The Earth Times reports,
Sixteen Vietnamese medical and charity workers went on trial Tuesday for committing fraud in 266 adoptions of local children by foreign parents. The accused allegedly took money from adoption agencies to create fake documents enabling foreigners to adopt the children, said Ngo Tien Hung, vice president of the People’s Court in the southern province of Nam Dinh.
The AP confirms this report and adds,
The head of two social welfare centers in Nam Dinh province as well as several doctors and nurses at village clinics went on trial Tuesday, said Dang Viet Hung, the chief judge at the court hearing the case. The defendants are charged with “abuse of power and authority” and could face prison terms of five to 10 years.
The defendants allegedly solicited infants from unwed mothers and those from desperately poor families and falsified documents claiming the babies had been abandoned at village clinics, making them eligible for adoption, Hung said.
The ring sent 266 babies for foreign adoption from 2005 to July 2008, when the activity was discovered, Hung said.
And the AFP in Canada says,
Vu Duc Long, head of the Vietnamese Justice Ministry’s International Adoptions Department, said then that most children sent for overseas adoption from the two Nam Dinh centres had ended up in France and Italy, and some in the United States.
16 Responses
The US agencies licensed in this province at the time were Los Ninos International Adoption Center, Orphans Overseas, and Faith International.
I have very mixed feelings on my agency & this isn’t a site I would normally admit which agency I used so I’m going anonymous on this. I hope that’s okay.
I used Orphans Overseas & from what I recall, at most, they only completed 2 adoptions from Nam Dinh & that would have been the summer of 2006. The last baby referred from Nam Dinh was late fall ’06 & that placement fell through.
Of course, Tracy, I am sure you are aware that your comment is intentionally misleading us all towards an assumption of guilt unless we also identify the numbers of adoptions these agencies completed from Nam Dinh Province. This would be a fair question to ask, wouldn’t it? Or does VVAI not care about actual truth. Only misdirection of truth?
John,
Tracy simply listed the agencies licensed in Nam Dinh during that time. It was not an attempt to mislead, just a simple statement of fact. If you would like to share with us how many adoptions your agency, Faith International, completed from Nam Dinh, I’m sure our readers would be interested in that information.
Wow, John that seems pretty accusatory.
I am not Tracy, but as one of the contributors I think I can answer for Tracy when I say that we very much care about actual truth. We have nothing to gain here… except for truth.
It seems that your comment would lead us to think that a completed adoption=an ethical adoption, and I hope by now we all know that that is not a valid equation in all situations.
Perhaps that is not the point you were trying to make, and I somehow misunderstood you?
All of you know contributors know that VVAI is not totally focused on truth. Your own integrity is lacking in the forum you have claimed to create as a representation of integrity.
Tracy, if you really did make your list as a statement of fact, I sincerely apologize to you. But my guess is that this was not the case. It was intended to point readers in that direction.
Jena – no, I am not saying that a completed adoption = equals an ethical adoption. In fact, I am saying the opposite. If 266 adoptions were completed and some or many of those were clouded in illegality or wrongdoing, it is inappropriate to point readers towards the licensed agencies unless VVAI also says either: 1) We are not aware of the numbers of adoptions that were completed by these agencies, so we can only identify them as the licensed agencies in this province at this time; or 2) These agencies were licensed and agency A completed X adoptions, Agency B completed X adoptions, etc. But this is rarely the case on this blog. It seems that you write in a realm of which you have almost zero direct information, but you have no problem shoveling dirt despite your lacking information. This is the epitome of a lack of ethics.
John
John, I have to disagree with you. One of the biggest problems with adoptions in Vietnam is the lack of transparency in the process, and that includes the numbers of adoptions completed by any specific agency that chooses not to disclose them. As Christina asked, could you please provide the number of adoptions completed by Faith International in Nam Dinh? I’m sure a lot of us would be interested in that information.
Tracy’s statement was a simple one of fact. There are three agencies licensed to complete adoptions in Nam Dinh. I am not a regular contributor to this site, but I think its contributions have been valuable. The material on this site certainly helped my husband and I when we were in the throes of evaluating whether it was feasible to complete an ethical adoption from Vietnam. These women have no agenda except seeking the truth, a desire that is painfully absent in a lot of international adoption.
John-
The VVAI contributors discussed whether or not the information about the agencies should be included in the post itself. We decided not to include it because the agencies had not been directly linked to the scandal. Still, the third article does say, “Vu Duc Long, head of the Vietnamese Justice Ministry’s International Adoptions Department, said then that most children sent for overseas adoption from the two Nam Dinh centres had ended up in France and Italy, and some in the United States,” which means that at least one of those agencies I listed had adoptions that were affected.
However, the last time we posted about arrests in Vietnam (http://www.adoptionintegrity.com/2009/06/26/three-child-traffickers-jailed-in-vietnam/), someone asked in the comments which agencies had been working in that province, so I knew the question would come up here as well. That’s why I posted it.
Nowhere did I say that those agencies were guilty. As an adoptive parent though, I believe it is completely relevant information. I personally would want to know if my agency had been in the province being discussed so that I could ask my agency the appropriate questions. I certainly have my own opinions on which agencies were likely to be involved, but you will notice that I did not post that here.
With all of that said, it is not my job, nor the job of any other of the VVAI contributors, to stand up for agencies. It is the agencies’ job to stand up for themselves. We are an open forum and as we have not censored your posts. You are always allowed to validate your agency in any way you choose. Frankly, the more info the better. I would certainly appreciate it if you would share more with us.
I would be interested in seeing more information if John is willing to provide it. I agree the more information the better. We are so often working with unclear information here. I would welcome more details.
One other comment – it would be quite easy to figure out which agencies worked in Nam Dinh whether Tracy had posted it or not. So I’m not sure why her posting it is a problem.
Fair enough. Sometimes it is necessary for us to simply agree that we have very different perspectives. I didn’t mean to attack, but I realize I came across in that way. For that, I am sorry.
What I am about to say, I say gently. It seems in reading this blog that it is okay for the owners/writers to say as you please and sometimes attack as you please – but it is not okay for any of us to challenge you at all. Am I wrong about this?
Rachel and Sarah, I agree. We need a lot more transparency in intercountry adoption. It would address most of our questions.
Sarah – my concern is not that Tracy posted the names of the agency. Of course, this is okay. My concern is that by posting the article, and posting the names of the agencies, VVAI is essentially saying that these agencies are responsible for the illegality the article was referring to. This isn’t known by VVAI. VVAI may have had good intentions when writing this particular entry, but VVAI did so with no points of direct information. Simply an news article. No attempt to ask any questions or ascertain the number of adoptions completed or how many went to Americas vs. French or Italian. Just throw out the info – making it seem as if there is a lack of integrity (hence somehow falling within the goals of this blog). This makes it seems as if VVAI lacks the very integrity you so frequently harp about. Of course, you will disagree with my perspective. But that doesn’t mean my perspective isn’t equally valid to that of the 4 ladies writing here. I feel you are doing an injustice to everyone when you write without any direct sources of information. It’s not journalistic, it’s not well-informed, it’s simply linking to other sources of info, or batting around rumors. If the goal of the blog is to inform people of ethical road blocks in adoption, I don’t see how the blog has accomplished that. There has been just as much misinformation shared as there has been information. But the goal is noble and worth pursuing. Vietnam adoptions have become somewhat of a joke and are in need of reform (both within the procedures themselves, but also within the individual agencies facilitating these adoptions). If you write about these issues you have covered – but also include real facts – you’ll be on to something. But until that becomes a part of this blog, I fear you are writing in vain and will only earn the following of the readers that don’t necessarily care about well-researched perspective.
John – Tracy posted freely available information. There is a very old and long standing page on this site called Licensed Agencies by Province and all she did was pull the names of the agencies associated with the province listed in the article. Although agencies are no longer licensed in Vietnam, we keep this page up as a reference for precisely situations like this. This cross-referencing is something we commonly do for the ease and convenience of our readers and is no way specific to this one article or your specific agency and certainly it was information anyone could have gathered from simply clicking on one additional page here on this site.
This is a collaborative blog. Countlessly, when people complain that we are only sharing one side or one viewpoint, we reextend the invitation (see tap at the top of the site titled “Speak Up!”) to other viewpoints but interestingly there are fewer times than I can count on one hand that those with differing views chose to take us up on the invitation. I suspect – and correct me, please, if I’m wrong – that seldom are folks willing to take a more vocal stand because that opens themselves up to scrutiny and it seems possible their viewpoints may not hold under scrutiny.
To that end, you have now been asked at least twice to share the number of adoptions your agency has completed out of this province and you’ve been conspicuously silent. To add to their questions, I’d love to know the number of referrals compared to the number of completed adoptions for your agency (and the other two agencies however this questions is specifically posed to you and obviously you can’t speak for the other two agencies) out of this province. Thanks in advance for this information.
I’ll pipe in here… as a mother of a Vietnamese child and someone who believes it’s very important to keep up on all of the news coming out of Vietnam.
I check this blog frequently as a source that pulls together all of the info coming out of Vietnam regarding adoptions. When I read the post, I looked to see which agencies were involved. Two of them, I immediately said something that would translate into non-swear words as “it figures”. The other surprised me a little. I did not immediately think “oh great, another sucky agency”. Instead, I wondered how many of that agency’s adoptions (if, indeed they completed any from that province) were older children or special needs adoptions and then I talked to a couple of people who might have additional information. Perhaps other people read this blog and make immediate decisions about which agencies are guilty of ethical violations (and worse). I do not. I start here. And then read the actual stories, ask questions of others in the know, and – if the information would ever involve my agency – I’d go straight to the agency and ask questions.
So… I appreciate what VVAI is without condemning it for what it is not. It’s almost impossible for the adoption agencies to get accurate information regarding Vietnamese adoptions… how can you expect these writers to do so? I appreciate and value their opinions and information.
[…] Nien News reports that all sixteen defendants in the adoption corruption case in Nam Dinh province have been found guilty. Six were sentenced to jail sentences of two and a half to four years. The […]
Hi.
I used Faith for my adoption that was completed in the summer of 2006. Faith had many referrals from Nam Dinh in the summer of 2006. I am not sure exactly how many but I do know for sure that at least 6 and I think many more. When I was at the embassy in Hanoi I was told that Faith was the first agency to have children coming from Nam Dinh and was told that Faith had a number of children coming from there. Again I am not sure how many children they had from there. John please tell us how many adoptions Faith completed from Nam Dinh.
Thanks.
Mom to a Nam Dinh cutie
Hi.
Opps, mistake in my last comment. That should have said SUMMER 2007. Faith had a number of adoptions completed in Nam Din in the SUMMER OF 2007. Sorry for my typing mistake. Again, I ask that Jonh tell us how many adoptions Faith completed from Nam Dinh.