On December 28, President Vladimir Putin signed into law a bill banning all adoptions of Russian orphans by Americas. The law went into effect January 1.
Dr. Jane Aronson, founder of Worldwide Orphans Foundation, states these children “will be abandoned to languish and rot in ‘gulags’ in Russia. Russian orphanages are the worst in the world…”
The law is a retaliatory measure designed to respond to a US move that would block visas and seize US assets of suspected Russian human-rights violators.
That anyone, especially a world leader, would use children to get back at political opponents infuriates me. It’s appalling. It’s unforgivable.
If I drank, I would join the Facebook boycott of Russian vodka. I might do it anyway, for solidarity’s sake. If they’re in it for they money, let them think they’ll lose a lot.
If you’ve read very many of my posts, you know that we have adopted three children from a former soviet country. In fact, we signed up to adopt from Russia. We turned in our dossier in November, and it was translated into Russian. Kazakhstan opened formal adoptions on January 1, and it was a very Russian-style system, so our dossier was sent there.
One of the first questions we were asked while standing before the judge in Essyk, Kazakhstan was, “Why would you adopt a child that is obviously not yours?” Since our daughter is ethnic Kazak, it is quite evident she is not our bio child, but she is ours. Russians don’t think like that. We were told in Kaz that a couple will wait until a child is a toddler to see what he will look like to be sure to get one that looks like them, adopt him, and then move away so no one will know he is adopted. Russians and other Eastern Europeans will even fake a pregnancy before adopting an infant.
When this story broke, every major newspaper carried a story of a family that is caught “in the pipeline,” that is, one of those whose adoption will now not be completed. Many are adopting older children who have met and bonded with “Mommy and Daddy” and are waiting from them to come back. But Mommy and Daddy won’t be coming back.
One adoptive mother said the child she was adopting had been passed on by as many as 20 Russian families. Russians won’t or can’t adopt the children with medical issues because they either can’t afford the care, or it isn’t available there. When we adopted, we were asked if we would take a “special needs” child. You would be shocked at the list of what was considered special needs there, that is easily treated or even cured here.
One person who heard this news misunderstood the law as being due to having plenty of Russian families ready and waiting to adopt. If that were true, I would be the first to say “hallelujah!” Domestic adoption is better. Helping families in all countries so they can raise their own children is best. But until that happens, international adoption is part of the solution.
Instead, it’s being used as a political game. Children are being used as pawns. As Dr. Aronson says, “Where is our humanity? There should be an outcry internationally to censure Putin for his evil act to lock up and ruin hundreds of thousands of children. He hides Russian offenses against children with this ban. He summarily ends a discussion about his personal lack of responsibility to orphans in his own country.”
When my ethnic Russian son saw me reading the stories, obviously upset, he asked me what I was doing. When I told him, he said, “Aren’t you glad you already got me home?” I tried to explain he came from Kaz, not Russia. He didn’t get it. He just smiled and kissed me on the cheek before he wandered off to play, while I tried to stop the tears.
But I couldn’t.