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Translations are informal, when quoting please refer to the original article.
Source: http://www.sbpost.ie Vietnam law change may allow adoptions to resume Adoptions from Vietnam are set to restart from January next year, after Vietnam passed legislation to ensure that its laws comply with the Hague Convention on intercountry adoption. Around 60 per cent of the 400 or so international adoptions in Ireland every year are from Vietnam. However, the existing bilateral adoption agreement between Ireland and Vietnam lapsed on May 1, 2009, leaving many Irish couples unable to complete adoptions. Sixty applications from people seeking to adopt Vietnamese children were subsequently withdrawn… |
Date: 2010-06-14 Source: http://www.irishtimes.com New adoption agency to bid for clients in coming weeksCAROL COULTER Legal Affairs Editor A NEW adoption mediation agency will seek to engage with the governments of Vietnam, Bulgaria, India and Mexico concerning adoption when the Adoption Bill is passed in the coming weeks. The Bill ratifies the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption, The executive director of Arc Adoption, Shane Downer, former chief executive of the International Adoption Association (IAA), told The Irish Times he hoped the agency would be operational by September. It has already been approved in principle by the Adoption Board. The new agency will be committed to transparency, he said, and will expect to be subject to tight regulation. Arc Adoption is a not-for-profit organisation, and will be a company limited by guarantee… |
Source: http://www.examiner.ie Sunday, May 23, 2010 Previous editions Adoption agencies to be struck off for ‘wrongdoing’Friday, May 21, 2010 ANY adoption agency which engages in illegal practices should be de-registered and if necessary the case referred to An Garda Síochána, the chairman of the Adoption Board has said. The issue of illegal adoptions was raised with Geoffrey Shannon following the Irish Examiner’s investigation into the case of Tressa Reeves, whose son was illegally adopted and falsely registered as the natural child of the adoptive parents. This was facilitated by St Patrick’s Guild adoption agency, which remains fully accredited by the Adoption Board, despite the board being aware of the case since 2001. Speaking on RTÉ’s Prime Time, chairman of the Adoption Board Geoffrey Shannon gave a personal guarantee that any such cases would be investigated and if necessary referred to the relevant authorities. "I don’t want to become involved in discussing individual cases, but what I am saying is, if anybody has concerns in relation to their individual case, that I am giving a guarantee that their case or cases will be immediately drawn to the attention of the Adoption Board and if there are any concerns emerging from an examination of that case that warrants referral to the gardaí, to the General Register Office or any other statutory body that will happen as a matter of priority," he said… |
Source: www.irishtimes.com The Irish Times - Saturday, April 10, 2010 Blacklisting reflects child welfare fears | 10/04/2010 JAMIE SMYTH, Social Affairs Correspondent SEVERAL HUNDRED Irish couples attempting to adopt children in Russia could be blocked from completing the process following Moscow’s decision to put the Republic on a new “adoption blacklist”. This week, Russian authorities stopped accepting adoption referrals from Irish applicants and the embassy in Dublin is refusing visas to couples because the Republic is blacklisted. Oleg Bikmametov, a diplomat at the Russian embassy, said yesterday a block had been placed due to a failure by some Irish adoptive parents to provide post-placement reports on children they adopted. He said Russia was unhappy because 50-70 families had not completed the reports, despite promising they would when completing their adoptions. Moscow requires all parents who adopt Russian children to send post-placement reports to the authorities to monitor their welfare and how they are integrating into the family. It has recently tightened up its monitoring of adoption following the deaths of several children adopted by international parents… |
Date: 2010-01-16 Source: www.thefreelibrary.com STOLEN TO ORDER; Byline: by Simon Parry in Vietnam The Mail reporter who revealed the reason Ireland had to end its adoption agreement with Vietnam returns to the country...and makes another deeply disturbing discovery HIGH in the jagged limestone peaks that mark Vietnam's border with Laos, Cao Thi Thu squats on the stone floor of her family's hut, staring at me with a mixture of hope and desperation as she pleads: 'Please help to bring my daughters back home.' It is more than three years since Thu says officials came to her village and offered her the chance to send her daughters Cao Thi Lan, 3, and Cao Thi Luong, 8, to be educated in the provincial capital . Instead, they were sold for thousands of euros for adoption in Europe and the U.S. Clutching the only photographs she has of the girls - ironically taken at the children's home to send out to prospective adoptive parents - it is clear that the pain of separation is as sharp today as it was on the day she last saw them… |
Source: www.thefreelibrary.com Baby broker: Mrs Tang sells newborns to the orphanage next door Byline: Simon Parry IT IS seven weeks since I held in my arms a baby boy called Hoang outside an orphanage in northern Vietnam where he was offered to me for $10,000, and the look in his mother's eyes as she reluctantly handed him over still haunts me. Beneath the watchful stare of a 'baby broker' providing her with bed and board and a cash payment in return, Hoang's 28-year-old mother seemed torn between instinct and duty as she slowly gave up her first-born child. Married in her teens, this woman from a poor mountain village had tried for years to conceive success. When she finally fell pregnant, she decided to give her infant away for adoption because her husband had a mistress and she feared she would be left to raise the child alone. At least that is the story I was told. But did this woman living in a country where family ties are so strong really want to give up her baby because of a spouse's infidelity? And would she really have even considered having him adopted overseas were it not for the money? The release this week of a damning UNICEF report, into the way overseas adoptions take place in Vietnam, confirmed the powerful suspicions I harboured at the time that the answer to both questions was a resounding and emphatic: 'No.' As a father of young children, I found my encounter with Hoang and his mother grotesquely unnatural and upsetting. It should be deeply disturbing too for the many Irish parents who have adopted babies from the orphanage in Lang Son next door. Posing as a prospective adoptive father, I arrived at the orphanage just days after a group of Irish couples collected their babies. All six babies came to the orphanage through the baby broker next door. Those couples had been taken to the orphanage by the adoption agency Helping Hands then marshalled and minded every step of the way. I went alone with a translator and bags full of gifts for the children to see if I could find someone to show me around… |
Source: www.irishtimes.com Vietnam adoption agreement suspended Related » Vietnam adoptions remain suspended | 25/11/2009 Minister for Children Barry Andrews said the decision was taken in response to the “serious findings and recommendations” contained in the report on intercountry adoption commissioned by Unicef and the Vietnamese Ministry of Justice and carried out by International Social Services (ISS). The report, which he said was accepted by the government of Vietnam, proposes that the country suspend intercountry adoptions for the necessary period during this year that will enable it to ensure optimal implementation of the Hague Convention on international adoptions. It will also allow Vietnam prepare for the entry into force of the new law on adoption in 2011. Mr Andrews said the Unicef report also raised “serious questions regarding adoption practices in Vietnam”, including claims that inter-country adoptions were essentially influenced by foreign demand… |
Source: irishtimes.com The Irish Times - Friday, November 27, 2009 Ahern warns of 'anti-adoption bias'MARIE O'HALLORAN A FORMER minister has suggested there may be an “anti-adoption bias” at senior levels of the Department of Health and of the Health Service Executive. Noel Ahern (FF, Dublin North West) questioned why people were obliged to wait five years to adopt when “it only takes nine months to have a baby”. And he challenged why Ireland had let the bilateral agreement with Vietnam go into abeyance. Mr Ahern said Minister of State Barry Andrews had referred to reports critical of Vietnam’s procedures. “But it is extraordinary that other countries, and I do not mean banana republic countries but countries such as France, Denmark, Canada and Italy, do not seem to have difficulties with the bilateral arrangements with Vietnam.” He wondered “whether we are being a bit too careful”. He was speaking during the ongoing Dáil debate on the Adoption Bill, which brings the Hague Convention on the protection of children and co-operation in respect of inter-country adoption into statute law. Mr Ahern said during the debate that “often over the years I felt there was an attitude at a high level in the department or the HSE long before the Minister of State or his officials were there, which was not exactly friendly to the adoption process”… |
Source: http://www.irishtimes.com/ Minister examines UN reports pointing to concerns at Vietnamese adoptions Helping Hands chief executive Sharon O'Driscoll: "We have to put in systems to enable Vietnam to do the job". CAROL COULTER Legal Affairs Editor INTERVIEW: SHARON O’DRISCOLL has the unenviable task of heading up an adoption agency liaising with a country from which adoptions have stopped, at least for the moment. She is chief executive of Cork-based Helping Hands, which assists couples who are adopting children from Vietnam. Since the lapsing of a bilateral agreement between Ireland and Vietnam last May, these adoptions have been suspended, though 20 applications that were in the system in Vietnam before the deadline are still in the process. According to Minister for Children Barry Andrews, the Government is considering two UN reports on Vietnam before taking further steps towards a new bilateral agreement. These reports highlighted concerns about the adoption process in Vietnam, and one, a draft report from the UN’s International Social Service, seemed to criticise Helping Hands, describing its public information as “at least somewhat misleading and consequently disturbing in its implications”… |
Date: 2009-10-01 Source: http://www.irishtimes.com Adoption agency approved in principle CAROL COULTER Legal Affairs Editor Up to now, the only Irish mediation agency was the Cork-based Helping Hands Adoption Agency, which facilitated adoptions from Vietnam. Its mediation licence was revoked by the Vietnamese government in June, following the lapsing of a bilateral agreement on adoption between the countries. Helping Hands received €1.6 million in HSE and lottery funding from its setting up in 2006, and employs four staff in Ireland and four in Vietnam. The new mediation agency, provisionally called Leanbh, is being set up by a number of leading members of the International Adoption Association. Its constitution and means of operating are set within the framework of the Hague Convention. Following its ratification, only other countries that have ratified it may send children to Ireland for intercountry adoption… |
Source: Irish Times Wednesday, September 23, 2009 These are adoptions that the Vietnamese authorities have agreed can go ahead despite the lapsing of a bilateral agreement on adoption between the two countries. The applications were received in Vietnam before the agreement lapsed, and they will go ahead with the assistance of the Irish Embassy. The processing of the 20 applications was discussed during a visit to Vietnam by the Minister for Children, Barry Andrews, over the summer. “Vietnam said as an act of goodwill they would administer as a unique group,” a spokesman for the Minister told The Irish Times. “The Adoption Board will then look at each one individually to make sure the criteria of the 1991 Adoption Act are fulfilled.” The spokesman said that because the Helping Hands adoption agency had had its licence revoked by the Vietnamese government when the bilateral agreement lapsed, consular support would be provided by the Department of Foreign Affairs in consultation with the Adoption Board… |
Adoptions from Vietnam may not be recognised, says board Monday, September 21, 2009 The board sent out the notice last week, warning prospective adopters that any application to adopt from Vietnam would be examined to ensure it complied with Irish adoption law, and would be decided on a case-by-case basis. According to a notice from the Minister for Children, Barry Andrews, on the website of the Adoption Board last June, the mediation licence of the Irish adoption agency operating in Vietnam, Helping Hands, has been revoked by the Vietnamese government. This follows the expiry of a bilateral agreement with Vietnam last May. Although talks had been taking place with the Vietnamese government about an interim agreement, such an agreement has been put on hold by Mr Andrews, pending the consideration of two UN reports by his department. In the absence of an agreement, no legal adoptions can be processed in Vietnam… |
FG request interim Vietnam adoption agreement 19/09/2009 - 10:43:38 Fine Gael are asking the Government to introduce an interim adoption agreement to allow adoptions between Vietnam and Ireland. The party are claiming that the Government is not helping 350 families in their efforts to adopt Vietnamese children… |
The Catholic church sold my child Unmarried mother Philomena Lee was forced to give up her son to Irish nuns, who sold him on to rich Americans. For decades she tried to find him. A chance meeting with Martin Sixsmith eventually uncovered the truth Martin Sixsmith It began with a chance encounter at a New Year's party in 2004. I was trying to leave, but a woman said she had a message for me. She knew I had been a journalist and she had a friend who wanted my help to solve a family mystery. I agreed to a meeting, and found myself embarking on a five-year quest for a man I had never met. The woman's friend was called Jane, a financial administrator from St Albans. She was in her late 30s and had been through an emotional experience. Just before Christmas, her mother, Philomena, tipsy on festive sherry, had revealed a secret she had kept for 50 years – she had a son she had never mentioned to anyone… |
Delegation to seek deal on adoptions from Vietnam Delegation to seek deal on adoptions from Vietnam 28 June 2009 Andrews is leading a delegation that includes Elizabeth Canavan, former principal officer at the Office of the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs; and former junior justice minister Frank Fahey, who was minister for children between 1997 and 2000. Shane Downer, chief executive of the Intercountry Adoption Association (IAA), is also joining the delegation in support of the minister’s initiative… |
Organisation bids to cut adoption times 21 June 2009 The organisation is being backed by the Intercountry Adoption Association (IAA) and promoted by figures from the business and healthcare sectors, including the chairwoman of the Communicorp Group, Lucy Gaffney, hospital developer Michael Cullen and the former chief executive of Our Lady?s Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Michael Lyons… |
Government set to accelerate its foreign adoption process Sunday, May 10, 2009 By Susan Mitchell Radical new proposals are being considered by Barry Andrews, the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, which would result in the establishment of an intermediary agency that would be responsible for processing adoption applications and issuing post placement reports. Andrews said the move would alleviate pressure on social workers, who were under enormous pressure due to heavy workloads.. The minister said the current adoption process ‘‘takes far too long, with many people waiting four to five years before they receive a referral for adoption’’. Andrews said applications should be assessed within two years and vowed to speed up the process during his term in office. He said that he was aware that many parents felt the system was riddled with ‘‘bureaucratic inertia’’, and that the current assessment process was ‘‘overly intrusive’’… |
Andrews defends HSE as Russia halts adoptions Friday, May 8, 2009 |
Government urged to ‘come clean’ about break down of inter-country adoption links Galway Advertiser, May 07, 2009. |
Talks on new Vietnam adoption deal begin From The Sunday Times Irish delegation to travel to Vietnam this week |
Vietnamese adoptions thrown into doubt From The Sunday Times A decision not to renew an adoption agreement with Vietnam could leave up to 300 Irish prospective parents in limbo Mark Tighe Almost 300 people who have been approved to adopt children from Vietnam have seen their plans left in limbo after the Irish government decided to negotiate a new adoption deal with the country. |
The curious case of Tristan Dowse Joe and Lala Dowse were an affluent, attractive couple who had everything except for a child of their own. So they adopted a little Indonesian boy. When things didn't work out, they placed the toddler in an orphanage in his home country. An international political and legal battle then ensued over this small, confused child. Donal Lynch recounts the sorry saga |
Law may limit adoption countries |
Couples turn to Russia and Vietnam for child adoption Tuesday January 06 2009 |
Adoption of 200 children from Vietnam now in doubt By Geraldine Gittens IRISH adoptive parents fear that Vietnam may pull out of an adoption deal which will prevent more than 200 children finding a new home in Ireland. Some parents, who have already seen photos of the Vietnamese children they were due to adopt in the coming year, may now have their hopes dashed, the Herald can reveal. Feared Fears are growing since a new Adoption Bill, which is due to be published by the Department of Health and Children, will change Ireland's adoption rules, and could frazzle adoption relations with Vietnam. Irish officials travelled to Vietnam recently to start discussions on new adoption agreements. Yet it is feared that both governments will not reach a new adoption agreement before the current agreement expires. As a result, many Irish parents could be left without a new member to their families this year. "The current agreement will not expire until 1 May, 2009," says the spokesperson. "One scenario is that agreement cannot be reached on a new deal. A second is that negotiations on such an agreement will not be complete by May… |
Behind the Chernobyl children's travel ban Saturday, September 13, 2008 Tanya Kazyra, right, with her host family, the Zapatas, at their Californian home. Photograph: AP/Eric Risberg The decision by the Belarusian government to prevent its children travelling to the West reveals a lot about the country and its politics, writes Daniel McLaughlin THE DECISION by Belarus to stop children affected by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster from travelling abroad not only outraged Irish families that welcome thousands of such youngsters each year, but threw a spotlight on one of the most secretive corners of Europe. Ireland is lobbying for an exemption to the ban, which was imposed after Tanya Kazyra (16) refused to return to Belarus from California last month, after spending six weeks with the family with whom she has stayed each summer for the past nine years… |
Watchdog warns on legality of migrant adoptions Tuesday February 19 2008 'Unless migrant women are given appropriate counselling, their consent to adopt could be revoked' A NEW report has expressed concern at the growing number of foreign women living in Ireland who are forced by circumstances to hand over their babies for adoption. The report by the Labour Reform Commission suggests that an increasing number of migrant women here are giving up their children because of economic necessity and lack of full legal status. And it warns that parents who adopt children under these circumstances could face a legal challenge in the future from the birth parents, which could see the adoption revoked. The Government's legal watchdog has warned that unless migrant women living in Ireland who place their children for adoption are given language and culturally appropriate counselling services, their consent to adopt could be revoked on foot of a successful legal challenge… |
Ethiopian adoptees may never be granted citizenship By Aodhan O'Faolain A COUPLE who went to the High Court for permission to bring back an Ethiopian baby for adoption were told yesterday that the child may never gain Irish citizenship. The Adoption Board told the High Court that it was unsure about whether Ethiopian law on adoption is compatible with Irish law. The concerns have raised doubt over whether children adopted from Ethiopia may ultimately be registered as citizens here. The situation has yet to be fully clarified, the board said. Some 60 adoptions have been registered since 1991 and the Adoption Board is recording an increase in annual figures with a current average of nine a year… |
Vietnamese adoptions under way 'not illegal' By Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer THE adoption agency which now organises all adoptions between Ireland and Vietnam disclosed yesterday they have no evidence that any recent adoptions were unethical or illegal. This is despite secretely recorded information obtained by the Irish Independent in which it was admitted there was forgery and corruption. The agency, Helping Hands, said it had "no evidence of children being unwillingly removed from their parents, as alleged". The agency's website adds: "The orphanages which adoptive parents have visited are, as far as anyone can ascertain, genuine and the children are in dire need of secure family placement." However the Irish Independent recently secretly recorded former facilitator Ms My Linh Soland, admitting birth certificates were forged and all adoptions depended on Vietnamese government officials receiving corrupt payments... |
New fears over Vietnam adoptions Monday July 24 2006 Concerns are raised about fraudster connections of newly-appointed facilitator here HELPING Hands, the Irish adoption agency which now organises Vietnamese adoptions, has appointed My Linh Soland's sole employee as the new facilitator for all Irish adoptions. The Irish Independent has also learned that the Irish Adoption Board received a letter warning about Ms Soland's activities in May 2004 shortly after she was appointed. Last week Ms Soland admitted, in a series of secretly-recorded meetings, that all the Irish adoptions from Vietnam relied on corrupt payments to officials at every level of the process. Ms Vu Thi Tanh Binh, who worked with Ms Soland on processing Irish adoptions, worked on all these adoptions. There is no evidence that she was involved in corruption or was aware of the corrupt practices. When approached by the Irish Independent about her appointment as the Vietnamese facilitator, Ms Binh denied ever working for Ms Soland. When pressed, she admitted that she had "done some translation". However, in a statement yesterday, Helping Hands said Ms Binh's connection was much more extensive than she now admits… |
We Irish play an essential role in illegal trafficking in babies IT would be hard to underestimate the pain My Linh Soland, the Vietnamese adoption facilitator, has brought to unsuspecting Irish families. IT would be hard to underestimate the pain My Linh Soland, the Vietnamese adoption facilitator, has brought to unsuspecting Irish families. More than 150 couples have used Ms Soland to arrange the adoption of a Vietnamese child to complete their family. On Saturday we revealed that Ms Soland, who was unaware that she was being secretly recorded, told a reporter posing as a prospective business partner about the corruption behind every Irish adoption out of Vietnam. She outlined how she was at the centre of a corrupt adoption ring that operated at every level of the Vietnamese government. Birth certificates were forged, babies were listed as abandoned even though the authorities knew where the parents were, and humanitarian aid that was supposed to help children was pocketed by corrupt officials. In a country where the average salary is $640 a year, the $7,000-plus adoption fee was a cash cow they could not resist milking… |
Adoption chief used Vietnam fraudster as a tour guide By Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer THE registrar of the Irish Adoption Board employed corrupt adoption facilitator My Linh Soland to act as a guide last week - despite the fact that she was under investigation by his organisation and the gardai. Kiernan Gildea travelled to Vietnam with a scout group on a volunteering holiday which also included sightseeing excursions. THE registrar of the Irish Adoption Board employed corrupt adoption facilitator My Linh Soland to act as a guide last week - despite the fact that she was under investigation by his organisation and the gardai. Kiernan Gildea travelled to Vietnam with a scout group on a volunteering holiday which also included sightseeing excursions. It was just one week after the Adoption Board announced its investigation and called in the gardai to examine Ms Soland's past. |
I was tricked into giving Tristan away but now I want him back in Sunday Mirror, Sep 4, 2005 by LISA O'CONNORSURYANI Dowse has vowed to fight a legal battle to keep her son - four long years after his controversial "adoption" by an Irish businessman. It was a moment the Indonesian mother believed she would never experience again, even if her four-year-old boy Tristan did look with bewilderment. The emotional meeting went ahead just three weeks ago as the authorities try to work out what future is best for the traumatised four-year-old boy. He and his mother spent a just few precious hours together outside the orphanage he now lives in near Jakarta in Indonesia. As he was taken away from her within weeks of his birth, he is unlikely to recognise her. But for mum, Suryani, 35, it is the start of a bonding process that she hopes could eventually see them permanently reunited. Suryanih said there was a deep and immediate bond when she picked him up and embraced him. "Even during that short time, it seems like we had a heart-to- heart connection," she said. Suryani insisted that she was "tricked" into giving the baby away by a suspected child trafficker called Rosdiana exposed by the Irish Sunday Mirror… |
Romania: Tragic twins 'were not orphans' 23 March 2994 Geoffrey Briggs was convicted of grievous bodily harm
BBC Northern Ireland's Spotlight programme has revealed startling new details behind the lives of tragic Romanian baby twins adopted by a Portadown couple. In October 2000, less than four months after arriving in County Armagh, one of the boys died in the care of his adoptive parents Gwen and Geoffrey Briggs - his tiny body covered in multiple fractures.
Two weeks after the death of David Briggs, his brother Samuel was brought to hospital with a fractured skull. Geoffrey Briggs had punched the child for refusing to take some medicine. Briggs was subsequently jailed for grievous bodily harm for the attack on Samuel. No-one has ever faced charges over David. The Briggs have since left Northern Ireland but Spotlight tracked them down to their new home in Scotland. A special investigation by the programme, shown on Tuesday, revealed the children were not orphans and have a mother in Romania who claims the twins - real names David and Samuel Filipache - were internationally adopted without her knowledge or consent. The twins were not orphans and have seven siblings Mrs Filipache and her husband, who have been together for 23 years, have seven other children - the older and younger brothers and sisters of the twins. Spotlight's production team in Romania tracked down the family and found that no-one had ever told them of the fate of David and Samuel, despite the information being available on the internet… |
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Minister Lenihan announces a bilateral adoption agreement between Ireland and Vietnam 16 July 2003 Minister for Children, Mr Brian Lenihan T.D., is pleased to be able to announce that the government has now agreed to the signing of a bilateral adoption agreement between Ireland and the Social Republic of Vietnam. Vietnam has become a very popular country of choice for Irish Couples wishing to adopt. Up to 1999 only 2 children were adopted from Vietnam to Ireland but by the end of 2002 this figure had increased to 104 children. Vietnam suspended all adoptions to countries that did not have a bilateral agreement in place as from 1 January 2003. At the Minister’s request Ireland’s Ambassador to Vietnam, met with the Vietnamese Authorities in December 2002 and reported the willingness of the Vietnamese to enter into negotiations on a bilateral agreement on adoption with Ireland…
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Romania: SECRET REPORT ACCUSES KID CHARITY OF FRAUD PHELIM McALEER in BUCHAREST, 16 March 2003 THE charity behind a paralysed tug-of-love Romanian girl's escape to Ireland has been accused of cashing in on the lucrative adoption trade. Little "orphan" Mihaela Porumbaru was at the centre of a custody battle between Romania and Ireland 18 months ago. But a Romanian government investigation into her case has accused the charity that set up her adoption of fraud and misrepresentation. The investigation into how five-year-old Mihaela went to Ireland for a two-week holiday and ended up staying five months has also revealed the child is NOT an orphan but has parents who have visited her. Mihaela captured Irish hearts when Dundalk mum Briege Hughes mounted a vigorous campaign to keep her here after her two week summer holiday in 2001 finished. Briege Hughes believed wheelchair-bound Mihaela lived in a grim dilapidated, Romanian orphanage. And she feared when the child returned to Romania she might be placed in an adult psychiatric institution because she had lost her place in the orphanage. But it was then revealed Mihaela did not live in a grim Romanian orphanage - and had been living in a loving foster home. The confidential report into FAMA, the children's charity which took Mihaela by Romanian Child Protection Agency reveals it: |
Sunday Mirror, Apr 14, 2002 by CHRISTIAN McCASHINCRUEL nuns kept illegitimate babies with their "Magdalene" mothers until they were toddlers - so they could get lucrative State hand- outs. When the tots reached two they were torn away from their mothers and put up for adoption in an unspoken "babies for sale" scandal which helped fill Church coffers. State documents from the 50s, 60s and 70s reveal the Government was handing the nuns a small fortune to care for illegitimate children until they were two-years-old. In 1945 local authorities paid "mother and baby" homes 12 shillings and sixpence per week for each expectant mother. The rate doubled to 25 shillings a week when the baby was born - the equivalent of the average industrial wage. But after two the funds dried up so nuns put them up for adoption. Records show that in the 1960s the adoptive parents forked out sums as large as pounds 10,000 to the nuns to cover so- called "legal fees"… |
SHE IS OUR GIRL TOO; Romanian foster parents of tug-of-love Mihaela tracked down by The Irish Mirror The Mirror (London, England) , August 29, 2001 ANN McELHINNEY in BUCHAREST THE Romanian foster family of orphan Mihaela Porumbaru yesterday said: "We want our little girl back." The disabled four-year-old had been living with the family for more than a year before she was brought to Ireland for treatment to her legs. Romanian authorities agreed at the last minute to let Mihaela stay with her Irish foster mum Briege Hughes, who said she desperately wants to adopt her "little angel". However, those hopes could be dashed once again after the Irish Mirror tracked down Mihaela's ... |
Mihaela is 'home where she belongs' By Neans McSweeney, Irish Examiner, August 28, 2001 These were the delighted words of Briege Hughes after she was reunited with a four-year-old Romanian orphan she rescued and took home. Mihaela Porumbaru, who has serious spinal injuries, was awoken from her warm bed just after 5am at her foster mother's home in Dundalk yesterday morning and brought by a Romanian social worker to Belfast for a flight home to Romania. Romanian officials said her holiday visa did not cover a medical stay. But there was confusion at the airport over tickets as she was reunited with her adoptive family yesterday afternoon. Officials were adamant that she return to Romania today, but after intense public and political pressure they agreed that she could stay in Ireland until her adoption papers come through… |
Adoption scandal man is Dáil candidate by Carl O’Brien, 23 October 1999 |
Banished Babies: The Secret History of Ireland's Baby Export Business Since this story broke in 1996, the Irish media have been chasing down details of the "export" --primarily to the U.S.--of 2,000-plus infants and toddlers born to unmarried Irish mothers between the late '40s and the mid-'70s. Reporter Milotte did a TV documentary on the subject; his book incorporates new archival material released by the Irish government and the Catholic Church, as well as three involving case studies of efforts by adoptees or the mothers who reluctantly gave them up to get back together. At mid-century, both church and state in Ireland stressed shame, secrecy, and the religion of adoptive parents over all other considerations; only in the mid-'50s did Eire require confirmation that proposed parents could provide a healthy (as well as a Catholic) home for Irish kids, and several money-based schemes slipped through the Republic's lax rules. An enlightening international sidebar to studies of the consequences of open versus closed adoption. Mary Carroll |
@2009 Against Child Trafficking