By Jim Coggins

CANADIAN adoption agencies are being bombarded by well-meaning citizens wanting to adopt children orphaned by the devastating earthquake in Haiti.

They shouldn't expect to bring a Haitian child into their homes anytime soon, Lorne Welwood told CC.com. Welwood is executive director of Hope Adoption Services in Abbotsford, B.C., a Christian agency which facilitates about half a dozen Haitian adoptions each year. "Natural disasters disrupt rather than speed up the adoption process," he said.

Even more than adoptions within Canada, international adoptions are a complex process. They are especially complicated due to concerns about human trafficking -- the buying and selling of children, who may be diverted into prostitution or slave labour.

To begin with, Canadians who want to adopt foreign children must be approved as suitable parents by a provincial social services agency in Canada. This includes a criminal record check, a home study, a financial health check, a medical check-up and sometimes even psychological testing. The government agency may also provide resources to help the prospective parents prepare for adoption. This process alone can take three to five months.

Then, in the case of Haiti, all of the information has to be translated into French and passed on to the Haitian government, along with notarized copies of such documents as the parental candidates' passports.

Next, the adoption must be approved in Haiti. The first step is for a child to be declared legally available for adoption.

Welwood noted that many of the Haitian children available are 'economic orphans,' children whose parents -- often single mothers -- have given up their children because they can't afford to feed them, and this means they must formally relinquish their parental rights.

The child is then matched with the Canadian parents through a Haitian agency. There are at least 18 orphanages in the Port-au-Prince area, and scores of Haitian agencies authorized to facilitate adoptions.

Next comes an investigation by Haitian social service agencies, and a legal process which results in a Haitian court formalizing the adoption. In recent years, the Haitian government has required that adoptive parents come to Haiti some months in advance to sign papers and have their picture taken with the child, so there can be no question about identity later on.

Once the adoption is approved in Canada and in Haiti, a final process approves the immigration of adopted children to their new country. In this case, the Haitian government issues the child a passport, and the Canadian government issues a visa. Only then can the parents fly to Haiti and bring back their child. The process can easily take two or three years.

When natural disasters occur, many people want the adoption process speeded up -- but that is precisely when it slows down.

For one thing, key infrastructure may be severely damaged. In this case, the courthouse in Port-au-Prince collapsed, and the judge who handles adoption cases, Rock Cadet, was killed in the earthquake.

The buildings of the government social services agencies have also collapsed, and many of the government employees have been killed or injured. As well, many of the legal documents have been destroyed or buried in the rubble. For the time being, the Haitian government adoption process has ceased to function.

In addition, Welwood said, governments in disaster zones place priority on meeting immediate needs such as providing food, water and medical care.

A spokesperson for Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) confirmed that CIC "understands that adoptive parents are anxious to be united with their children." But when there has been a major catastrophe, the Canadian government has to deal with many aspects of the situation, including immediate aid and long-term reconstruction, and it can't focus solely on adoptions.

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Further, "governments become more vigilant during disasters, not less," Welwood said. This is because of people who try to take advantage of chaotic situations.

The CIC spokesperson noted that governments try to protect the best interests of the child. In a disaster, many children become separated from their parents, and the priority is to try to reunite them with their parents or, failing that, to find them other guardians in their home country.

The spokesperson said there are concerns that people who want to help might resort to bribery or fraudulent documentation to adopt children who might otherwise have been reunited with their parents. There are also "people looking to abduct children for personal financial gain." Therefore, the Canadian government "wants to avoid shortcuts that allow unscrupulous people to gain control of children."

On January 16, Citizenship and Immigration Canada announced it was setting up a dedicated office to give priority to family class immigration from Haiti, including adopted children. On January 18, that office was bombarded with 55,000 phone calls from Canadians anxious to bring their relatives to Canada.

The office can be contacted by phone Monday to Friday from 7 am to 7 pm at 1-888-242-2100 or by email at question-Haiti@cic.gc.ca.

On January 20, Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Jason Kenney announced that the government had identified about 100 adoption applications in process. These are adoptions that CIC has already been informed about, which usually happens relatively late in the process.

The government is contacting all the adoptive parents to clarify their status. A news release stated: "We are determining whether we have some level of approval in principle from the Haitian government, and we will be approaching Haitian authorities with this list to have their confirmation we can take these children to Canada."

The CIC spokesperson noted that CIC is being careful to respect Haitian laws. If the Haitian government gives its approval to these adoptions, the Canadian government will issue temporary resident permits to allow the Haitian children to enter Canada, will waive medical exams and regular processing fees, and will cover health costs until the children can be covered under provincial programs.

The Canadian government has also asked the provinces to identify other adoptive families who may not be quite as far along in the process, and is also encouraging those families to contact its call centre. The government would also like to expedite these adoptions.

The Canadian government response has not been without problems. The Canadian embassy in Haiti was damaged in the earthquake, and the Canadian government has been trying to set up another office in Port-au-Prince to handle immigration and other paperwork.

The other problem is transport. Since 'nonessential' travel into Haiti has been banned, adoptive Canadian parents cannot fly into the disaster zone. There is a possibility the Canadian government could fly the children out, along with other evacuated Canadians, on the planes it is using to fly in relief supplies. However, that has not been confirmed by the government.

Parents who have already received an adoption order from the Haitian court or whose paperwork is before the court might well have their adoptions speeded up, Welwood said. However, people whose adoptions are not that far along in the process -- and especially those who have not yet started -- yet may find that the process takes even longer.

That does not mean Canadians should not try to adopt Haitian children. "If they are really serious about wanting to help," Welwood said, "they should get started right away."

It will take several months for them to be approved as adoptive parents in Canada; and if they start now, they will be ready when the infrastructure is re-established in Haiti. There were children needing adoption in Haiti before the earthquake, Welwood said, and "the needs will not be less now."

WEBLINK: international.gc.ca/humanitarian-humanitaire/earthquake_seisme_haiti_help_aide.aspx

January 20/2010