimated number of orphans that have lost only their father: 101 million 
• Estimated number of orphans that have lost both parents: 17.8 million

Source: U.S. Government "5th Annual Report to Congress on Public Law 109-95" and affirmed by UNICEF

Waiting for Home

For our readers who want to know what is really happening in international adoption, the deep truth in policy and practices, we invite you to listen in to an eye-opening program: "Waiting for Home" featuring Dr. Jane Aronson, and some double-talk by UNICEF.

Waiting for Home - Part 1

Waiting for Home - Part 2

Love and Legislation: The International Politics of Inter-country Adoption

Alison M. S. Watson | August 17, 2011

Credit: Bergius

Probably not since the first wave of inter-country adoptions took place in the aftermath of the Korean War has there been so much attention focused upon the very personal decision of taking a child from one country, and placing him/her permanently within a family in another. Between 1999 and 2010, 224,615 children—often girls, and most aged two and under—were adopted into the United States,¹ whilst overall, Sweden, Ireland, and Spain lead the field in terms of inter-country adoptions per 100,00 inhabitants in each country (10.18, 9.45 and 7.79 respectively).²

In an increasingly celebrity-obsessed culture, inter-country adoption can appear to demonstrate the very worst of what wealth and fame can bring—the ability to treat children as commodities, "buying" them to create not only the family that you desire, but the one that publicly appears to elevate the adopter to some form of "saintly" status. It may also appear to imply neo-colonialism, with the common assumption that inter-country adoption implies that a child is "saved" from a poor country by bringing it up in a rich one.

Behind such appearances, however, is the real story of inter-country adoption—and it is a story that demonstrates a number of things that are of significance not only to each family touched by adoption, but also to the wider discourse of international affairs, and to the ethical dilemmas that surround it. In an era supposedly characterized by a desire for pluralism, multi-culturalism, and hybridity, the many dilemmas of inter-country adoption demonstrate how far we have come, but also how far we still have to go.
Although the number of inter-country adoptions is certainly large, the figures should be seen in proportion. UNICEF estimates suggest that there are around 140 million children who have lost at least one parent, whether as a result of poverty, conflict, or disease. The greatest proportion of these children live in Africa, whilst the largest numbers of orphans are in Asia.³

For the vast majority of these children, adoption is not an option, whether because it is unnecessary—they may still be being cared for within their families, whether by their surviving parent or by extended family; because it is unlikely—some children may be seen as "unadoptable" for a variety of reasons, such as age, disability, or HIV status; or because it is impossible, for example in societies where there is no history of adoption or where the societal infrastructure cannot support it. Where it works, however, it seems that inter-country adoption can actually help to change the culture of adoption in the adoptees' native country, so that in the longer term more children are cared for within their own communities. In China, for example, there is now evidence that as the number of inter-country adoptions has increased so has the number of Chinese families willing to consider domestic adoption.

As interest in inter-country adoption has grown, so has the desire of the international community to create a regime that they hope will ensure that the practice is not only legally appropriate but also ethically sound. This desire has been aided at times by some very high profile cases—often in the wake of conflict and natural disaster—where legality and ethics appear to have left the room. A recent example is the now famous case of January 2010 when Haitian police arrested and charged ten American nationals from the Idaho-based charity New Life Children's Refuge, who wanted to take orphans from the quake to an orphanage in the Dominican Republic for subsequent adoption into the United States. Actions such as these demonstrate the increase in "demand" for inter-country adoptees that happens at such times, something indeed that Haiti has recognized in its vocal acknowledgment of its intention to join the Hague Adoption Convention. Questions remain, however as to the efficacy of the Hague Convention and what the present legal regime surrounding inter-country adoption is really designed to achieve.

The Hague Convention of May 29, 1993 on Protection of Children and Co-operation in Respect of Inter-country Adoption (Hague Adoption Convention) protects children and their families against the risks of illegal, irregular, premature, or ill-prepared adoptions abroad. This Convention, which also operates through a system of national Central Authorities, reinforces the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC - Art. 21) and seeks to ensure that inter-country adoptions are made in the best interests of the child and with respect for his or her fundamental rights, and to prevent the abduction, the sale of, or traffic in, children.

These are goals that all should be able to agree on, and of course the UNCRC would appear to have a clear mandate, given that it is the most widely ratified human rights treaty in history. However the UNCRC is a document that is arguably flawed in that rather than giving children real rights, it instead lays down the obligations that adults have to them, all couched in terms of a western idealization of childhood that can actually curtail the rights of those children whose lives cannot live up to that ideal. Moreover, the Hague Convention has currently been signed by only 87 countries and ratified by 83, and the majority of those who have ratified it are countries who in inter-country adoption terms would be "receiving" countries rather than "sending" ones.

This does not mean that those countries who have not signed and/or ratified it do not set a priority on the best interests of the child. Rather that they may not see adoption as a significant issue or, indeed, that they may not be able to afford to implement the regulations that the Convention requires, such as ensuring that, after the possibilities for placement of the child within the State of origin have been given due consideration, an inter-country adoption is in the child's best interests; and that the persons, institutions and authorities whose consent is necessary for adoption, have been properly counseled and notified of the effects of their consent, in particular whether or not an adoption will result in the termination of the legal relationship between the child and his or her family of origin.⁴

For this reason, many of the "receiving" countries, for example the U.S. and the UK, will have national legislation in place that covers adoptions from Hague Convention signatories AND from non-Hague Convention signatories. The U.S. is in the unique position of being a signatory to the Hague Convention, but of not being a signatory to the UNCRC, the latter a decision that appears to be informed by the notion of the primacy of the family, and in particular the role of parents, as well as the concern (often expressed by conservative Christian groups) that the UNCRC in some way undermines parental rights and authority.⁵ Such a position is particularly ironic given that so many U.S. agencies specializing in inter-country adoption have a clear Christian focus in their activities, and also given that so many adoptive parents cite a calling from God as the catalyst for their adoption journey.⁶

The debate surrounding inter-country adoption is not made any clearer by the somewhat negative tone that some of the most powerful intergovernmental and non-governmental organizations (NGO's) that advocate for children assume in their views.

For example, UNICEF states that it supports inter-country adoption, when it is carried out in line with the standards and principles of the Hague Convention, but that it is a practice that can also pose significant problems and risks if children are unnecessarily denied the opportunity to live with their parents or relatives and/or are exposed to trauma and long-term emotional problems. UNICEF also states that the financial aspects of international adoption can encourage malpractice and accelerate the proliferation of poor quality orphanages, as well as diverting resources from the development of good quality alternative care for children in their own communities.

There is no doubt that there is truth in such statements—adoption does have a life-long impact on any child, and there are indeed financial incentives that can encourage malpractice. But many would argue that the amount of lip-service paid to these issues is out of proportion with the extent of these malpractices themselves. This is not to say that cases of corruption and child laundering do not take place—they absolutely do; however seeing inter-country adoption as somehow commensurate with such malpractice is to take a distorted view. Moreover, such sentiments take much away from the majority of bona fide adoptive parents who often spend significant time ensuring that their adoptions are ethical, and on trying to minimize the long-term ill effects on their child.

Similarly, Save the Children states that:

While intercountry adoption may, in some circumstances, be the best option for some children, adoption does not address the root cause of its existence, namely poverty, wars and natural disasters. If the economic, social and protection needs of citizens in developing countries could be met, there would be little need for intercountry adoption. Consequently, families in developing countries should be supported so that children are able to be cared for in the context of their own families, communities and culture.

Again, this is a laudable aim, and no-one should ever seek to take away a child from his/her birth family when the possibility exists that they could remain. But the problem is that for so many children, despite the best efforts of NGO's, such a possibility does not exist—whether because of poverty, or illness, or separation—and when this is the case inter-country adoption is one of a range of options that are available. Furthermore there are few who would claim that adoption is a solution to the root causes of its existence. Of course the ideal solution is an end to poverty and wars, and creating better coping mechanisms after natural disasters in developing countries. Yet the current reality is that for individual children who cannot be cared for in a family setting in their country of origin, inter-country adoption may be the best permanent solution.

In a recent open letter to former President Bill Clinton, founder of Worldwide Orphans Foundation Jane Aronson stated that:

The destruction of international adoption has become the cure for a misdiagnosed disease. Uninspired, bureaucratic, desperate decision-makers in governments, including our own, and in large child welfare organizations, raise the cry of "trafficking" and the rest is inevitable: to protect the children and stop the trafficking—stop adoption."

Policymakers might make better use of their time if they actually tackled the root causes of inter-country adoption that continue to exist in developing countries—the searing poverty and inequality, and the soaring levels of HIV infection—rather than spending so much time trying to legislate it out of existence. Whilst no one is denying that adoption needs to be transparent, ethical, and in the best interests of the child, I would argue that when done right, inter-country adoptions can be beneficial for all concerned—because the real story of inter-country adoption can be seen in the thousands of children who have received better life chances as a result, and the thousands more who have been denied that possibility.

Indeed, the real questions we should be asking are: What is our current international system, and the legislation that supports it actually designed to do?: Is it to help those who are in need, or is it to allow policymakers—whoever they may be—to think that they have? 

The author would like to thank the editors, Madeleine Lynn and Oliver Richmond, for their comments during the writing process. All errors remain the author's own.

NOTES  1 http://adoption.state.gov/ 2 http://www.aican.org/statistics.php 3 "UNICEF Data on Orphans by Region to 2010 [Chart]," in Children and Youth in History, Item #293 4 Hague Conference on Private International Law, Intercountry Adoption section 5 Kilbourne, Susan, "Placing the Convention on the Rights of the Child in an American context," Human Rights, 26.2 (Spring, 1999): 27(5). 6 Evidence of this can be seen in the many "gotcha day" videos on YouTube that document, the journey towards adoption that so many families have made.

Copyright © 2011 Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs