I've been following a story out of South Africa for a while now, about an African-American family who fell in love with a newborn who had been abandoned head-first in a bucket and the apparently insurmountable barriers placed in front of their attempts to adopt the child.

Well, the saga continues.

In the South Africa Legal Brief it has... more

Continued from the previous post.

It is more than a little likely that if your kids were born in China, Guatemala, Peru or Russia, for example, their birth families were speaking something other than Mandarin, Spanish or Russian at home, and perhaps wouldn't be able to understand a word of the language many would assume would strike a familiar note in their children.

Since our kids often are often born in the more marginalized populations of the countries they come... more

One hit I've heard international adoption take more than once involves the usually inevitable consequence of moving a child from one country to another that means a loss of access for the child to the language of his birth family, country and culture.

It's a common theme on adult adoptee boards, and there is no shortage of resentment over the fact that a visit to a birth country is complicated by an inability to communicate in the native language.

Language is one of the great treasures of culture and a tie that can bind people together even more strongly... more

Continued from the previous post where we've been looking at the Ethopian community of Awra Amba.

According to an Action Aid report men and women in Awra Amba take turns cooking, baking, weaving, baby sitting and anything else that needs doing ... even on days dictated by religions to be set aside from work.

Now Action Aid is looking into ways to "replicate their working habit and other... more

What do you think of when you see 'Ethiopia' in a blog headline? Adoption, of course, since this is Adoption.com and many families are falling in love with Ethiopian kids. AIDS, poverty, beautiful children, great food, tremendous history, ancient culture, diversity, dust, mountains ... those of us who have not adopted from the country have taken bits and pieces from the writings of those who have and developed an image of a far-away, exotic land with amazing people facing desperate challenges.

Mary... more

UNICEF released figures last week showing that fewer of the world's children under the age of five-years died last year than usual ... less than 10 million of them ... a turn of events the organization is calling "solid progress on child survival".

"This is an historic moment," said UNICEF executive director Ann Veneman. "More children are surviving today than ever before. Now we must build on this public health success to push for the achievement of the Millennium... more

The 9th Global Consultation on Child Welfare Services will be held next week in the Philippines, hosting local and international adoption specialists and addressing concerns of Filipino children, adoptive families and foreign adoption agencies.

The conference will see the launch of a new book called "Adopting a Filipino Child the Intercountry Way" by Gwendolyn Pimentel-Gana, a work described as a "useful source of information ... in matters relating to the foreign adoption placement of Filipino children."

The author explained her belief that "intercountry... more

A 'major human trafficking ring' has been busted by Cambodian police, according to reports.

Run by Sri Lankan and Pakistani ex-pats working in Cambodia ... ringleaders Mariam Pillai Lerins Ranni, the Sri Lankan owner of the Raani Curry Leaf Restaurant in Phnom Penh, Lipton Lerins, the husband of Ranni, and Mohammed Nadim, the Pakistani owner of the Taj Mahal Restaurant in Siem Reap ... the ring planned to shuffle over 200 people through the country to various destinations... more

Elizabeth Mallory of NCLO has announced via e-mail to web groups and individuals that her organization is stopping all operations in Cambodia as of the 26th of this month.

According to the message I've seen posted, one main reason for the shutdown has to do with the children in the NCLO Children's Home being invited into "one of the best facilities in all of Cambodia".

Here, they will attend a top rate school that offers them far more than we could ever imagine offering them.... more

A baby-trafficking ring was reportedly busted in China last week, with ten people arrested for collecting some 40 month-old babies for sale. (That's 40 babies of the age of one-month-ish, not some three-year olds, just in case that's not clear. )

Like the 2004 case that netted 54 traffickers and 100 buyers and found 28 drugged and bound babies stuffed into bags on a bus headed north from Guangxi, the one-child policy that does girls no favors is mentioned as a source of infants.

Do I need to mention that none of this has anything to do with international adoption, that trafficking... more