„Romania entirely observes the law on international adoptions. Currently the draft law on changing adoptions is with the Prime Minister for a first reading,” said the head of the Romanian Office for Adoptions. The Secretary of State added that Romania gave pride of place to national adoptions at present and mentioned that an important element of adoptions was the post-adoption monitoring.
The reaction of Secretary of State Bogdan Panait comes after the Committee on Petitions of the European Parliament informed of the organization on Monday of a debate on international adoptions of children from Romania following a petition submitted by the Amici dei Bambini Association.
The petition is brought forward by Marco Graffini on behalf of the Amici dei Bambini Association and refers to Romania’s observing international conventions on children’s rights.
The petitioner criticizes the Romanian laws on adoptions, and thinks that they do not observe the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Convention on Protection of Children and Cooperation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption, signed in The Hague in 1993. The petitioner says that the Romanian law only allows international adoptions in the case of the relatives up to the third degree living abroad and thinks that it does not consider the minors’ interests.
He requests the European Parliament to take all the necessary measures for making the Romanian authorities recognize the international adoption as a legitimate instrument, which is necessary for ensuring a family to the children that were abandoned and could not be adopted in Romania. The petitioner also requests the start of the suspension procedure against Romania on the basis of Article 7 of the EU treaty on violating the rights of the minors without a family.
The petition was declared admissible on November 23, 2009 and the European Commission was invited to supply information. On February 19, 2010 the EU Executive answered that they were acquainted with the situation described by the petitioner. Romania is a special case within the EU, as it is the only member state that de facto abolished Law 273/2004 on international adoptions, adoptions being only allowed when they are requested by the child’s grandparents living abroad. By law 49/2009 this possibility was extended to the relatives up to the third degree (aunts, uncles).
The policy that was adopted is the Romanian Government’s responsibility exclusively. This restrictive measure must be placed again in the context of past abusive practices in matters of international adoptions from Romania. After five years when the current law was in force it seems the right time has come for Romania to be able to reconsider its position to international adoptions on the basis of some deep-going and substantiated examinations, at least as regards certain categories of children, who cannot be adopted in Romania if one considers their age, health or ethnic origin.
Indeed, as early as October 2009 the Romanian Office for Adoptions sent the Government a memorandum referring to the resumption of international adoptions in cases in which the domestic adoptions failed repeatedly. The proposal was immediately turned down by Emil Boc, the then Prime Minister, reads the answer of the Commission.
The European Commission thinks that in this case the start of the procedures stipulated by Article 7 of the EU treaty is not justified. It devolves on the European Parliament to decide if a resolution were useful requesting Romania to take the necessary measures for complying with the recommendations of the Committee on the Rights of the Child.
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