Show. Lies in justice special coverage on aljazeera. Welcome to the stream of family ok a gander mother has launched a Landmark Legal effort the reuniting with her child was taken through a forward and adoption but her case isnt linked today we ask has International Adoption tricky than some parents read children single thoughts through twitter i need change. In most cases adoption gives the Child Opportunity and stability but some biological parents in uganda have lost their children without their consent amid fraud and excellent exploitation last week a mother filed a ugandan coopetition to overturn what she says is the illegal adoption of a son a lasso a living or patients from Campaign Group no white savior has suggested that stricken cover this story and sent this video called i have a. Reason why the story is really important is because the book and the steel in the road the book as a tribute to the United States going to want us to be signed up to now so the should be a stop on display be ugandan government this is what we are doing for now. Which aside as you can to find solutions to this problem. Were joined from the ugandan capital kampala by dennis and that of matthew the advocates he is the legal representative for the mother who filed that petition and cavell is a correspondent is Emmy Award Winning 4 lines film adoption inc the baby business examined for the adoption cases in uganda hes also in kampala nicholas arpaio is a human rights lawyer who has in the past booked on adoption cases is also in the ugandan capital and joining us right here in our washington d. C. Studio ryan hanlon he is Vice President of the National Council for adoption what its good to have you here nicholas you used to work on adoption cases it was such an awful experience you gave up why. Well about 12 years ago when i went to them actually told me. To provide legal representation and. Funding going to local home. I mean that. I gave her a couple of abduction cases but after. Doing a couple. Because the entire shift in. Action process in this country was for correction. Of my conscience. So many occasions so many american. Court hearings and only chimes with the court. And my conscience clear. To the American Embassy and to the media suggesting. Something. Unfortunate grab the time. Being. Doing that. With no time ran by the attorney general of the republic of uganda and say nothing nothing much done about it and to continue to question was allowed to continue you know dennis what youre describing is actually not a typical in with International Adoption its a very normal thing that when us families travel they often dont meet that child until theyre in country to finalize the adoptive placement so exactly what youre describing there is something that we would see in countries all over the world the system is designed that way where the parents arent in the country or selecting a child in advance theyre receiving paperwork from the Foreign Government or from the foreign entities that theyre partnering with the u. S. Side and the foreign country side are partnering in that collaboration so wrong that sounds like a transaction it sounds like you dont have to. Point out is ready. Its very transactional and we wouldnt want to use those commercial terms and were talking about anything pertaining to you know children and there always are but what we want to talk about are the safeguards that are put in place and i need safeguards where on the u. S. Side were screening in assessing parents and then in the foreign side there screening the entire situation revolving involving the birth parents and preparing a file on the child to make sure we have the proper medical information the socio biographical history and then the Foreign Government and the u. S. Government or both agreeing to that adoption so the idea is the paperwork that stumps us before the race not a solution you know if thats the liberal thats ideal argument i think nicholas let me show you something good yet there had then i want to show our audience something that i thought they had to connect with us you want to see the families and out went and met families on both sides of the atlantic because you dont have i think that i think in cases involving children well in malta important its a big family to be able to have a connection with their char it would simply about the epilogue in my family more than a connection because if the child is jacks you know you can begin to figure out their emotional process for the child there or so i think that our interaction may be terrible experience or didnt and the fact could be if youve not been bam i mean even being suggested that. I think will be your complete disregard it will be emotional i well being of the charles that is am i right in thinking that. The laws in uganda have changed somewhat of that. That there is a period of time where that up to parents have to be available to that child and have to have contact with that child for a year was it through yes help me out. Thank you think what may grow their own say for missing the point i want to call go with my brother nicholas that the relationship between and i dont give parent any child is that our interest possibility and it chose to get there with that but to ensure intending to here and should have an opportunity to live together so that well and grows dark in the ugandan laws under the childrens act it only intending to parent is supposed to leave with a child to period of one year and they should of foster that child so that one period and footnote really the system is cured you know where that gets up becomes explained the look holds as to defeat the ends of justice as far as childrens interests are concerned adoptive person says i guess let me just take a pause for a moment i want to play a little bit of the 4th film that was involved in a 10 because it takes us out of the process of the paperwork and really she says the real people behind some of the stories where they have rock have a look. The only place Florence Genova see their children now is in photos. 5 years ago they sent them to stay with their system r. E. M. The when they returned to collect their children had disappeared from. Marrying claims she put them in a boarding school but in fact the children had been taken to america legally adopted without their mothers knowledge. What do you think about the fact that a family can come from another country and become illegal parents of somebody elses child to be sure you know who the runner nametags family is and then hes going on and im going to where to now for long im as if i laugh around. And i want to bring into this conversation by vice and tweets and some comments from our Online Community so look at eva here eva says it would appear that the adoptive parents and all the orphanages are taking advantage of the language communication barriers of the mothers and so theyre helping the mothers raise their children the system is enabling the children to be taken away very sad and then this very simply for. They still children what is your take. Well i think we were talking about the bill i guess were talking about the paperwork area and that is significant but i think. What it might be difficult for people outside uganda and other countries like uganda might be difficult to understand is that institutions dont function as a christian leaders they do elsewhere in the world in the u. S. For example and peoples communities and peoples families are not necessarily going to be as organized as people in the developed world would expect to it might seem very surprising that 2 mothers could send their children off to boarding school and have no idea that theyve been legally adopted without their knowledge thats because documents he can very easily be forged and in that case for example the aunt posed as the mother of those children and was able to take those documents not only to court but also to the u. S. Embassy in claiming that she was the mother of those children so the paperwork was the only in that it was all appearing to be official as far as anybody in court or the American Embassy or the u. S. Adoption agency may have been concerned and i think that is at the heart of what this problem because if you cant trust the paperwork or if you cant trust the institutions were corrupt and is widespread its very very difficult to protect the families in uganda who are losing their children and its also difficult to protect the adoptive families in places like america because when they just go over whats happened when they discover that sport theyre also victims of this and every day and youre right that we do need those protections in place and what i would say is that we have protections in place and there are solutions here we can do d. N. A. Testing of these individuals to determine are they the birth parent or are they different relative or are they not related to a child at all so that we dont have that exact same situation happen we can do record interviews to make sure this isnt happening but right now the system in uganda is the same as it is in many countries where the birth parents or others would have to go to. And providing revokable consent there then interviewed again by the u. S. Consulate and so you know there are there are solutions and we need more safeguards such as the ones im proposing here to put those protections in place because to your point we dont want any any parents the birth parents or the adoptive parents to feel like anything was not all but above board and i had i i do appreciate that that is an effort that some countries are making but what i think again its difficult for outsiders to understand is thats not necessarily going to help all of the families who were tricked into giving up their children who i met didnt understand what was happening so in many cases they were coached to go to court or to the u. S. Embassy and because they understood that they were getting a wonderful sponsorship opportunity for example these people were very very easily exploited by the agents who were finding these babies and a d. N. A. Test wouldnt change that because these people were coached to go and lie in court and at the American Embassy and again that might seem difficult to understand from the perspective of an american audience but here in uganda one is a single mother shes illiterate she has no money and somebody apparently of influence like a lawyer or an adoption agent comes to her and tells her what to do it be very difficult for her to resist shes very very easily tricked its very easy to mislead these people and i mean something that people here are fond of saying is there is no armed adoption. Apparently there is no equivalent so its very difficult to explain to somebody in a rural area i think i have more faith in you know in the people i have gone to to understand what adoption is and to its it is a Cultural Practice its something that happens within families within uganda all the time so i dont think what youre saying is accurate at all and i think that what youre describing here and even even the i dont know that you have there and we had a we had a birthday karen whose child had already been placed for International Adoption so the idea that she doesnt understand that i think i just dont have any sense this make or. That our community has been your grab bag you are very very. Communal. Children have to get out of the community im going to extend it. And still get quantified what higher. Crime or another im going to leave because no sorry in. North carolina to be without parents because it charlie. Born into a community where they dont quite fit what direction is after all the we are all going to have to its not me theyre directed here but socially speaking or cruel the country that. Caption was made widespread children belong to because im sure going the wrong tree and it didnt get to where they are but that what are you going to wear charlie believed to be a child of the climate by the editors and the reason that i think are so i think thats a good point but for me were missing an important part of the conversation here and i have completely missed or perhaps purposely excluded an important voice here which is that there is an Organization Going around uganda trying to coerce and threaten birth parents and telling them they need to rescind in that same organization is reaching out to us families and doing the same thing so i have a question and a why didnt you report on that in your film. Ive actually never heard about its not something recent so i dont know its not going anywhere i would have thought it had a name that it was in isolation and reunite let me let me play this because its a little clip from the film and i think what i did in the film as she did this flat money was a big impact in terms of people feeling that maybe my child will be looked after by by these other people across the ocean not quite understanding maybe what that transaction actually meant and then no question used for one of those organizations so that she was pushed into walking for them and if she didnt do the walk stripping fiat have a look at the sky. So what was the involvement of journeys of the heart. To provide their Financial Support and then i would provide this service was the sadness was to find children that can be adopted they wanted to fit in fast 1st because if if you get a child today spend in our home late 23 months. Is adopted that means theyre spending less on this chain. But if a child comes to his for a year. Its much experience. And they would say that to you they will say we need children that can be adopted 1st so dennis this idea of this mother who doesnt have parent or rights over her own child and you are trying to get them back. Is that even possible legally t. Is not the parent anymore. But a sister. Career also married the entire situation as it is under the ugandan system where. Do you. Abuse the processes. Information to give. All grounds now because we are hungry its close to what i know youre saying. We have to all legal guardians living in a 0 misrepresented. Periods all the channel was. Who will know who the woman a. Good years you know was granted was this is why when you look at there was the mother is with us today mr smiley because i know youve been following this case for a long time i just wanted now can you get your child back. If there hasnt been some detail work thats gone over why theres been some forward involved can this mother become the mother again or were the adoptive parents who are legally the guardians will they at some point be out to get their child from your dad that their child where legal Guardians Group you are an adoption order it didnt become grounds for telling you all for learning through vocation that their ground when im not really going to supervillains that dennis finished being a dentist let dennis finish basically if youre going to is actually going to get her child back that is thats what i was curious about knowing is that possible. It is the responsibility to. Be related. Let me bring in somebody whos in remembering it another way but never thought i would just want to run this by brian because the concept of international into country adoptions is quite controversial as they come more and move theyre actually beginning to drop and the more countries that say no you cannot take our children out of the country the more places like uganda republic of congo become more attractive for families and parents to possibly dot do you feel that adoption should not be allowed to happen from one country to another country without make life a lot simpler for both said. Theres hundreds of thousands millions of children around the world growing up without parents and if we cherry pick one case here and one case there and we make a docu documentary and say you know adoptions why not use act quotes were stuck in the document nowhere because didnt it come across as journalism it came across as activism it didnt show the whole story what i was saying earlier before i was cut off is there are going to say shes going around from birth parent to birth parents threatening them telling them they have to rescind you know telling them that what they did was wrong and so none of that was reported on in that socalled documentary i dont think thats an accurate depiction of adoption whatsoever in fact i think adoption is a way that were able to allow hundreds of thousands of children who need parents to get the loving families that they deserve all right before i close i want to show you starting to hear these out and leave it there are a whole tonight everybody Nicholas Nicholas hoult time this is really important for our audience how will carry on my laptop these adoptions International Adoptions im going to just pick 2018 im going to go down to uganda. To write down here just bear with me everybody because i want you to see the number of adoptions that we are talking about that are registered and then i you can come right back in here here is uganda. Im going to press go here and then your cancer see how many assumptions happened in the last 26. Yeah thank you im just im curious about rons perspective because hes now talking to you to uganda but the law theres a huge volume of evidence which says that. The International Adoption coming from places like you is that the American State Department right and what is your perspective i use their key to dismiss the idea that theyre to be cultural difference that raju why dont you prepared to listen to people here in uganda no i think youre misrepresenting what im saying of course im willing to listen to them im not going to pretend that youre the other 2 guests here are unbiased one of them has litigation on this very matter but you brought of unicef unicef around the world has been shown that they arent supportive of adoption and theyve actually employed mark riley who is part of the couple whos part of this organization reunite thats an adoption thats going to birth parents and harassing them and threatening them and coercing them so im glad you raised that with unicef and my question again to you is why are you not reporting on that how could you put together a documentary where this is widespread reported within uganda and not show another side of the st