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U.S. SENATOR LISA MURKOWSKI (R-AK) HOLDS HEARING ON ASIAN ADOPTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES

Political Transcript Wire; Lanham [Lanham]12 June 2006: n/a.

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U.S. SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE: SUBCOMMITTEE ON EAST ASIAN AND PACIFIC AFFAIRS HOLDS A HEARING ON ASIAN ADOPTIONS IN THE UNITED STATES

JUNE 8, 2006

SPEAKERS:

U.S. SENATOR LISA MURKOWSKI (R-AK) CHAIRMAN U.S. SENATOR LAMAR ALEXANDER (R-TN) U.S. SENATOR CHARLES HAGEL (R-NE) U.S. SENATOR GEORGE ALLEN (R-VA) U.S. SENATOR LINCOLN CHAFEE (R-RI) U.S. SENATOR RICHARD G. LUGAR (R-IN) EX OFFICIO

U.S. SENATOR JOHN F. KERRY (D-MA) RANKING MEMBER U.S. SENATOR JOSEPH R. BIDEN (D-DE) U.S. SENATOR RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD (D-WI) U.S. SENATOR BARACK OBAMA (D-IL)

WITNESSES:

U.S. SENATOR LARRY CRAIG (R-ID)

U.S. SENATOR MARY LANDRIEU (D-LA)

CATHERINE BARRY, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR OVERSEAS CITIZENS SERVICES, BUREAU OF CONSULAR AFFAIRS, STATE DEPARTMENT

ROBERT DIVINE, ACTING DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION SERVICES, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY

THOMAS ATWOOD, PRESIDENT AND CEO, NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR ADOPTION

SUSAN SOON-KEUM COX, VICE PRESIDENT OF PUBLIC POLICY AND ADVOCACY, HOLT INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN'S SERVICES

[*] MURKOWSKI: OK. Good afternoon and welcome to the Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs. Today we are going to be taking a look at the United States' policy on international adoption and, in particular, adoptions from Asian nations.

I am particularly pleased to have Senator Larry Craig with us this afternoon. Senator Mary Landrieu will be joining us shortly. They are here this afternoon to provide us with their insights and their perspectives on the issue of adoption.

I think it's fair to say that there are probably no greater advocates of adoption in the United States Senate than these two, and certainly, a tremendous credit to this body for their hard work in this area.

And Senator Craig, I want to personally thank you, and I will do the same, too, to Senator Landrieu, for your efforts. Here in the United States, U.S. citizens adopt more children from abroad than the citizens of all other countries combined.

Last year, over 22,000 foreign children were adopted by U.S. citizens. And we recognize that that does create a burden on the Departments of State and Homeland Security to meet the demands and the expectations of the prospective parents, who are anxious to bring new family members into their lives.

Yet, much of the burden lies with the foreign governments who must permit adoptions by foreign nationals and provide a smooth and transparent process for inter-country adoption.

The Hague Convention on Inter-Country Adoption, which entered into force in 1995, is designed to facilitate the process of inter- country adoption.

Congress passed the International Adoption Act of 2000 to provide the domestic legislation to implement the Hague Convention. And yet the U.S. has not yet ratified that Convention.

I hope that our witnesses from the administration today will be able to provide us with an update on where we are in implementing the Convention and what Congress can do to help facilitate that process.

During the course of the hearing, I would also like to bring up the status of adoptions from both Cambodia and China. In December 2001, the United States placed a moratorium on adoptions from Cambodia due to concerns about baby trafficking, certainly a concern that must be addressed.

At the time of the moratorium, we had two families in the state of Alaska who were left in limbo. Their adoption petitions had been approved. They'd already visited the children, but they were unable to finalize the process.

But fortunately, thanks to the efforts of many interested organizations and families, the cooperation of the administration, many of those that were stuck in the pipeline, including those families from Alaska, were able to complete their adoptions. But still, that moratorium remains in place.

And in a similar vein in 2001, and again in 2004, Romania changed its adoption laws to essentially prohibit international adoption.

After the 2001 moratorium was first implemented, we again had an Alaska family who was in the pipeline to adopt a Romanian child. And they were one of the few families who the Romanian government eventually allowed to proceed with their adoption.

Since then, the State Department has worked aggressively with Romania to help reform their adoption laws. And, in this past May, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved a resolution introduced by Senator Landrieu, urging Romania to reduce their barriers to inter-country adoption. I am hopeful that similar efforts are being made with Cambodia. Now, with regard to China, the number one source of adopted foreign children by U.S. citizens, the issue is probably one of timing more than transparency.

It often takes more than the allocated 18 months to process an adoption petition in China, requiring prospective parents to incur additional costs in renewing their petition and submitting new fingerprints.

And although the time frame may be a problem only for adoptions from China, it is a problem for thousands of Americans each year, nearly 8,000 last year.

And as more and more families look to adopt from overseas, and particularly from China, it seems that we should be able to find an acceptable solution to this growing problem.

With that, I would like to begin with our first panel, Senator Craig. I do understand that Senator Landrieu is in a meeting and will join us, hopefully, after you've had an opportunity to make your comments, Senator Craig.

If not, we will work her into the panels when she arrives. But, if you would please provide your statement here this afternoon. And, again, thank you for your efforts to make a difference to so many families.

CRAIG: Well, Madam Chairman, thank you for that kind introduction. And thank you for convening this important hearing on adoption from primarily the Asian region, the source of the largest number of children adopted internationally in the United States, as you've just previously stated.

I wish my schedule permitted me to stay and listen to all of your witnesses today. I'm sure they will be providing the subcommittee with some additional valuable information.

This hearing is particularly noteworthy because I believe it is the first congressional hearing on international adoption issues to be held since the publication of the final rule on accelerating accrediting agencies in inter-country adoptions, one of the last steps necessary for this country to fully implement the Hague Treaty on Inter-Country Adoption that was signed more than a decade ago and ratified by the Senate six years ago.

In other words, we are fully entering a new era of international adoption by Americans, an era in which the federal government has a critical role in the adoption process. There should be an ongoing dialogue between Capitol Hill and the executive branch of government as we move ahead.

For example, we will surely find the need to adjust our system and law. In fact, during the immigration debate, the Senate passed the ICARE amendment offered by Senator Landrieu, Senator DeMint and myself and others to make some important changes that will help Americans involved in international adoption. I know we still have to convince some people on the details of this amendment. And I believe we will be able to address those concerns. But my point is that there is an ongoing need for focus by Congress and other federal agencies on the issue of international adoption. And I'm very pleased you're kicking it off with this discussion today. It is tremendously important.

As you know, Madam Chairman, I'm an adoptive parent. As a freshman senator, I became involved with the Congressional Coalition on Adoption. And several years later, Senator Landrieu joined me as Senate's co-chair.

That coalition, today, numbers nearly 200 members of the House of Representatives and the Senate for whom adoption is a priority issue.

Senator Landrieu and I have also helped to establish a non-profit institute called CCAI, Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute, which helps to educate members of Congress and the public about adoption.

On the international front, CCAI has played a key role with foreign delegations involved in adoption issues who are traveling in our country. And we've organized trips for members of Congress to visit the source countries for U.S. adoption and discuss adoption matters with their government.

Although I'm a strong advocate for adoption, it wasn't my passion for this issue that drove all of these developments. It's important to note that we were responding to a demand for congressional assistance that has been growing steadily from adopting families in the United States.

And you've spoken in your opening statement about the concerns of some of your constituents in Alaska. When there was no specific point of contact in either Congress or the federal government on handling adoption issues, our coalition and the institute began to help fill that very gap.

Today, that situation is changing as regards to international adoption with the Departments of State and Homeland Security stepping into some of the central authority roles described under the Hague Treaty.

However, one thing that probably won't change is the demand coming from adopting families. Americans pursue international adoptions for various reasons.

Some have personal roots in another country that they want to renew through adoption. Others just feel a cultural kinship with a foreign country. Some adopt internationally for humanitarian reasons. And frankly, some choose international adoption as a last resort, out of frustration with U.S. law that hinders them from adopting domestically.

They want to form a family through adoption and, when they can't do it here, they reach out around the world. Whatever the motivation, U.S. families have been adopting overseas at ever-increasing numbers. And you mentioned those, more than 20,000 annually for the last couple of years.

That's a lot of people who potentially need assistance from our government in dealing with foreign countries. The greatest number of U.S. international adoptions that you've spoken to comes from China.

China is much improved, even though there are still difficulties. There's a greater transparency and efficiency and predictability. And yet, still, it's timely and it's costly. And we ought to work to improve that with the Chinese government.

I wish I could say as much about the experiences Americans have adopting elsewhere in Asia. It is not true. There are enormous difficulties in sending countries that comprise the Asian region, including their unique culture, their characteristics and their governments. All of these unique traits affect how these countries deal with adoption.

This past year, I was in India. There it is nearly impossible. And yet there are more Indian children in need of a home than almost in any other continent of the world.

Beyond those difficulties, obstacles have arisen in international adoption from Asia because of the concerns about the horrible crimes of human trafficking. And you've mentioned some of that, in Cambodia and Vietnam, in particular.

Even legitimate adoptions have been disrupted in a fight against corruption. You mentioned Cambodia. We were involved in Cambodia for some citizens from my state of Idaho. It was also true -- you mentioned Romania -- the same thing happened with Idaho in Romania.

Let me stress: I do not know of anybody in the adoption community who would countenance trafficking in children. As much as we want to facilitate adoptions, these adoptions must be ethical and they must be transparent.

Having said that, however, we should help these nations find ways to fight corruption while allowing legitimate adoptions to proceed. Otherwise, it is the orphan who will be paying the price for somebody else's criminal behavior, the orphan who cannot be adopted domestically and may be deprived of a permanent, loving home from an adoptive family of another country.

I have only scratched the surface here, and I'm sure you will hear much, much more of the challenges and the opportunities for adoption in the Asian region from the panelists that you've assembled here today.

In closing, again, Madam Chairman, let me thank you for beginning a very critical dialogue, a new role to be played between the Congress and the executive branch of government. There are literally thousands of Americans waiting to form families, and you and I and others can play a critical role in facilitating their dream. Thank you very much.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you, Senator Craig. And again, thank you for your leadership on this.

We had an opportunity to speak just a few moments ago, and talked about the competing priorities that we as a government face, that the agencies face. State Department has a great deal of important issues on their plate, as does Homeland Security. We've got the war. We've got other issues.

But, we know that, when it comes to caring for our children, this is the true marker of good people and of great nations, is those that are able to find a way to help the children. So thank you for your efforts in doing just that.

CRAIG: Thank you very much, Lisa.

MURKOWSKI: And we appreciate your schedule. And we'll look forward to Senator Landrieu's comments when she is able to join us.

With that, let's call up the second panel. Catherine Barry, the deputy assistant secretary for Overseas Citizens Services, Bureau of Consular Affairs here in Washington, D.C.; as well as Mr. Robert Divine, who's the acting deputy director of the Citizen Immigration Services for the Department of Homeland Security.

Welcome to the committee this afternoon. And again, we thank you for joining us this afternoon to share comments from both the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security.

With that, Ms. Barry, if you want to start off, please?

BARRY: Chairman Murkowski, thank you very much for this opportunity to discuss the status of inter-country adoptions from Asia, as well as the Department of State efforts on behalf of American families who have decided to open their hearts and their homes to Asian children in need of permanent, loving families.

The Departments of State and Homeland Security are deeply committed to working with these families, as well as with the children's countries of origin, to ensure that inter-country adoptions occur under transparent conditions and with appropriate safeguards to protect the interests of birth parents, adoptive parents and, most importantly, the children themselves.

Last year alone, Americans adopted nearly 23,000 children from countries around the world. Over 10,000 of those children came from Asia. We encourage Asian nations to allow inter-country adoption as an option for children who otherwise would spend their childhood in orphanages and other non-permanent care.

Our work encouraging inter-country adoptions is inspired by the 1993 Convention on protection of children and cooperation and respect of inter-country adoption, which I will further refer to as the Hague Convention. The Convention recognizes that the full and harmonious development of a child needs a family environment, quote, "an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding," end quote.

It also recognizes that inter-country adoption may offer the advantage of a permanent family to a child for whom a suitable family cannot be found in his or her state of origin.

As of today, 68 countries have ratified or acceded to the Hague Convention. Asia is well represented in this group. China, India, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand are all Hague countries.

Through discussions in cooperation with Asian governments, particularly those that have not ratified the Hague Convention, we seek to implement and enforce standards and protections to ensure that the children's best interests are always the primary consideration, and to combat baby-buying and selling.

Consular officers and other State Department officials abroad, as well as those of us here in Washington, meet regularly with country of origin officials to identify potential problems and coordinate solutions.

The past years have several milestones that I believe portend good things for the use of inter-country adoptions in Asia to help children in need.

On June 21, 2005, Assistant Secretary for Consular Affairs Maura Harty and Vietnamese justice minister, Uong Chu Luu, signed a bilateral adoption agreement that reaffirmed both countries' commitment to high standards and safeguards and allowed for the recommencement of adoptions from Vietnam.

The Vietnamese Department of International Adoptions has licensed nearly 20 U.S. adoption agencies to work in Vietnam. And, on January 25 of this year, the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi issued the first orphan immigrant visa to a Vietnamese child since our embassy took over the responsibility for orphan visa cases from our consulate general in Ho Chi Minh City and the bilateral agreement entered into practical effect.

Over two dozen Vietnamese children have found permanent families with American citizen parents since January. And we believe that many more children will follow them in the coming months.

In another important and extremely positive development, the People's Republic of China, the largest country of origin of children adopted by Americans internationally, ratified the Hague Inter-Country Adoption Convention on September 16, 2005.

The Department of State and the American adoption community have long viewed China as a country of origin with clear uniform procedures that are transparent to adoptive parents and their representatives.

We also know that the Chinese government has strict measures to verify the identity and status of children available for adoption. China's Hague Convention ratification bolsters even further our level of confidence in China's commitment to equitable, legal and transparent adoption procedures that meet the best interests of children, nearly 8,000 of whom came to the United States last year.

At the other end of the confidence spectrum, unfortunately, is Cambodia, the only country for which the United States currently has an adoption suspension in effect.

The then-Immigration and Naturalization Service suspended adoptions from Cambodia in December 2001 due to very serious concerns about baby-selling and rampant document fraud, some of which led to criminal convictions in the United States.

Although a small number of so-called pipeline cases were allowed to continue to conclusion, the U.S. government suspension has, at present, essentially stopped adoptions from Cambodia to the United States.

The U.S. government remains engaged on this issue. U.S. Ambassador to Cambodia Joseph Mussomeli met in March with UNICEF officials to coordinate efforts to assist the Cambodian government in building its capacity to establish and/or regulate child welfare institutions.

A draft child welfare law, which UNICEF wrote and the United States supports, is under consideration. And we are hopeful that the critical legislation might be enacted by the end of the year.

The draft legislation would permit inter-country adoptions. The U.S. government, in partnership with UNICEF, stands ready to provide guidance to the Cambodian government in both establishing a child welfare system and enacting and implementing the pending legislation.

Let me briefly summarize our efforts to ratify the Hague Convention on Inter-Country Adoption in 2007. We plan to complete our regulatory work this calendar year.

In February, we published the final rule regarding the standards of accreditation for adoption service providers and approved persons.

This summer, we will publish, for public comment, regulations modifying the consular role in immigrant visa processing in Hague cases, regulations governing the certification process for Hague adoptions to take place in the United States, and regulations establishing reporting duties for adoption service providers handling emigrating adoption cases.

In this matter, we are working closely with the Department of Homeland Security.

In the near-term, we hope to sign agreements with our potential accrediting entities. Once these agreements are ready, we can announce the application period for those interested in becoming accredited adoption service providers or approved persons.

Once we know the total number of applications, we will be able to provide a more accurate estimate of when we will be able to complete ratification of the treaty in 2007.

It is our goal, now and in the future, as the central authority for the operation of the Hague Convention, to support the generosity of American families to provide permanent homes to children in need throughout Asia and the rest of the world.

Thank you for your attention.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you, Ms. Barry.

Mr. Divine, welcome.

DIVINE: Thank you. Senator, my written remarks are in the record, and you either read them or can read them, and I won't repeat them. And I'll speak a little bit from the heart.

As an immigration lawyer for 17 years before coming to the government, I've represented a number of families who were adopting children internationally. And I know the frustration with process. And I have experienced with them some of the difficulties.

Two of my very best friends have adopted three different Chinese children in the last two years. My wife and I have adopted three children ourselves. And I know what it's like to eagerly await your child.

I have happily accepted invitations of child-placing agencies to speak with prospective adoptive parents. And when I have done that speaking, I have tended to find myself saying the same thing that my wife and I were preaching to ourselves as we were going through the process, and that is, it's not about us; it's about the children.

This is about the best interest of the child. And I know that, among the prospective adoptive parents, some were hurting. Most were anxious. All were eager. And God bless them, but it is about the children.

Adoption is a beautiful example of grace and restoration in an otherwise sometimes disappointing world. And children who need a home and parents who want a child can come together and make a family.

But most good things are subject to perversion and abuse and this is no exception. Some people would want to adopt for the wrong reasons that would not be the best for the child.

Others may have great homes and great intentions, but, whether known or unknown to them, their eagerness to parent can create a market for children that works against the best interest of children in a country.

U.S. law, I think, is well-conceived to protect the children and everyone else in the process in international adoptions. And the Hague Convention and the Inter-Country Adoption Act will provide more protection.

USCIS, the agency where I work in the Department of Homeland Security, works to ensure several things: first, that at least one of the parents is a U.S. citizen, according to law.

Also, through an FBI fingerprint check, we make sure that the adults in the home are not dangerous.

Next, through a home study, we ensure that the adoptive home is appropriate for a child. Then we make sure that the child to be adopted is truly a child without a home and is not being sold.

If there is an inadmissibility issue, maybe a disease issue, then we adjudicate the admissibility through a waiver.

And finally, we issue work cards and citizenship certificates, actually a lot more citizenship certificates -- permanent resident cards, excuse me, not work cards. We issue certificates of citizenship and permanent resident cards to children who immigrate to the United States.

As in so many areas of the law, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of State share responsibilities and processes in international adoption.

Since coming to the government, I've really been impressed with the dedication of people in both departments who are working well, and better all the time in their own agencies and with each other. But we can do better.

We need to give a clearer picture, in my view. In my personal view, we need to give a clearer picture to adoptive families about how the process will work and where they are in the process at any given time in it.

The process needs to flow more naturally and more efficiently. There needs to be a more seamless connection between the government offices involved, both within and between the departments.

An example of how things ought to work and what we ought to be shooting for is one of our processing successes. The Child Citizenship Act amended Section 320 of the INA to provide automatic citizenship when, basically, everything has come together, to result in permanent residence conferred on the child with a full and final adoption.

So, beginning in January 1 of 2004, USCIS, before I got there, made the process as automatic as the legal effect for these children.

So, as the adopted child enters the U.S. port with an IR-3 visa, the visa file is routed to the USCIS office in Buffalo who, instead of issuing a permanent resident card, goes ahead and issues a certificate of citizenship without even having the family have to apply separately for that document.

That's the kind of thing that we ought to be shooting for, less complexity for the families, better ultimate result.

At the beginning of this year, I had become aware of some concerns --some friends of mine dealing with the process, other people -- and got some folks together.

And it became clear that our adoption process at USCIS needed improvement, especially in streamlining and clarifying the process for those families.

I set up an inter-country adoption working group. And it involves both at USCIS and at the Department of State. They're taking a fresh perspective to improve what we're already doing, and to get ready to implement the Hague Convention, according to the Department of State schedule that was mentioned.

We expect to have a draft of our rule next month. It has to make its way up through the department and OMB, but we're doing everything we can to get that done. It's part of a bigger scheme, and the goal is to have it all converge so that nobody's holding anybody else up.

This working group is a marvelous group, fantastic leadership. Ann Palmer is leading it. And, by all accounts, she is incredibly dedicated to this task. And she has really solicited ideas from stakeholders. And I think people in the stakeholder community would applaud what she's been doing.

On June 12, that group will give the first of, I'm sure, many, quarterly reports to the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute. And we'll look forward to that. And I'm sure that your staff will be interested in that.

So, in closing, I'd like to just mention the ICARE Act. I really applaud the willingness of the Senate to consider a new perspective, a new approach, and not be completely hampered by however things have gone before.

And we're certainly trying to approach things that way in our agency. But the Department of Homeland Security has concerns about the ICARE Act, and particularly the provision that allows foreign governments to designate U.S. citizenship through the foreign adoption process.

That citizenship provision, in our view, is too automatic. And we urge you not to eliminate the critical U.S. government control over citizenship determination.

I guess, otherwise, I would say, as we've described, we're trying to make the very best out of the process that we have, and out of the framework that we have. And we look forward to the opportunity to make that as effective as anything else could be.

Thanks.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you, Mr. Divine. I appreciate your testimony here this afternoon, and your personal perspective.

A couple questions here this afternoon. Ms. Barry, I had mentioned the situation in Cambodia and the moratorium that is in place. And you have spoken to that, indicated that the ambassador has been involved in working with UNICEF. What, specifically, in terms of the government agencies, have been involved in any form of negotiations, or the efforts with Cambodians?

And from the Cambodian perspective, on their side, what agencies within Cambodia have been responsive to the discussions that have been going on, whether it's law enforcement, to the police, judiciary?

If you can just give me a little bit more detail into the status of where we are with Cambodia?

BARRY: Yes, of course. I'd be happy to give you some more background on Cambodia.

The U.S. Embassy in Cambodia does have several agencies represented there. For this particular issue, the main players have been the State Department officers under the direction, primarily, of the ambassador. The various ambassadors we've had there have all taken a very personal role on this particular issue, and USAID.

As we step back from the suspension and the processing of the pipeline cases and took a look at what we thought needed to be done, we decided not to focus on the legal framework because UNICEF had taken a very proactive role in working on that problem.

And so we got together with UNICEF and we agreed that we would support them, but allow them to take the lead on that, working with the legislatures of Cambodia on that particular issue.

Then, we thought it was a good idea to, sort of, define the problem.

Just how many children in need are there?

What is the nature of their needs?

And where are they?

And so that was the idea for what turned out to be the USAID- funded survey of children in need. And so we started that and, in fact, it was Holt who was asked to actually do the work, to go out and about through the countryside and to do that survey.

So we turned the survey over to the government of Cambodia, hoping that that would then allow them to start to define the type of executive agency that would need to step up and do child welfare.

They have an agency, which we call by its acronym OSAVI, which does social welfare and children and which was the agency involved in adoptions earlier. But it was not acting in a professional manner, had no internal controls that we could see. And that was what, in part, led to the baby-buying and selling.

The other player that we would look to would be law enforcement because, if you are talking about document fraud, if you are talking about facilitators who are engaged in criminal activity, the only one who can shut them down is an effective law enforcement arm.

Although, on our side the U.S. government stepped up primarily through the work of then-INS and got criminal convictions on our side for those who had abused the adoption process, no one in the law enforcement community in Cambodia has stood up to shut down anybody who was abusing the process in Cambodia.

So, to this day, we do have interest in the legislature to get the legal framework in place. And UNICEF continues to take the lead on that. We continue to work very closely with the executive branch of government to work on the social welfare structure that needs to be put in place.

There hasn't been much activity, as we would like to see, on the part of the Cambodian government. We are looking for more demonstration of political will to actually put some real effort into this.

But we will keep trying. We will keep trying. And in part, we think that the legislation is important because it will define who, at the executive level, will have the oversight responsibility. But we're trying to keep several efforts going simultaneously.

MURKOWSKI: What thresholds do the State Department or Homeland Security use in determining when a country is no longer suitable for adoption?

What do you specifically look to?

We've mentioned the baby trafficking in Cambodia, obviously, but is there a threshold where you say we're cutting it off, and there is now a moratorium in place?

DIVINE: Cutting off all adoptions for a country is, obviously, an extraordinary measure, and it's very rarely used.

There's not a set criteria for a checklist. I think it's an overall determination. Every country is unique. That sounds like an agency to say that, but I think transparency is probably the key.

If you can't see into what's going on, you can't trust what's going on, and especially when you also know that there were a lot of bad things going on.

Until you can see better systems that will prevent bad things, then it's hard to open it up because you've got a serious possibility of encouraging the very market that you don't want to foster.

MURKOWSKI: Right.

Back to you, Ms. Barry. With the ratification of the Hague Convention, you've mentioned the expectation that in 2007, sometime during that period, recognizing, as Senator Craig has mentioned, that it's been 10 years in the making.

Are we certain as to that timetable, or the time frame of 2007? BARRY: Yes, I will say I am confident that we will make that deadline. And the reason I say that is because the regulations that I mentioned that we're going to publish this summer are much less complex than what we've been through in setting standards for the adoption service providers.

The first regulation that you'll see is modifying the visa process. And we're really not so much modifying the process as simply recognizing the definition of "orphan" from the Hague Convention into the regulatory framework for visas.

So that's a very short regulation, will not be controversial. And we'll be able to finalize that, I'm certain, this calendar year.

The other one concerns children leaving the United States who will be adopted elsewhere. And the Convention, as you may know, requires a certification and process between the two governments before the adoption is finalized.

So we will be proposing in that regulation to the American public how we propose to do that. We think we're going to propose something fairly straightforward. And, again, I don't see that that will be a controversial issue.

And then, the third one goes to a requirement of the Inter- Country Adoption Act that we track, that we have a mechanism to track cases, both incoming and outgoing cases.

Since we use automation extensively now for the immigration of adopted children into the United States, that is not a difficult step for us. But we will explain again in a short regulation how we intend, in general terms, how to do that.

So, I am confident that that regulatory framework will be wrapped up by the end of the calendar year. As I said, the wild card, so to speak, for when we can actually ratify is the accreditation process.

How many adoption agencies will step forward to seek accreditation, because they will all have to be inspected by the accrediting entities.

So, is it 50? Is it 100? Is it 150?

We will know that number by the end of summer, and then we can come back and tell you and others much more specifically, based on the professional evaluation of accrediting entities, how long that process is likely to take.

MURKOWSKI: And one final question: After the tsunami in Indonesia, the adoptions coming out of Indonesia and Thailand were suspended.

Can you tell me what the current state of affairs is on that?

And I have to assume that, from the State Department's perspective, there were a fair amount of lessons learned with that process. If you can just speak very briefly to that?

BARRY: The suspension on adoptions from the countries hit by the tsunami was a suspension by the governments of those countries, not by the U.S. government. So, if I could just make that clear for the record.

The process adoptions are now available, in principle, in all countries that were hit by the tsunami, but American citizens, in looking at the State Department information that we have on each country and the adoption process in place in each country, will find that the process in those countries is very different.

MURKOWSKI: Different post-tsunami than it was pre-tsunami?

BARRY: No, it did not change. Indonesia, for example, has always had a residency requirement for adoptive parents. And it's a fairly strict residence requirement. And so it is not attractive to American families to move to adopt to Indonesia for a significant period of time. But it is available. It is an option.

MURKOWSKI: What about Thailand?

BARRY: Thailand -- we have our statistics that we submitted for the record. Thailand, if you'll give me a second to look them up, I don't believe we've seen any significant change in Thailand over the years.

They actually, relatively quickly, were able to identify the children in need because of the tsunami, and they responded very quickly. So, for example, in 2004, American families adopted 69 children from Thailand and, in 2005, 72.

So you'll see there was almost no change whatsoever. As I said, Thailand responded very effectively to the tsunami and helped their affected populations.

And the other thing about Thailand is that the tsunami actually harmed a relatively small part of the country, as opposed to Indonesia, where much larger populations were harmed, and badly harmed, obviously, by the tsunami.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you.

Mr. Divine, I appreciate your perspective. I mentioned thank you for the personal side of it, as well.

It's one thing to be working within a department, within an agency, and recognizing that you're part of a bureaucracy, but also to wear another hat, the hat of a parent, an adoptive parent, to recognize that you may be part of the problem, and how can you fix this and to know that you have been proactive in forming a working group to try to figure out how do you do make for a more streamlined process, provide for the questions and to try to meet the needs of those that are trying to fulfill their dreams by having a child and having the family. MURKOWSKI: Can you give me a little bit of insight then, either from your bureaucratic side or from your adoptive parent side, in terms of the average time frame that it takes for an application for an international adoption to be processed?

And I'm just looking for averages. It probably differs from country to country, I would imagine.

DIVINE: Part of the problem is that there are several steps in the one process and things have to coalesce before we can approve that first part where we bless the family as able to participate on the other end in the country, to say, "You're fine to be an adoptive family," because they have to have their -- you know, they've filed some papers to say who they are.

We send them to a local fingerprint station. We call it an application support center. And they have to have their home study completed and sent to them.

And I know, in my home state of Tennessee, I was forever receiving calls from families who were complaining that the Immigration Service was not doing anything on their case, and why weren't they doing it.

And it turned out that what was happening is that the home study, which had been done by the child-placing agency and the family knew it, had been sent to Nashville to the Interstate Compact Office that had to then be the one to send it to the immigration office. And those people had not forwarded it on. So the immigration office had not received it, but the customer didn't know that they hadn't received it.

And so one of the things that's pretty obvious to do is just to put in a few little customer service steps to say, "We got your home study," so that they know that all of the pieces are in.

Another piece is just to figure out where, in the process, we should send people to get their fingerprints done, because there's a tension there. We want to go ahead and get the fingerprints done so that, when the home study comes in, it's all done, and we can approve it and send them on their way.

But, at the same time, if it's going to be a long time before, say, China makes the child available for them, the fingerprints could expire. And we need to balance that, and we need to figure out what's the optimal.

And Also, I want us to give people options so that they can be part of the process of gauging for themselves, because each country is different and the condition of the parents may be a lot more attuned to the situation. Those are little examples, but it's surprising how much they can matter.

MURKOWSKI: And that's one of the issues that we've learned with the China situation, where we've seen the process take longer than that 18 months to be approved by the Chinese government. And so you've got I guess an expectation, through the process here, but you've got a process over in China that's taking longer.

DIVINE: It's tough for everybody to predict how to pull it all together at the right time so that everything's current and valid at the time it needs to be and people can go.

MURKOWSKI: Is China the exception, then, in terms of the length of time it's taking them to go through the approval process, as compared to some of the other countries that we're seeing so many of our foreign adoptions from?

DIVINE: Well, I can't claim to have a comprehensive country-by- country perception on this, but my sense is that China is the one country that has been sending the most children that has had a significant slippage in the period of time that it takes for a family to be able to go and meet their child.

And that has been a function, as I understand it, of conditions in China, not a function of anything the U.S. government is doing.

MURKOWSKI: Can you tell me, give me a for-instance, which countries are perhaps more cooperative in DHS investigations, which ones are really difficult to deal with, and perhaps the reason why?

DIVINE: Well, let me -- the positive first, anyway. I think China is a good example of a country that's been very involved. And while there's been one incident late, their reaction to it demonstrated their commitment to the integrity of the process.

And so that's on the positive side. And I think that -- my understand is -- and I'm not a Hague Convention expert yet, but my basic big-picture understanding is that the Hague Convention is going to make adoptions for participating countries look more like Chinese adoptions, in a sense, because the country of the child is going to be more involved, centrally ensuring that the conditions out of which the child is coming are appropriate for an adoption.

But my colleague may have more useful things to say on this.

BARRY: If I may comment on China, one of the issues is that we don't have the full picture because we are one of several receiving countries. So we know how many U.S. files have gone to the Chinese authority for adoptions.

We have no idea how many files they've received from Western Europe, the Nordic countries, Australia, New Zealand, in other words the other receiving countries.

And so that is, as I said, unknown to us, so we can't predict exactly how long China will take. As you've said, the timelines have changed a bit. And I think that is a reflection that China is receiving files, probably more files from American families and more files from other receiving countries, as well.

MURKOWSKI: Do you think that we can expect that the time frame within which China is able to approve will be reduced?

I mean, are things better or are things getting worse in terms of the time frame?

BARRY: It has gotten somewhat worse. And I think we'll simply know that over time by maintaining good communication with the Chinese Central Authority.

Our goal is to have the best information available to the perspective families so that, whether it's 15 months or 18 months, I think it's most important that families know that.

We'll continue to talk about how we can improve the process with the Chinese to keep it at the lower end, but I think we do have to be mindful of the fact that there is a larger process going on. It's not simply a U.S.-Chinese relationship.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you.

Mr. Divine, one final question for you. This is as it relates to the October 2005 GAO report that found that USCIS didn't have a formal quality assurance program in place to review the quality of the adoption process.

Has this aspect been addressed, or is it being addressed?

DIVINE: I have to confess that, apparently, that's one of the things the working group is definitely on to. And let me say, about the working group, it's not one of these things where we have to look like we're doing something, so let's round up some people and put them in a room and let them act like they're doing something.

I mean, we have pulled in the people who care about this. We brought down, full time for months and months, the person in Buffalo who really spearheaded this process of giving citizenship certificates to people. And she's riding herd on this regulation, full-time.

And we've got several people. This is not just a tangential effort. I really want this done; I want it done right; and I want our agency to look to be a more, sort of, centralized and coordinated effort of the type that, I think, the ICARE envisions this other organization in State Department would be.

And my view is, if we can just get that working, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference in that and whatever else you might try to come up with. It doesn't matter so much which agency it's done in, as long as ...

MURKOWSKI: As long as it's done.

DIVINE: As long as it's done, and done right.

I mean, one of the biggest problems is this is--and this is part of our bigger picture, that our systems have not been great. And this is one of a few types of cases that have been filed locally and are not on any database, except whatever local database the local office has.

We've got a lot of opportunity to put order into this and systematize it because of how decentralized it's been. So, we've got a lot that we can do, and we're going to do it.

MURKOWSKI: Good. Thank you.

Thank you to both of you for coming this afternoon and for providing your testimony and your efforts.

With that, I'd like to invite up Senator Mary Landrieu. As I mentioned earlier, the senator has been a leader on adoption issues here in the Senate. We greatly appreciate her work.

Senator Landrieu, Senator Craig was able to join us at the beginning of the hearing, and certainly lauded you for your efforts, as I certainly concur, certainly agree with, and thank you so much for joining us this afternoon. I know we've had to adjust schedules a little bit, so I appreciate you working us into yours.

LANDRIEU: Well, thank you, Madam Chair. And I really appreciate you taking the initiative to call this very important hearing today. It's a subject that, I'm sure Senator Craig shared with you, we think is so important and doesn't get the attention that it really deserves and needs here in Congress.

Of course, there are many important issues, but for families that have built their families through adoption, for many child welfare advocates here in America and around the world and any number of other agencies, entities, non-profits and individuals, this is the most important issue because they really believe that adoption is such a positive outcome for so many children and families in the world that the uniting of the families is so beneficial for the parents and the children. And the need is so great, Madam Chair, as you know.

Unfortunately, the number of orphans in the world is rising exponentially. In Africa and India, the numbers are hard to get accurate, but the estimates that I'm aware of, there are more than 40 million orphans in Africa alone. And those numbers continue to go up because of war and famine, AIDS, the AIDS epidemic, et cetera.

Here in the United States, today we have 500,000 children in foster care between the ages of zero and 18. About half of them are waiting for families to come adopt them, orphans, or their parental rights have been terminated. They don't have parents and they're waiting to be adopted.

And so, Senator Craig and I and the 190 members of Congress spend a great deal of time trying to educate ourselves about adoption and trying to educate the country about the benefits of trying to connect children with families. Because we think governments here in the United States and around the world do a lot of things well, but raising children isn't one of them, that parents, or a parent, a responsible, loving, nurturing adult should raise children, should raise a child or children.

And in addition, the new policy around the world and here to keep sibling groups together -- that can be quite a challenge if the sibling group is eight or six or 10. But we're making a great effort to not only have children adopted, but keeping sibling groups together. And China, I have to say, has been really extraordinary, as countries go in the world, in being willing and able to participate in this process.

As you know, 120,000 children are adopted every year in the country. Twenty thousand of those come from other countries to the United States. Approximately 100,000 children are adopted within our own country -- and about 20,000. And that number has increased dramatically over the last 15 years.

But in our view, as adoption advocates, we don't think that number is nearly high enough. We've not set, as a coalition, a target, but our stated and unstated goal and just focus is to find a home for every orphan in the world. So we have a long way to go.

And that is why I get so frustrated, Madam Chair, and so does Senator Craig and the members of our coalition, when bureaucracies slow this process down for no good reason.

Sometimes they are good reasons to slow the process down. You want to eliminate fraud. You want to eliminate crime, criminal behavior.

But if we have a process that's so full of red tape and bureaucracy and paperwork, et cetera, and if we stop the process every time there's one violation, we will never create a system in this country or the world that gives a chance for kids who are desperate for parents and parents who are desperate for children to find each other.

And so I'm here. I've got a written statement, but I'd really rather just focus on two specific things about China and Asia because our delegation has been to China. And I have been in touch annually with the Chinese officials since getting here 10 years ago, or just about, and trying to work closely with them and encourage them to keep this very mutually beneficial relationship going.

And what do I mean by that? China, as you know, has a population challenge. And they also, with the one-child policy, which is being somewhat liberalized, thank goodness, these days, but they just have millions of children that need homes.

And we have millions of Americans that are able and willing and want to adopt children. Number two, besides the obvious immediate benefit of connecting parents that want kids and kids that need parents, I've explained internationally that these children become the most effective ambassadors for these countries when they come to the United States, without saying or doing anything.

The children's presence softens and opens up America's eyes to China and to Korea and to Vietnam, and to Guatemala, which is not the subject here. It's Asia.

More than I can tell you, and I'll share one story for the record, I was in -- I'm always in Louisiana, as you know. You're always in Alaska. But three years ago, I was in a tiny town, tiny town called Vulcamville (ph) that you'd never hear or see anywhere. And it's right outside of Monroe.

And the city council member from Vulcamville (ph) came up to me. And he's just a good old guy from Louisiana and he threw his arms around me. He said, "Senator, I vote for you. I support you. I'm appreciative of everything you've done." He says, "I want you to see a picture of my grandchild."

So I'm sort of half paying attention. And he shows me this picture, and this is a baby, clearly I can see, from China. And I looked at him, and he looked at me. And I said, "And so, you went to China for this baby?"

And he said, "Oh, yes. And I -- you know, my daughter went. And this baby is the apple of our eye. And this baby is the special child in Vulcamville (ph)."

And I'm thinking, "Now, this is something, Vulcamville (ph) to Beijing, Beijing to Vulcamville (ph), and how they're now celebrating this child in this town that you wouldn't necessarily think was on the cutting edge of international adoption.

But I'm telling you, in America, from little towns to big cities, parents are adopting children domestically and internationally.

China asked me, when I was over there, if our State Department could help them, if we could move the center from Guangzhou to Beijing so our parents don't have to travel back and forth.

And it's our decision, not China's decision. Our State Department hasn't done that yet. So I want to go on record urging our State Department to do that if possible.

Also, they said that, because China deals with this in a very centralized way and our system is very decentralized with our 50 states --we respect that; we need to keep it that way. These agencies are licensed by the state.

But we've worked now for many years to try to encourage the State Department here to assume a more centralized role with respecting the 50 states, not trying to step on the toes of our 50 states. But they've got to come up with a streamlined, central State Department and not three different departments and not three different entities but one.

And we think the State Department, that's what the treaty says, that's what the Hague implementation -- and really, Madam President, we just have to get this implemented. There is a bill that we've been trying to pass for five years called the ICARE Bill.

It's broadly supported by Democrats and Republicans. And our State Department continues to push back.

So I'm sorry I wasn't here for the questioning of the State Department, but I'm going to pursue lines of questioning in writing to them as we work through this, because the countries that we work with all over the world are creating these more centralized systems, and they have to work with a national, centralized agency.

And they can't work with 50 states. China can't work with California one day and then New York another day, and then North Dakota another day, and then Louisiana. They're just not organized that way.

So I understand that we can't do everything these other countries ask and we have to respect our own country. But, as a Senator who believes in this, I've got to figure out a way to get the countries to a common ground.

And so I'm asking our State Department to move a little more quickly on some of these that would help China to continue to be the largest sending country to the United States.

The last I looked, China sent 7,000 children for us to become American citizens. We are so grateful. The parents that have adopted these children -- I literally was stopped today, two hours ago, but this happens to me every day.

I went to give a speech to the Des Moines, Iowa group. Before I could even walk in the door, a woman running that association said, "I've got to thank you, Senator. My three-year-old is from China." And we had to talk for a little bit, how parents do, about their kids.

And she was telling me how tiny she is and how little she is but how beautiful she is, and how smart she is. And she's got a 10-year- old brother.

And I could tell you this whole story, which I won't, but this happens to me every day. And so, she said, "Senator, please continue to fight for shorter times, less paperwork, less finances. These children need us and we need them."

So I just want to encourage you, Madam President. I'm going to stop and just answer any questions you might have, but, Madam Chair, in your role on this committee, to please continue to focus on South Korea and Vietnam and China and these Asian countries.

But I promise you that we want to focus on all the countries of the world because we believe there are many countries that need to find places for children.

And we need to do a better job in our own country of finding homes for the 250,000 children who are now available for adoption. And we believe we have an obligation to provide a family for them and a future for them.

So, I want to continue to help. I'll be happy to answer any questions that you might have. And our whole 190 members of Congress are committed.

And it's amazing, in this caucus. It's the only one I belong to that doesn't argue. (LAUGHTER)

And we have Democrats and Republicans. And everybody, just, is happy. And we all get along because we just literally don't argue about it. We're all together, trying to make this work. And it's a happy caucus and we're happy to testify any time that we can help on these subjects. Thank you.

MURKOWSKI: Well, again, I want to thank you for your leadership in this area. It's so very, very vitally important.

Just very quickly, I'd like you to comment on a statement that was made by Mr. Divine from Homeland Security.

He commented on the ICARE legislation, and had indicated that, from Homeland Security's perspective, that one of the concerns was the automatic citizenship determination. Please speak to that, yes, absolutely, provide me a little bit of education on that.

LANDRIEU: Well, let me tell you why we do that, and why we feel very strongly about this because, as you know, if you went overseas as an American citizen and you were pregnant and had a baby in a country, that child might not be born in the United States, but he's an automatic citizen of the United States because that is the law.

When an adoptive parent goes to adopt a child in China, and that adoption is finalized in China, that child is, at that moment, as an adoptive parent, at that moment under most laws, not all, is the child of that parent right away. There is no waiting period.

Now, domestically when you do an adoption, some states require a three-month waiting until it's completely finalized by the law. And you can understand why that might be the case for a domestic adoption. But, in an international adoption, that is a final and forever and ever and ever, that is your baby. That is your child. And we think it should be an automatic citizen.

Right now, parents have to go through the court process, or whatever process in the country for adoption, then they have to file additional paperwork for their child to become a citizen. It doesn't make any sense. So we wanted to reduce the paperwork and the time and make that automatic. And so, that's my answer.

It's the same way a biological child would be brought back. You don't need a visa for your newborn coming back from wherever you were overseas. You don't need a visa. That child is a special visa.

You might need a passport to get the child back, I think, but you don't need a special visa application. And it's just another step that adoptive parents go through that there's no real good reason.

And let me just say one other thing. I've tried to explain this to the State Department. It's not just this current State Department. It's been a problem with all the State Departments I've worked with.

And I understand that the need to focus against fraud. Believe me, nobody wants to eliminate fraud more than our delegation, our whole caucus.

But, I want to say this for the record. When a bank is robbed in Chicago, we do not shut down the banking system. We go find the bank robber and we put them in jail. Every time there is one stealing of a baby or one violation of a crime, everybody starts shutting down international adoption.

And we don't realize that, when they do that, they literally sentence children to death, literally. And they disrupt the lives of thousands of good-hearted, taxpaying, churchgoing American citizens who were just at the end of their process, and then somebody steps up and says, "Oh, we have a suspicion that 10 babies were taken illegally, so we're shutting the system down."

It is the worst shock to a system. And we do not do it anywhere else. And I'm going to fight against these closures that we keep going through, and we need to keep the system open, transparent. And it is a literal lifeline to children and a happiness line for parents.

The second thing I want to say is all of this negative, this -- every time we have an incident, one adopted child was hurt in America -- I hate to say this because it's a hard thing to say, but I tell international people that come to my office all the time -- they tell me, "Senator, how do we know our children are safe? How do we know that you take care of our children? How do we know that you all just don't adopt the children?" --they think, for body parts, sometimes.

I try to calm them down and say that we have a free press. If we were taking body parts from children, you would know about it. Our press would write about it. That doesn't happen, I said.

But every now and then, of course, a parent will do the wrong thing and hurt a child. Sometimes they hurt adoptive children. But I hate to tell you all this, and it's hard for me to say it, but Americans kill their own children.

I mean, I don't know what the number is nationally. It's 1,700 children? Seventeen hundred children are murdered every year in the United States at the hands of their own parents, I mean their biological parents.

So I hope the State Department understands that, if you're looking for a perfect system where children are never hurt, we'll never get there.

We just have to have a system that works 95 percent of the time, that does everything it can because, if we're trying to get this adoptive system to be perfect when the normal world is so imperfect, then all we'll have is millions of orphans sitting around in orphanages, literally wasting away, and millions of parents that would love to adopt them and we can't get them together because we've got bureaucrats running around wanting the perfect system.

So, I'm sorry I went on about that, but any other question?

MURKOWSKI: No. I appreciate your passion. I think we do see this ripple effect, if you will, or allegations or reports of baby trafficking in one country that do threaten to undermine international adoptions, not necessarily from that country but from other countries as well.

All of a sudden, all the flags go up and everyone is ultra- cautious. And, of course, we do need to be cautious. We do need to be making sure that everything that we do is in the best interest of the child.

But we need to make sure that it's not an over-reaction to, hopefully, very, very isolated instances. And, in an effort to make sure that we don't ever have that problem again, that, as you point out, we seal it off, and the ones that really do lose are the children and the prospective adoptive families that were looking to get those children.

So I appreciate your passion on this and all of your good work. Thank you so much, and for spending the time here before the committee.

Let's next go to, I guess, it's our last panel here this afternoon. We have Mr. Thomas Atwood, who's the president and CEO for the National Council for Adoption, as well as Susan Soon-Keum Cox, the vice president of public policy and advocacy for Holt International Children's Services.

Welcome to the committee this afternoon. Thank you for your time.

Mr. Atwood, why don't you go ahead and present your testimony, please?

ATWOOD: Thank you, Madam Chairman Murkowski. My name is Thomas Atwood. I'm president and chief executive officer of the National Council For Adoption, NCFA. I thank you for the opportunity to testify.

NCFA applauds the subcommittee's interest in the compassionate practice of inter-country adoption.

An adoption research, education and advocacy organization founded in 1980, NCFA has been involved in improving the inter-country adoption system since the early stages of the drafting of the Hague Convention and right on through the enactment of the Inter-Country Adoption Act in 2000.

Since last September, we've continued the work. We've traveled to China, Vietnam, Russia and The Hague, serving as a global advocate and expert on adoption and child welfare.

Adoptions from Asian countries have increased 10 out of the last 12 years. At the 2000 census, 12.6 percent of America's adopted children living with their parents had been adopted internationally; 6.2 percent were born in Asian countries, nearly half of them from South Korea. China and South Korea have been in the top four countries of origin for American adoptive parents since 1994. In the first half of the 1990's, South Korea was the leading country of origin, with 25 percent of all American international adoptions during that period.

With the increase in adoptions from China, Russia and Guatemala since then, and with South Korea's recent decline in adoptions, Korean adoptions stood at seven percent in 2005.

China has been the number one country of origin in each of the last six years, and in either the number one or two position every year since 1995, with annual adoptions by Americans ranging from 4,800 to 7,900.

Much of the overall increase in inter-country adoptions in recent years has been due to increases in adoptions from China, with most other Asian countries either remaining steady or declining slightly, such as India and the Philippines, and others declining dramatically due to suspensions, namely Cambodia and Vietnam.

The basic tenet of inter-country adoption is that national boundaries and national pride should not prevent children from having families. This truth seems self-evident.

Given the choice between growing up with a loving, permanent family of one's own through international adoption versus growing up without a family in the country in which one happens to have been born, most people would choose a family through inter-country adoption.

To varying degrees, inter-country adoption encounters a streak of nationalism in every country of origin. To some extent, this nationalistic reaction is understandable.

Any self-respecting nation would like to be able to take care of its children in need itself. Our inter-country adoption advocacy should be careful not to feed into this nationalist caricature that rich, presumptuous Americans are coming to take the mother country's children.

This potential pitfall argues for our government's current advocacy approach, whereby the assistant secretary for Consular Affairs manages inter-country adoption as part of a broader portfolio. And it argues a single focused ambassador-at-large for inter-country adoption position.

It is difficult to see how political leaders in countries of origin would want to associate publicly with the American representative whose sole purpose is to enable Americans to adopt the native country's children.

NCFA instead recommends a holistic approach, which respects inter-country adoption as part of the country of origin's overall adoption and child welfare program.

This approach presents inter-country adoption as a positive option for orphans, second in preference to timely domestic adoption but to be preferred over domestic foster care and group or institutional care.

However, when a domestic adoption is not occurring for children within a certain time frame, orphans should become eligible for inter- country adoption.

As they implement the Hague Convention, many countries of origin are taking holistic looks at their adoption and child welfare programs. Thus, because of our country's many decades of experience with child welfare policies, America's opportunities here go beyond promoting our own citizens' ability to adopt internationally.

By sponsoring educational seminars and exchanges with other Hague central authorities, for example, we can promote and inform the global proliferation of adoption and child welfare policies.

Madam Chairman, here is my most important point this afternoon. Now that the State Department has published the implementing regulations for the Inter-Country Adoption Act, the top international adoption priority for the American government and the adoption community should be to make a smooth transition to implementation and ratification of the Hague Convention through these regulations.

This will not be easily accomplished. The regulations are sound, and will promote child protection and international adoption, but they are also complex and demanding. Over the next 18 months, the entire international adoption community in America will be relearning its ways of processing adoptions. The very complicated steps involved in making this transition are described in my written testimony.

Further reforms may be appropriate once we are further along in the transition to the Hague Convention. But there is no compelling reason to implement other major reforms at this time, such as transferring to a State Department all of DHS's work currently housed in the Citizenship and Immigration Services, as contemplated by the ICARE amendment referred to by Senators Craig and Landrieu, and by Mr. Divine.

Forcing such a transition at this already demanding time would disrupt inter-country adoptions and confuse our central authority partners around the world.

After many frustrations with CIS, formerly INS, and the State Department in previous years, the adoption community now reports significant improvements in the performance of both agencies.

There has been greater cooperation between the two agencies, increased communications and more responsiveness to families and adoption service providers, increased standardization of processes across branch offices, and more proactive advocacy of adoption. There has been a positive corporate culture shift in both agencies.

The pivotal moment of implementation of the Hague Convention and the IAA is here. The American international adoption community believes that we should not jeopardize this long-awaited transition by introducing other major bureaucratic and organizational reforms at this time. I further submit for the record, Madam Chairman, NCFA's letter to Senator Landrieu regarding the ICARE amendment expressing our concerns.

MURKOWSKI: We'll include that as part of the record.

ATWOOD: Thank you.

In conclusion, if I may, I have three two-sentence points about specific countries. My written testimony discusses salient issues regarding specific Asian countries in more detail.

But first, China's and South Korea's increased emphases on domestic adoption and child welfare programs should be applauded, but America should continue to advocate with these countries that a family through inter-country adoption is better for children than domestic foster or institutional care, especially for younger children.

There is a specific proposed amendment in the South Korean legislature at this time that would end inter-country adoption. In this trail-blazing country for inter-country adoption, it would end it. This requires our urgent attention.

Second, America's imminent ratification of the Hague Convention creates opportunities to increase adoption with countries that have said they would be interested in doing so when America ratifies, such as India.

The American government and adoption community should begin to discuss moving forward with this plan with the Indian Central Authority. And third, recent progress in restarting adoptions from Vietnam is very encouraging.

We hope that similar progress can be made with Cambodia while ensuring child and birth parent protection and a legal, ethical transparent process in both countries.

In conclusion, Madam Chairman, the National Council for Adoption greatly appreciates the American government's and this subcommittee's advocacy of inter-country adoption, and we offer our continued assistance in advancing this crucial mission.

Thank you.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you very much, Mr. Atwood.

Ms. Cox, your comments this afternoon?

COX: Thank you. I would like to thank you and the committee for holding this hearing today, and especially for your support and interest in this subject.

My name is Susan Cox and I'm vice president of Public Policy at Holt International, but I also have a distinction of being an adult adoptee. I was the 167th child to be adopted from Korea, so that was obviously a very long time ago. But it has really been a pioneering effort that has continued to help more than 200,000 children around the world find families of their own.

An unfaltering commitment of adoption is that it is intended to be a means for families for children rather than children for families. And I can tell you that, in the three generations, now, of adult adoptees, that's something that's very important to us.

This simplistic assumption that a poor child in a developing country will have a better life with a family in a rich country is simply misguided, imperialistic, and it overlooks the sacrifice and loss not only to the sending country but also to the child.

Having said that, I don't know that you will ever find anyone that feels more positive about adoption, inter-country adoption, than I do.

But, at the same time, the rest of the world doesn't necessarily understand or believe that families are willingly adopting children who are orphans, who are in orphanages and institutions. And it's something that they don't understand to the point where the body part scandal makes more sense to them because, in fact, families would be adopting children for their body parts.

In this environment, it is very necessary for the advocacy efforts of the U.S. government on behalf of so many different children and families. I want to point to some of the issues that are very important and critical now.

As China hosts the Olympics, I think it's important to look at the lessons learned from Korea in 1988 when they hosted the Olympics, and the stories where it said, "Babies For Sale: Koreans Make Them, Americans Buy Them."

The response to that in Korea was literally to stop adoption for a period of time. And, certainly, the public opinion about adoption in Korea has never been supportive. It is that sort of environment that has made Korea begin to propose an inter-country adoption ban immediately.

In Cambodia, the only country that has actually been closed to adoption by our government, it's important that we don't sacrifice that process and lose the opportunity that's there to maximize the resources and expertise of private-public partnerships to be able to build an infrastructure and a process that can support inter-country adoption.

I would say that the violation of the process there was so critical when adoption was stopped, there really was no ability for adoption to move forward. And it created an unstable process in the region, where Vietnam, where other countries were also tainted by what was happening in Cambodia.

I would like to support the process of The Hague as it moves forward. Tom and I have both had the privilege of being members of the special commission. And it's very clear that we are, the U.S., is the 800-pound gorilla.

We are the largest receiving country in the world. And because of that, we have a moral responsibility to make sure that the rest of the countries that are also participating in The Hague see us as being leaders as we move forward.

I would like to express concern about the shutting down of countries. Madam Chair, you talked about that in response to allegations, or things that have gone wrong. But, when the process isn't respected, when it is circumvented, the tragedy is that the programs do shut down.

Back in the '70s, in Thailand, where there were abuses and you could easily bring a child home for adoption, the consequence was that that country shut adoption down. And, even now, those numbers are quite small.

In Latin America, responses to allegations of abuse and trafficking, and then certainly in Romania, while hundreds of children were placed, because that process was never readily in place in a way that was respectful of the process of the children, and so on, that's a country that's now closed.

I would like to join my colleagues, Tom, the National Council for Adoption, as well as the Joint Council in expressing our grave concern about ICARE.

We applaud the efforts of both Senator Landrieu, Senator Craig and all of the members of Congress who are advocating, and the adoption tax credit, many of the initiatives of the last few years, certainly support that.

However, we feel strongly that this puts to risk the process that is happening now, and, in fact, instead of being able to streamline it, in fact, would have the opposite effect. And that's something that's widely felt through the adoption community.

So, again, I want to thank you for this opportunity, for your interest, and to remember that there really are thousands of children who will benefit from adoption if we all work together in this behalf.

Thank you.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you so very much, Ms. Cox.

Let me ask a question to both of you. And this is relating to the ICARE legislation, which you have both mentioned and have expressed a degree of concern.

Mr. Atwood, I thought I heard you say that your concern was yet another layer of bureaucracy or a different process.

Is that really what it's about, that we are at that point where we know what the process is and we've learned to work with other countries and they understand our process, and that, if we change it, it will be more complicated, or does it add more bureaucracy? I'm trying to understand clearly the concerns coming from the adoption community on this legislation.

ATWOOD: First and foremost, it's a management issue. It's a transition issue.

The Hague implementing regulations were just published in February. They're 100 pages long. They change a lot of ways of doing things. It's going to take 18 months for the inter-country adoption system, approximately, to -- or 12, at least -- to make the transition to that new way of doing things.

And to, at the same time, ask that everything that is being done presently by the Department of Homeland Security has to be moved to the State Department while both of those agencies are in the midst of managing the Hague transition and to have the adoption service providers out there and the prospective parents to be able to try to figure out what's going on, it's an impossible assignment.

MURKOWSKI: So, is the concern as much about timing, that if we had had an opportunity to, kind of, vet these new regulations that are going to be placed forward with The Hague, that perhaps the ICARE legislation would fit better and the objections are more around timing than anything else?

ATWOOD: As we say in our letter to Senator Landrieu, "NCFA finds many of the tenets of ICARE to be of interest and potentially worth pursuing, and we sincerely respect the excellent intentions contained in the initiative. However, we believe that now is not the time to consider such dramatic changes to the inter-country adoption system, just as that system is in the midst of transitioning to the recently released regulations."

And moreover, as we make the progress through the Hague transition, it's quite possible we'll encounter other reforms that might need to be considered. It would make a lot more sense to make the Hague transition and then look at the ideas in ICARE and anything else that comes up in the meantime.

MURKOWSKI: Ms. Cox, would you care to add anything?

COX: Yes. I agree, also, the Hague regulation process certainly has taken more time than any of us in the adoption community hoped that it would, for sure.

However, it has also been incredibly invested in in terms of comment periods, the amount of time that the adoption community, in terms of parents, agencies, advocates, have been able to provide their input into what those regulations would be.

So I think there's been a great deal of investment, really, in terms of understanding and putting together something which we believe will balance both the bureaucracy, the process that has to happen, as well as expedite the process.

And timing, you're absolutely right. There's certainly, absent The Hague, then the ICARE is something that, obviously, would be a good idea.

But there are two parallel tracks. And I think, at this point, that it would be very confusing and, instead of moving a process that is going forward now, continue to move that forward, it seems that it would derail that, or certainly, potentially, could derail that.

MURKOWSKI: Let me ask you, again, both, because this is something that Senator Landrieu brought up in her comments, that there have been allegations or concerns that, here in this country, we adopt from another nation and bring the child in and then the child is abused or there are bad things that happen to those children.

How do we as a nation counter the cases of abuse of adopted children to assure other nations that they want to continue to have open adoptions with us and not close off their adoption process to the United States, and remain willing to participate in the international adoptions?

ATWOOD: Well, first, I think we have to share in the grief and outrage that a country feels when one of its children adopted by an American is harmed.

This should never happen. It is an outrage. But, that said, these rare tragic incidents could only be made more tragic if they resulted in a shutdown of adoptions and children being deprived of having families. Unfortunately, harms to children do occur in families, whether adopted or biological. And we should do everything we can to minimize those.

We have strict screening processes. Of course, people who adopt go through much more to be able to adopt than people go through in order to bear their own biological children.

So we do need to be strict in our screening processes. Many countries require post-placement reporting. And we need to be cooperative. Both adoption service providers and parents should obey the rules that countries put on them with respect to post-placement reporting.

So the emphasis needs to be, however, we believe, on the need for children to have families, ultimately.

COX: I think that the preparation of families is critical. And while you can certainly also point to abuses that happen in biological families, this is different because it's been the trust of one country to let their children be adopted by another country.

And so it does create a different kind of tension, certainly. And I think one of the things that The Hague will do, certainly is, by the accreditation process, there will be a much more stringent requirement for uniformity in the way agencies prepare families.

The idea that you can just love a child and take them home with you and that everything will be OK, unfortunately, that isn't true. And so many children who are placed for adoption have been institutionalized. And they will have the effects of institutionalization, of all of the abandonment, the loss, all of those things which reflect in how a child will behave and develop.

And if a family is not told about this and prepared, they don't really have anyone to go to. And we're looking now at what's happening in Russia with some really terrible abuses that happened there. And the numbers may be small, but it's created a huge amount of attention in their country.

And so we have to be careful. And sometimes it may seem overly stringent. And there needs to be a balance between reasonableness but also protection.

MURKOWSKI: Thank you. I appreciate that.

When you talk to anyone who is an adoptive parent, the adoptive families, if there's one thing that's consistent in their complaints, it's the bureaucracy, the process that they've got to go through.

And I think so much of it is just understanding the need for all the hoops and all the checks. And there is very good and legitimate reason for so much of it. But it seems that the bureaucracy and then the cost associated with it are hurdles that we hear about all the time.

What is the role of the National Council on Adoption in, kind of, addressing this, or helping to alleviate or just helping to explain these two issues?

ATWOOD: Alleviate and explain both. We are an adoption research education and advocacy organization, so we do policy analysis and advocacy. We do education.

And with respect to the bureaucracy, as you noted, there are good reasons for significant regulations when you're talking about the termination of parental rights of one set of parents and the transfer of parental rights to another set of parents.

Child protection is needed. The regulations to prevent corruption are necessary, of the process. So part of it is explaining.

Another part of our work is to try to improve the rules and regulations, however. And that is one of the incentives behind the Hague Convention, is to create uniformity, predictability, transparency, to promote inter-country adoptions while protecting children and birth parents in the process.

So, you have to really, kind of, analyze the regulation on a case-by-case basis in order to comment when a parent says it's excessive. It is a difficult process.

It needs to be a difficult process in many respects because we're talking about protecting children and the birth parents and adoptive parents, as well.

When something goes wrong in an adoption, it's heartbreaking. Things will go wrong in adoption because things go wrong on every human endeavor.

But when it goes wrong in a contract or a business deal or something like that, it's not the same. When it goes wrong in an adoption, you're talking about children, family, love, parents, dreams. And so that is the nature of what we're dealing with here in adoption.

MURKOWSKI: Ms. Cox?

COX: Sometimes the bureaucracy is our response to what the other countries require. The dossiers that other countries ask for are really quite elaborate. And it is a burden for adoptive parents; there's no question.

And so part of it is the required response that we have to fulfill the obligations that other countries ask for. But there are two points that I think that perhaps you and your committee can help with.

The extended time with China, for example, right now, is going to require -- and not only China -- but that families have to redo their certificate.

If there's some way to really look at a process where it doesn't have to be all done over again, the home study information is really not going to have changed that much.

If they had records, or if there were things that should have prevented them from being a parent, it's not going to change in that expired time of six months. So that really doesn't seem like a practical thing to, maybe, have to do. And so if there was something we could do to look at that, I think that would be very helpful.

The other thing that I believe will change with The Hague, and when the different bureaus around the country, formerly known as INS, has to look at the different home studies and the processes.

Very often, they also end up doing case work, that the information that has been sent to them wasn't adequately provided by the adoptive -- the agency.

And so, hopefully, when The Hague -- as the accreditation process, there will be more uniformity to it and those agencies that don't accurately do the work for their adoptive parents and for their process, that that will be eliminated and that will streamline it a bit. Certainly that is the hope.

MURKOWSKI: Well, is it also possible that, if they fail, these entities that have been providing some of these services fail to meet the accreditation, you actually have fewer out there and so that it could possibly take longer?

Is that a concern, or are we pretty comfortable with the accreditation, that those that are providing the service will be able to meet the requirements? COX: I think so. I mean, The Hague is not something that has just happened. I mean, we've been anticipating this for a long time. And so I don't know the number of agencies that are already accredited, but that's certainly something that agencies have been anticipating for some time.

So there will certainly be a moment or a time, as we're all adjusting in the transfer, that will be difficult. I think we've all expected that. But, hopefully, the agencies are also going to have a clear enough process and guidelines that will be able to accommodate that.

ATWOOD: You also asked about costs.

MURKOWSKI: Oh, yes, please.

ATWOOD: The cost of adoption is a stretch for many families. The adoption tax credit helps. We need the sunset that is scheduled for that in 2010 to be repealed. It's currently at 10,000, and it needs to stay at 10,000, at least. It should actually be indexed for inflation.

MURKOWSKI: What's the average cost of an international adoption?

ATWOOD: It's in the neighborhood of $18,000 to $25,000 on average. And it can be more.

The tax credit is really crucial for a lot of families. And this really comes into play in international adoption, in particular, because there are lots of children, internationally.

When it comes to domestic infant adoptions, while looking at it from the child's point of view, we know they're going to get adopted. So somebody will be able to afford to adopt those children.

But, when you're looking internationally, where there's way many more children eligible to be adopted than there are parents adopting them, it becomes really crucial for marginal families to have that tax credit.

But there again, it also needs to be noted that adoption has costs associated with it. People ought not to think that there are people out there who are just exploiting, in a systematic way broadly, widely, a parent's desire for children.

The large, vast majority of people involved in providing adoption service are doing it because they want to help children have families. That's their motive.

MURKOWSKI: Which is the right reason.

Quickly, the increase in international adoptions, is this leading to a downward trend in domestic adoptions?

Are we seeing that, or is -- what's happening on the domestic front? ATWOOD: Actually, international adoptions have slightly exceeded the number of domestic infant adoptions at this point. It's certainly not competing, so to speak, with infant adoptions. There will be plenty of parents who adopt them.

There are children in foster care, 118,000 children with a case status of waiting to be adopted, in foster care.

I wouldn't put it that way, that people are -- I think it's more of an expanding pie than a fixed pie.

People who are called to adopt a child will explore all the options. And any adoptive parent will tell you, this is my child. This is the child who is supposed to be in my family. We certainly feel that, my wife and I do, about our child by adoption. And this is true of every adoptive parent.

COX: The domestic numbers have also been affected by things like surrogacy, and, just, the increased ability for infertility treatments and that sort of thing. So that's been somewhat affected by it.

But I think that's a very good question, and I also -- one of the things I so appreciate about the Congressional Coalition on Adoption is that they advocate, not for our children and their children, but the children. It really is much more of a global emphasis on children, which I think is very positive and important. I thank you for that.

ATWOOD: Senator Landrieu, who is a great adoption leader, and I find it quite awkward and unusual to be having concerns about her legislation, has a very nice way of putting it, which is, "There are no unwanted children, only children who haven't found their families yet."

And so we need to do a better job of educating people about the need and inspiring them to a calling that they may be having to adopt. And then they'll find the right child.

MURKOWSKI: Well, thank you for bringing the children together with their families. We appreciate the efforts that you do on behalf of so many.

And thank you for giving us so much time this afternoon. We appreciate that. And with that, we stand adjourned.

END


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