International adoption

Saviours or kidnappers?

Amid catastrophe in Haiti, a new controversy about adoptions

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Readers' comments


Rupert Wolfe Murray

Well meaning adoptive parents usually have no idea that they are dabbling in an industry that facilitates child trafficking. The corruption of legal systems in poor countries and the unknown fate of most children adopted internationally is not of their concern. They fight for and will look after their child; how can they do more? But the fact is that once a child is taken from one jurisdiction and adopted into another the home connection is severed and there is no capacity, or interest, to follow up these cases. Because the trade is so completely unaccountable (remember, the Romanian Government, an EU Member State, cannot account for about 20,000 kids adopted between 1990 and 1997) I cannot say for sure that these kids were sold into the sex trade and neither can adoptive parents say that all reached happy families in the west. Those kids just disappeared. The other mistake the pro-adoption lobby make is to claim these children are orphans. The truth is that the vast majority of "eligible" children are not orphans at all, they are just poor kids who have been separated from their families for various reasons. The UN Convention of Child Rights says that governments must support poor families to look after their kids, perhaps using extended family networks, but what the adoption industry lobby does is break the link with families by bribing officials and judges to make them eligible for adoption abroad. They may declare each child an orphan, often falsifying the paperwork, or swop the birth certificate it with another (less attractive) kid, then sell it to the highest bidder (probably a western couple who have no idea of the evil wrongdoings that has been done in their name. The lobby then uses these "loving western couples" as the face of their global PR campaign. The whole business stinks and should be brought in from the shadows. Rupert Wolfe Murray


AdoptionResearch- I believe you are insinuating that my child may either be stolen or purchased for adoption. If that is true, then why do I have an original birth certificate, photos of him in the orphanage at 6 weeks old and medical records from the orphanage from when he was less than a week old? Are you saying that someone paid for him at birth and then the orphanage at the state's cost cared for him for almost a year before allowing him to be adopted. Or are you saying that someone forged all of those detailed documents? I'm not saying that baby trafficking doesn't exist but please explain how I've been duped into believing my child was not a true orphan. Kazakhstan is a developing country with little access to birth control. Are you suggesting that unwanted pregnancies don't happen?

With regard to the social orphans, the problem may come from international adoption. Orphanages, as underfunded as the are, receive aid/donations from agencies and families and this may create superficially better living conditions than the surrounding economy. This may create a situation where poor families feel their child will be better taken care of at an orphanage. It's an assumption that is wrong as institutional living is never better than family care but it could happen and that is regrettable.

Kazakhstan has been building foster care environments. It's not the same system that exists in the US. They have been creating villages for childless parents to live free in return for fostering orphans within the village. This program is the signature project of the First Lady of Kazakhstan and is an innovative approach to dealing with parent-less children. The country is not interested in perpetuating the cycle of orphans and exporting them overseas as you suggest. The country is a mineral rich country with a declining population. Exporting children does not bring in the money that coal, steel and natural gas do.

Adoptions are a business. I do not deny that. The goal though should be to figure out how to match true orphans with a domestic family first and an appropriate foreign family last. As I said before, true orphans should not be a casualty in the fight against corruption.


Walking in my shoes: you miss the point again. Kazakzstan and other very small former soviet countries like Krygzystan (which closed their adoptions some 14 months ago) are sending a dis proportionate amount of children (mostly healthy babies) out of the country vs their total population . It brings a big economic boom to their country because like Ethiopia -which is the hot country of the month for adoption - tourism is also included so many local people and business benefit off of this.
Kazakzstan and Krygzystan are behind on their social services and have yet to establish an in country foster care system. To these governments it is a financial burden to house what is called "social orphans" or special needs children --meaning that the children have parents but they just cannot afford to clothe and feed them. I agree with you that the people of these countries don't like their babies and few older children exported out of the country.
Please explain to me why American humanitarian groups set up through Adoption agencies do nothing to build their economy, set up medical clincs (God forbid they would lose their future inventory) . Beyond support to the orphanage which in turn gets the Adoption agency prime referrals international adoption is still a business transaction. FYI these two countries are heavily Moslem and Moslem law forbids the exchange of money for adoption they believe a family member or someone in the community should care for their children.
Lastly you do know that the Johnson and Johnson heiress that died last month from a drug overdose had also adopted (and was approved on the home study even with a past riddled with addiction and other issues) from Kazakhstan. Money and profit is still a big factor in International Adoption. While the average joe and jane may have to be poked, proded and analyzed the person with money and a questionable past can move to the front of the line waiting for a healthy newborn (especially a caucausian baby) Watch the migration of favorite adoption countries change as they have in the last 8 years. First that was hot was China, Russia, Bulgaria, Romania, Romania and Bulgaria closed, China and Russia tighten up so agencies moved on to Guatemala, Vietnam, Nepal and Liberia. BAM- they are closed to adoptions becuase of "questionable status of abandoned babies" then the agency is off to more obscure countries Kazakhzstan, Krygyzstan, Ethiopia, Ghana. 1 out of the 4 is closed due to fraud and the other 3 are being looked at real close because of fraud.
Remember American Samoa, and the rest and what happened. These children and probably yours have a bio family and siblings. In order to make a family, one has to be destroyed.
If getting creative isn't enough for you, Adoption agencies have started an International Surrogacy Adoption Program where you can rent the womb of a poor Indian, Ukrainian woman. Who cares about the orphans on the street we can manufacture more for our clients who pay up to $70,000 for a manufactured baby.


Lumping all international adoptions into the same category is unfair, uneducated and lazy.

My wife and I struggled to start a family for 5 years. After failing to conceive biologically, we turned to adoption. We looked at both domestic (US) and international adoption. We chose international. Now some suggest that we should have adopted one of the many foster children available in the US. Well, the only criticism I will take on this subject is from a parent who has actually adopted a non-infant foster child domestically. For those who haven't, your opinion means nothing. You have no idea what going through an adoption is and you have no clue as to the hurdles of starting a family non-traditionally. As for adopting an infant domestically, in the US, the decision rests solely on the birth mother and there is no guarantee that you will ever be chosen as a parent. This uncertainty is more than some can deal with.

As for inter-country adoption, there are problems and one must be smart with their research. My wife and I know that the adoption market is a business. Just as people don't stop getting pregnant because obstetricians make a profit on pregnancies, people shouldn't abandon adopting orphaned children because people may profit in some way.

My wife and I did extensive research before choosing an agency. We looked into the tax records of agencies including the pay of their board and staff. We spoke to the consulates in different countries and to other parents for recommendations. Based on a number of factors, we chose to adopt from Kazakhstan. Not because it was easy but because it was relatively hard. After an almost 2 year process, we traveled to Kazakhstan and spent over 2 months in country bonding with a child, petitioning the court for adoption, filing paperwork and waiting while all necessary paperwork was completed. For this article to insinuate that Kazakhstan has lax laws is laughable. Our paperwork was scrutinized by no less than 4 Kazakh government agencies from New York, Almaty and our final adopted region. The orphanage and department of social services presented evidence to the status of our prospective son as a true orphan with no family or domestic couple showing interest in him. In fact, the saddest truth at the orphanage were the many children not available for adoption because family members would continue to visit them (as little as monthly in some cases). These children had been left for any number of reasons but the truth was that they were living in an institution with no hope in finding a home.

In our time dealing with the Kazakh government and the orphanage we didn't see anything that was not transparent and fully documented. The only thing you could say was unethical from a western point of view was a gift, valued at $20, we gave the judge after our court case. The Kazakhs care for their children and hate to see them adopted to foreign countries. However, they also know that if there is no family and no domestic couple available, foreign adoption is the best option. This sense of care has endeared us to the people we encountered forever. For the next 18 years, my wife and I will happily send a report back to the government of Kazakhstan detailing our son's development and status.

Human trafficking is deplorable and must be fought. What must not be lost in that fight is the need of true orphans all over the world. It would be just as much a crime if in our fight against adoption abuses we leave orphaned children to grow up in institutions.


JO GREEK, then Adoption Agencies shouldn't be charging for these type of humanitarian adoptions.
Again, you miss the point, we should be spending that money into investing into their countries so they may become self-sufficient and not have to resort to selling their children to the highest bidder. Adoption is not a solution to poverty.
But it seems that poverty is the driving force for adoption.
Adoption is a mere band aid to poverty, disease, disaster and homelessness. Here is a novel idea for you, how about we adopt the homeless Americans that roam our streets? Did you know that 1.5 million are children? I don't see anyone rushing to adopt them do you?

Jo Greek

Where the children come from very poor countries, it is hard to see, how they could be worse off after adoption. Even horrid families must be better than starvation and debilitating disease.


Saviors or Kidnappers? International Adoption is a business transaction. Although your article states the agencies are "non-profit" many gross over $1 million a year. You can check out the so-called "non-profits" 990 IRS tax returns for free at International Adoption is a lucrative business, the Hague has curtailed some of the past behavior of running "baby mills" in countries like Vietnam, Guatemala, (other countries closed down to adoption) agencies bypassed the older true orphans on the street and dealt direct with poor birth mothers willing to relinquish their newborns for a small fee.
In the case of the 10 Idahoans that were charged with kidnapping of Haitian children into the Dominican Republic...they stated that they wanted to "give the children the chance to live in a seaside orphanage, with a sports field and possibly giving adoptive parents the opportunity to reside the 60-90 days (residential requirement for adoptions in Dominican Republic) for adoption.
Not only would they have made a cool million off of their cargo of 33 kids X $30,000 the 10 Kidnappers would have help support tourism in the Dominican Republic related to adoption, which no doubt they would get local kick backs for.
One of the 10 kidnappers is due in Idaho court next week because of non payment to customers and former employees for her business called Perhaps Ms. Silsby has decided on a more lucrative business and was in Haiti personal shopping for her rich caucasian clients.
Lastly, if these do gooders want to really help those less fortunate than they. They have no further to look than the ghettos of America where American Blacks suffer economically, children are fatherless, high percentage in Foster Care. When Katrina disaster happened many children were left orphaned, homeless and traumitized. Why not save their time, energy and money and devote to building homes, medical clinics and food pantrys for these children?
Take a look at the over 144,000 American children that are paper ready for adoption in the USA and ask yourself why are Canadians and people from the Netherlands adopting American children when their fellow Americans choose to fly 4,000+ miles away to some exotic country where money goes far and birth parents are forever forgotten when the child is human trafficked away.
At the high point of International Adoption in 2005, worldwide it was a $6.2 billion dollar industry with over $2 billion contributed from America. Because of the Murky in country laws and bribes to local officals International Adoptions were popular at one point 2005 over 22,000 children were issued Orphan Visas to the USA. 2009 there was slightly over 12,000 almost a 50% drop due to tighter regulations and Hague Convention implementation to fight against international human trafficking. Many adoption agencies have been closed and their assets were staggering, huge salaries, expensive luxury cars, homes in Santa Barbara and Hawaii. And you question whether International Adoptions is not a business? Look at an adoption contract, the agency clearly works for the paying client (PAP-prospective adoptive parent) NOT for the child. Adoption is not a solution for poverty, education and investing in the people of that country is. How dare any American look down on the bio parents of another child and feel they are more suited to raise their child because they have the money or are more educated.


In this age of laws and procedures, you can't be kind-hearted without being smart as well. Good simpletons that we admired so much from the literature of the past are extinct, indeed cannot survive in this age.


My husband and I have subscribed to your magazine for years, and always appreciate the balanced and thorough approach that you take.

However, I must confess to being very disappointed by this article. As an adoptive parent, I find this article, from its title onwards to be biased and highly inflammatory.

I agree that there are inherent flaws in the international adoption system. Ideally, children are raised by their birthfamilies. If that is not possible, then certainly extended families or in-country families are the next best solution. I am fully supportive of "levelling the playing field" where this is concerned. However, there is nothing romantic about poverty, and certainly nothing romantic about being parentless in a society with no safety net.

This article fails to mention several important points:

First of all, in most of the countries that you mention, adoption is often the only family planning option available to poor women, most of whom are burdened with subservient roles in these societies.

Secondly, many adoptive families in the United States take great pains to both educate their children about their birth cultures, and to offer support to the children's birthfamilies when possible. If you want to investigate this point further, you can look into an excellent organization in Guatemala called Asofamilia.

Finally, I take particular umbrage at your assertion that "blonde female babies attracting a hefty premium..." While you may be able to find cases in which fair or female children are preferred, you insult the many of us who asked their agencies to please just refer us to any child who needs a home.

While I am pleased that flaws in the international adoption process are getting attention, I fear that my child, along with thousands of others will grow up with a stigma that is unfair, at best.



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