Canada Bans Pakistan Adoptions UPDATED
“Canada has stopped adoptions from Pakistan, citing a conflict with the Islamic law over adoption and guardianship.
The abrupt move, which took effect in July, has left Canadian adoptive parents heartsick and religious leaders baffled.
“I was shocked, upset and depressed,” says GTA resident Shafiq Rehman, who had been hoping with his wife to adopt a child from Pakistan.
At issue, according to Citizenship and Immigration Canada, is the Islamic practice of kafala, or guardianship, which is common in most of the world’s 49 Muslim-majority countries like Pakistan.
Many other countries such as Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States have raised no issue about kafala and are still open to adoptions from Pakistan.
Canada has, in some or all provinces, suspended adoptions from Cambodia, Georgia, Guatemala, Liberia, Nepal and Haiti for various reasons. However, Pakistan is the only country banned due to kafala.
Immigration spokesman Glenn Johnson said Canadian families seeking to adopt Pakistani children are required to obtain guardianship certificates from a Pakistani court and then subsequently formalize an adoption in Canadian courts.
“However, legal and procedural requirements to obtain a guardianship certificate under Pakistan’s Guardians and Wards Act do not allow for subsequent adoption in the guardian’s country of residence,” Johnson explained in an email.
“Pakistan applies the Islamic system of kafala, or guardianship, which neither terminates the birth parent-child relationship nor grants full parental rights to the new guardian. This means that there are further legal incompatibilities in accepting Canadian applications for adoption.”
Michael Blugerman, one of the three licensed adoption agents in Ontario specializing in Pakistani adoptions, said the sudden move has caught parents off guard, some of whom were already halfway through the long process.
“There are all kinds of families trapped along the path. Immigration’s explanation is inaccurate and misleading,” said Blugerman, who has been an adoption agent for 33 years and does about eight Pakistani cases a year.
“Some of these parents have given up jobs, taken leave of absence to start the process abroad. It’s not the money, but their emotional investment into the process.”
To qualify to adopt, a prospective parent must undergo a minimum 10-week home study, during which the applicant is assessed by a registered adoption practitioner if considered is a suitable candidate.
The parent must complete a training course called PRIDE (Parental Resources for Information Development and Education) before the provincial children and youth services can issue an approval letter to a foreign adoption authority.
With that letter in hand, a prospective parent must find a match, have it approved by the foreign authority and obtain a “letter of no objection” from the province of residence before Ottawa issues an immigration visa to the adopted child.
Blugerman said an adoption from Pakistan typically takes three years from start to finish.
Shafiq Rehman, 52, and his wife, Rehmat Jahan, 46, have tried to conceive for almost two decades and spent tens of thousands of dollars on fertility treatment.
The Mississauga couple initiated the adoption process in 2011. On June 24, 2013, they received an approval letter from the Ontario Ministry of Children and Youth Services.
“I only found out they are no longer accepting adoptions from Pakistan when I got a call from my agent (on July 11). I was shocked, upset and depressed,” said Rehman, whose wife went to Karachi in November to start the search for a baby.
“We have not identified a baby yet, but we’ve already had all these emotions and expectations inside us. We had worked on it for so long. Why now?”
Imam Yusuf Badat of the Islamic Foundation of Toronto said adoption is not only allowed but encouraged, as reflected in Prophet Muhammad’s well-known adoption of Zayd, an orphan boy.
While kafala does create confusion in a few areas — such as inheritance and naming of the adopted child — Badat said those concerns can be easily addressed.
Adoptive parents, for example, can write a bequest for the adopted child, who would otherwise not have inheritance rights, unlike biological children. And Badat said an adopted child can certainly take the adoptive parents’ last name as long as they do not “falsify or lie” about the adoption.
“Adoption from Pakistan has been going on for decades. There has been no issue. I don’t see why it matters now. Why do they have to make it so complicated and deprive the children from the process?” asked Badat.
“All these guidelines are not written in stone. Canada should make it easier, not more difficult, to adopt.””
Canada’s ban on Pakistani adoptions baffles parents, clerics
[The Star 8/5/13 by Nicholas Keung]
REFORM Puzzle Piece
Update: We covered one case in July here. Now a second case of a relative adoption has been publicized. This case has dragged out for three years.
“The provincial government will review the “very urgent and compelling” case of a Saskatoon woman stuck in Pakistan with her adopted son, Premier Brad Wall says.
Waheeda Afridi and three-year-old Ajjab have been living in Peshawar, Pakistan for three years because the province won’t recognize the adoption, which has been approved by Ajjab’s birth mother, the Pakistani government and the Pakistani courts. Afridi’s husband, Ashfaq, lives in Saskatoon and has not seen his adopted son.
The family was told that the province won’t approve the adoption because Pakistan has not signed The Hague Convention governing international child adoption. On Monday, Wall told reporters that he is asking his officials to review the case.
“(The Hague convention) is there for a reason — to protect kids, to protect families,” Wall said.
“However, just on the face of it, there just seems to be a circumstance here where this is very clearly a very legitimate and important adoption and so if there’s anything we can do, if we have some discretionary ability as a provincial government to move on it, I’ve asked that officials find it so we could be a force for good in this particular adoption.”
The couple’s Saskatoon lawyer is encouraged by Wall’s comments.
“The family feels neglected so this is important feedback,” said Haidah Amirzadeh. “(The premier) is the one with the power in his hands and it’s up to him how to use it. On behalf of my client, I’m pretty pleased the premier is doing this. He could have just ignored it. This is one step.”
In 2010, Waheeda Afridi flew to Pakistan to attend the birth of Ajjab — the seventh child of her ailing, widowed sister — and begin the adoption process. Once all the approvals from Pakistani officials were given, the couple sought approvals from the federal and Saskatchewan governments, but the province refused to issue a “letter of no objection,” which stalled the process.
A letter from the Ministry of Social Services said adoption cannot be approved because Pakistan is not a signatory to The Hague Convention governing international adoption and because Pakistani guardianship laws fall short of Saskatchewan standards.
Wall said he believes the province should revisit that issue.
“Let’s deal with this current one that’s obviously very urgent and compelling right now,” Wall told reporters.
“The other issue is one where we have to take a look at the fact that the United States allows for these kinds of adoptions notwithstanding The Hague convention piece. So I think it’s a chance to review the policy overall, but in the meantime we’re going to try to see if we can’t help this family.”
Without the “no objection letter” from Saskatchewan, the federal government did not permit Waheeda to return to Canada with Ajjab, Amirzadeh said.
Ottawa has refused to grant mother and child a temporary residence permit, but Amirzadeh said the family is appealing and arguing that Ajjab should be allowed into Canada to be with his new family until he is a legal citizen.”
Wall says gov’t will review Pakistani adoption case
[The Star Phoenix 9/9/13 by Jeremy Warren]
Update 2: “A Saskatoon family, which has been separated for over three years, are overjoyed with the news today from the Saskatchewan government that they will finally come together.
Since 2010, the Afridi family has been trying to bring their adoptive son, Ajjab, to Canada from Pakistan.
They were originally given the province’s support. However, when the mother, Waheeda, tried to bring the now four-year-old boy to Saskatchewan, she was told she couldn’t because Canada didn’t recognize adoptions from the country. Waheeda has been with the boy in Pakistan since. Now, the province has sent a letter approving the adoption to the federal government.
“We’re hoping and we’re always positive that he is going to come to Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, one day,” said Ashfaq, the boy’s father. “Every night I was thinking, I was praying, so God accepted our prayer.”
Now, the province and the Afridi family must wait for the Federal government to receive the letter and approve the adoption officially.
June Draude, the Saskatchewan minister of social services, said the change of heart came from “new information” the government received last week, but she said she couldn’t say what it was.
Haidah Amirzadeh, the Afridi family’s lawyer for the past two years, confirmed what the new information was: an adoption expert in Pakistan and lawyer with 38 years experience was able to clarify Pakistan’s guardianship laws and verify what the Afridi family had been saying and that the adoption was legitimate.
Because of the information this expert provided, the Saskatchewan government was able to confidently approve the adoption by writing and sending the letter of no objection to the federal government.
Now, the province and the Afridis must wait for a final answer from the office of Chris Alexander, Canada’s minister of citizenship and Immigration.
“We were made aware of this recent development through the media not long ago,” Citizenship and Immigration Canada Press Secretary, Alexis Pavlich wrote in a statement Thursday afternoon to CBC News.
If the family is given approval from the feds, Ajjab and Waheeda could be reunited with Ashfaq in Saskatoon as early as next week.”
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