18 DÉCEMBRE 2019

30 ANS APRÈS LA CHUTE DE CEAUSESCU, LE PAYS EST ENFIN SUR LE POINT DE FERMER LES ORPHELINATS HÉRITÉS DE L'ÉPOQUE COMMUNISTE

Il y a 30 ans, à la chute du régime communiste, le monde découvrait en Roumanie d’immenses orphelinats, certains de véritables mouroirs, où survivaient des centaines de milliers d’enfants, parfois attachés à leur lit, livrés à eux mêmes. Depuis la disparition de Ceausescu, d'importants progrès ont été réalisés en termes de protection des enfants et le pays se prépare à fermer les 147 derniers centres hérités de l’époque communiste. Mais beaucoup reste à faire pour en finir avec l'héritage du dictateur : les abandons persistent et 54 000 enfants sont toujours sous tutelle de l’État, alertent l'association CARE et son partenaire SERA Romania.

La Roumanie est le seul pays où l’abandon d’enfants a été encouragé par l’État, qui avait développé un réseau de plus de 600 orphelinats. Conséquence de la politique ultra nataliste du dictateur Ceausescu - interdiction de la contraception et de l’IVG, obligation de faire 5 enfants par femme - abandonner son enfant était devenu en 1989 un acte banal. Si ce système a été abrogé en 1997, l’impact est encore bien présent 30 ans après. En 2018, 54 000 enfants étaient toujours sous la protection de l’État, dont 60 % en situation de handicap. Encore beaucoup grandissent dans des centres de placement inadaptés offrant peu de perspectives.

« Malgré un net recul depuis les années 90 et le travail acharné de nos équipes sur le terrain qui ont permis de fermer 87 orphelinats de l’époque de Ceauscescu et d’améliorer le destin de plus de 88 000 enfants en Roumanie, le nombre d’enfants placés est encore bien trop important ! », explique Bogdan Simion, directeur de l’association SERA Romania, soutenu par CARE.

On Tuesday, 17 December, Saeima’s Human Rights and Public Affairs Committee’s majority voiced support towards limiting adoption of Latvian children to foreign countries.

It is planned to return to this topic in January to decide if the Cabinet of Ministers should add changes to rules or laws.

During the meeting of the committee the head of the Ombudsman’s Office for Child Rights Laila Gr?vere said that in practice it is possible to circumvent certain limitations for foreign child adoption. It is possible to circumvent rules by putting a child from a foster family to an orphanage for a couple days to later adopt them to a foreign country. The ombudsman invites the Saeima to decide if it supports or does not support adoption of children to foreign countries and set a clear regulation in which cases it is permissible, says Gr?vere.

Welfare Ministry’s parliamentary secretary Krišs Lipš?ns said Latvia cannot put obstacles for child adoption to foreign countries. At the same time, it is not the primary goal – rather the last option available to provide children the right to a family.

Lipš?ns stresses that it is necessary to exercise children’s rights to live and grow up in a family environment, which is clearly outlined in the Constitution and international law binding to Latvia.

With the infertility rate crossing 15 percent, Kashmir is joining the societies where childless couples are always seeking kids to adopt. Saima Bhat investigates the least known aspect of the Kashmir society in which abandoned babies are filling part of the surging demand gap amid new rules and processes that make offering a child for adoption easy

On a rainy afternoon in 2012 summer, Farooq Ahmad, an auto-rickshaw driver was driving alongside Srinagar’s Flood Spill Channel near Aalochi Bagh, when, all of a sudden, his mother’s pleas flashed back to his mind. His mother wanted him to leave his wife as she could not bear him a child in 15 years of their marriage. Farooq loved his wife and his mother too. So leaving either of the two was not an option. He burst into tears and decided to stop for a while.

Farooq parked his vehicle on the bund and came out to take rest under a mulberry tree. “I was weeping like anything while resting my head with a tree and suddenly my eyes saw a miracle,” Farooq said. “In utter disbelief I saw an infant moving an arm from a bag. I thought God has answered my silent prayers and tears. It was a miracle that changed my destiny.”

His happiness, however, was short lived. He was hugging the infant, a baby girl, when the local police arrived on the spot. “He had kept the abandoned girl close to his heart and was crying that the kid has been sent by God for him only,” says Shahid, an eyewitness. “He gave a tough time to cops by not leaving the abandoned child. Ultimately the police motivated him to come along to the police station so that they can at least register the FIR.”

There is a set procedure if an abandoned child is found anywhere in the state. If found in Srinagar, they mostly land up in GB Pant Hospital for the treatment and then these children’s custody is given to the childless couples who remain waiting in the queue with their applications.

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Nandita Puri: Child trafficking is a global issue

Culture December 14, 2019December 14, 2019 Ritu Jha

Nandita Puri, author and wife of the late actor Om Puri, is gearing up for her fourth book, “Jennifer”, a real-life account of a girl who is a victim of intercountry child trafficking. She says addressing the issue through her writing was important for her, as child trafficking is a global issue.

Nandita was present in an interactive session at the LIFFT India Filmostsav 2019 that has started from December 12 and will continue till December 16.

The book is supported by Against Child Trafficking (ACT), an NGO based out of Brussels and working on the issue of intercountry child adoption, explaining the intensity of the matter.

Number smaller in comparison to other states. The Women and Child Welfare department yet to get updates on kids who have been returned by their adoptive parents

HYDERABAD: In a disconcerting trend, the state of Telangana has seen nearly 16 adopted children being returned to the State Adoption Resource Agency (SARA) in the last five years. The data was accessed by TNIE after National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) raised an alarm in September over the nationwide trend of adopted children being returned by their adoptive parents. The NCPCR asked the states to furnish details about the children sent back by their adoptive parents.

The information has become vital, as on Dec 5, a 14-year-old girl from Karimnagar who had been officially adopted from SARA in 2014 committed suicide amidst allegations of negligence by the adoptive parents.Telangana from its end has found that nearly 16 children were returned.

The children have been sent back to government homes or the NGOs from where they are adopted under the supervision of SARA. Interestingly, the women and child welfare department is yet to get reports on the status of the children who had been returned by their adoptive parents.

Officials are trying to find out the age of kids sent back to homes. Most of them were in their adolescent age groups. Their gender and district they belonged to. They also have to check whereabouts of other adopted children as adjustment issues can spring up for any child. The number, however, is smaller compared to other states in the country. Previous reports suggest that nearly 260-odd children were returned across the country between 2017-19, with Maharashtra and Karnataka topping the charts where 56 and 25 children respectively.

VADODARA: She was abandoned in a farm in Dahod district.

Many would have given up on the girl, particularly considering the fact that she had learning disabilities, but destiny’s designs are

not for us humans to see. On Wednesday, three-year-old Stuti was adopted by a couple from the United States of America.

Bought to a children’s home in Godhra, the abandoned newborn, found herself a new set of parents in Brooke and Kent Hackman. Incidentally, Brooke from Kolkata was adopted by her foster parents based in the US. Stuti could walk much later than a normal child. With treatment and care at the children’s home, Stuti started speaking a few words and eventually master the art of walking too who were looking to adopt a girl from India especially with special needs, were given Stuti’s details.

They showed their eagerness to adopt her, she said.

Eurochild is partnering with UNICEF Regional Office for Europe & Central Asia to coordinate a 12-month study aimed at mapping data collection systems on child protection across 27 EU Member States.

There is an unacceptable lack of data on children without or at risk of losing parental care in Europe today. What data is available is typically not disaggregated, for example by age, gender, disability. Where data is available, monitoring continues to be haphazard and often relies on the work of NGOs to fill in the gaps, such as what we have tried to accomplish with our partners in the Opening Doors for Europe’s children campaign country factsheets in recent years.

For over a decade now, Eurochild has been working on addressing these gaps around data for children in alternative care. In 2009, we carried out a survey of the situation of children in alternative care in Europe through its member organisations. 30 European countries participated, including the 4 nations of the UK and Moldova. The survey was not intended to be a scientifically rigorous research exercise but rather to identify what information is readily available and to note some common trends across Europe. However, we are both pleased and worried that this survey remains relevant today.

In brief, the lack of recent quantitative data on children without or at risk of losing parental care is a major obstacle in the development and implementation of comprehensive deinstitutionalisation strategies. Indeed, the systematic collection of accurate data on the numbers and characteristics of children in care, the root causes of institutionalisation and the function of the child protection system as a whole is crucial and can help ensure better policies, improve the state’s ability to protect and promote children’s rights and lead to sustainable reforms. With these challenges in mind, in 2020 Eurochild, in partnership with UNICEF, will map the child protection data collection systems across 27 EU Member States.

The study will build on the findings of a feasibility phase, which mapped the systems and corresponding data available in 4 EU countries (Bulgaria, Estonia, France and Ireland). Importantly, this research is expected to take an advantage of the window of opportunity offered by a new EU legislature, as well as the Child Guarantee Initiative, which the incoming European Commission (2020-2024) has identified as one of its political priorities.

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