Russian Ministry to Suspend All U.S. Adoptions
To punctuate a case that has drawn many a critical eye in Russia, the Russian Foreign Ministry is petitioning the government to stop all U.S. adoptions of Russian children, amid an “incessant string of crimes” allegedly committed by their American adoptive parents.
The Russian authorities say that due to domestic violence incidents, no fewer than 17 Russian children have died in the care of their American families. The Ministry goes on to say that after being suspended, the adoptions should only resume after Washington lawmakers sign an agreement with the Ministry saying that Russian monitors will be allowed to visit homes with adopted children in them.
One of the popular incidents cited by the Russian Ministry is one back in 2010, when an adoptive Tennessee mother sent her adopted 8-year-old Russian son on a flight, unaccompanied, back to Russia. A letter that the boy was carrying with him, supposedly written by the adoptive mother, said that she was returning him because he had severe psychological problems. Its authenticity could not be verified, but the letter said “This child is mentally unstable. He is violent and has severe psychopathic issues.”
In response to this, the United States ambassador to Russia, John Beyrle, said that he was “very angry that any family would act so callously toward a child that they had legally adopted.”
Russian Ministry members have reportedly said that when they requested such protection measures be put in place in years past, Washington lawmakers were unwilling to cooperate, but that this recent string of incidents is the last straw.
This will undoubtedly put a large damper on the number of foreign U.S. adoptions, since almost 50,000 Russian children have been adopted since the early 90s.
