need help with adoption from SRI LANKA

Hi Everyone I thought maybe I should update this topic and let everyone know that I have gotten to know quite a few Sri Lankan families who have adopted babies from Sri Lanka. I was actually amazed to hear their stories and get to know their success in this journey. Now all the families I know live in Canada and have worked with two different agencies here. Unfortunately, I don't think any of these agencies work with families outside the country. I hope this gives some of you hope in your journey of adoption. Shammi Amma to Serena

hI every one i am a lawrey from sri lanka.I specialise child custody matters. well it not that hard as everone says to addopt a child if you the parents are sri lankans.so do not hesitate to contact me for any clarificatins and legal assistence sajitha2005@yahoo.com is the email and +94 777 235611 is the mobile

For the fiscal year 2008, the US State Department issued two IR-3 visas, 0 IH-3 visas, 0 IR-3 visas, and 0 IH-4 visas for Sri Lanka. The statistics mean that two children came to the USA from Sri Lanka for purposes of adoption. Check out this website for current information: [url=http://adoption.state.gov/]Welcome to Adoption.State.Gov[/url]. In order to adopt a child into the USA, an agency accredited by the USA government must agree to represent the prospective parents in the adoption of the child from another country. Even if the prospective parents are Sri Lankan, one must be a US citizen in order to immigrate a child into the USA. With regards to Sri Lanka, if the Sri Lankan has relinquished their Sri Lankan citizenship, there appears to be no preference, unlike India, for adoption of Sri Lankans outside the country of Sri Lanka. Having checked with a Sri Lankan adoption attorney with the assistance of a couple who have adopted twice within Sri Lanka, we were told that we had to go through the foreigner regulations for adoption and could not use the same rules/procedures/process as those who are Sri Lankan living in Sri Lanka. More recently, we were told by another Sri Lankan family that after looking into adoption in Sri Lanka that they have strict age requirements thus barring anyone 40+ in age from adopting a child outside the country, thus making it difficult for most prospective families. On an extremely rare occasion, there might be a Sri Lankan child available within the Diaspora or within a refugee camp in another country; however, most of these countries (with the exception of India) do not allow their children to be adopted to countries outside of their birth countries so prospective parents need to reside in those countries and be connected to the community and let it be known to birth parents that they are looking to adopt. India has had a few rare exceptions of adopting out children as Indian citizens who are born in refugee camps; however, Indian citizens then OCI card holders then foreigners (which include Sri Lankans in the mix) can adopt. It's not an easy task to adopt a Sri Lankan child from India as one would have no way of knowing until a referral was given to prospective parents. One cannot work with an agency that is located outside of the country where they are residing. There is at least one exception given to US military/gov't employees working abroad who can adopt US citizens and who can work with stateside agencies. If one were looking to adopt a child of a particular language/ethnicity or who was born in a certain location, it is not easy to do so. India, for example, does not have a system whereby parents can be matched with children who share cultural, linguistic, and ethnic backgrounds and even Indians may find that they are not able to adopt a child who is of the same ethnicity and language as their family. In Sri Lanka, one adoptive family said that their child was half-Indian, half-Sri Lankan and that a relative had adopted a child that was half-Sri Lankan, half-Middle Eastern. The other challenge is that Sri Lankan children in the USA are only available via birth mothers or foster care systems. Note that each county has their own foster care system so there will be thousands of foster care systems to contact. There is no central national clearinghouse of foster care children; however, very difficult to place children with severe disabilities and/or who are older might be on such webpages or lists. The challenge is that there are very few Asians in the USA available for adoption and then Sri Lankans are lumped into the Asian category along with all of the ethnic groups of Southwest, South, North, East, and Southeast Asia! Never heard of a birth mother of Sri Lankan ancestry in the USA looking for adoption as a possibility, but there have been a rare few from the Indian community in the past several years who generally post directly to Indian adoption forums looking for a South Asian family to adopt their child. Good luck as you pursue adoption! I would imagine that not only does Canada have adoption agencies with Sri Lankan adoption programs that they would have children available in their foster care system who would be available for adoption. I wouldn't be surprised if there were birth mothers looking for adoptive families in the Toronto area since there's a very large population of Sri Lankan-Canadians living in that area. Best wishes!

An update: My husband and I were successful in adopting a child from India; however, are aging out of the program for future adoptions from India. Currently, if you want to adopt from India, it is best to see if you can qualify for an OCI card, otherwise, it is difficult unless you are interested in children who are older and/or who have disabilities. Sri Lanka was one of the first three countries to sign onto the Hague intercountry adoption agreement. The USA has fully signed onto this agreement as well as many other countries including Canada and Australia. This means that from one Hague country to another Hague country, kinship adoption is possible; however, there are eligibility criteria so not all children can be automatically adopted if their parents are living. If adopting from a non-Hague country, then kinship adoption is not possible.

Hi all, this thread is not the most encouraging! I am wondering if anyone has managed to go through the process since they wrote here... Shammy, the agency you talked about back in 2006 now accepts application from residents of other canadian provinces. My husband and I are dealing with them now... They told us the waiting time for a referral was up to 2 years. After the referral, things are said to go quite fast. They have done several Sri Lankan adoption in the last 10 years (7 or 8 in the last 3 years). Unfortunately, they do not work with families from outside of Canada. If anyone is interested, I have started a blog at [url=http://cinnamon-baby.blogspot.com/]Cinnamon Baby[/url] about our journey to adopt from Sri Lanka. I hope this helps... Good luck to you all! Gen

Please be aware that, even if you see children in orphanages, whether in Sri Lanka or elsewhere, many will NOT be eligible for adoption, domestically or internationally. In many countries, people who find themselves unable to parent their children, often put them in orphanages until they can get their lives together. They do not relinquish the children, but use the orphanage like a foster home or a guardianship arrangement. Sometimes, the children are reclaimed quickly, but sometimes, they stay there for years. Especially in countries where there is a strong belief in the "blood tie", families often won't relinquish their children for adoption because they believe that no decent people would want to parent a child who is "not of their blood", and that anyone who would adopt their children would be doing so for illegal or immoral purposes, such as slavery or prostitution. Sharon

Even in the past, relatively few adoption agencies in the U.S. worked with Sri Lanka, because the process was not always straightforward and predictable. The agency through which I adopted my daughter from China actually had a reasonably successful small program in Sri Lanka for some time, but finally closed it. When you have a small number of eligible children, local families willing to adopt, and an adoption system that is difficult to navigate, very few adoptions by unrelated foreigners will go through. As far as relative adoptions, it IS possible for an American citizen to do them from both Hague and non-Hague countries, if both they and the children to be adopted qualify. As an example, under the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act, a child cannot be adopted if he/she has been living with both parents. This law is in place to ensure that parents don't use adoption fraudulently in order to secure a visa for their child to live in the U.S. for a while. Sharon

Please check the information needed for the foreign applicants who desire to adopt Sri Lankan children: [url=http://adf.ly/3xmdI]CHILD ADOPTION PROCEDURE FOR THE GUIDANCE OF FOREIGN APPLICANTS[/url]

Guidence for CHILD ADOPTION PROCEDURE: [url=http://adf.ly/3xmdI]CHILD ADOPTION PROCEDURE FOR THE GUIDANCE OF FOREIGN APPLICANTS[/url]

Hi I live in US and I am ex-Sri Lankan. We are looking for an adoption from Sri Lanka. I am having a hard time looking for an adoption agency that works in Sri Lanka. Can anybody give me some names of the agencies I can contact. Thanks

Not sure what agency in the US does adoptions from SL. I live in Canada and we have one agency that does adoptions from SL and they work with only Canadian clients. Many of the members in this group are from the US and maybe someone else will respond to your post. Hope this helps. Regards Shammi

Thanks alot. I will keep my fingers crossed!!

International kinship adoption by Americans is very common. Many of the children who receive adoption visas to come to the U.S. from other countries are being adopted by American citizen relatives. Americans can adopt relatives abroad if they and the children to be adopted meet the foreign country's adoption and immigration requirements. Immigration is often a more difficult issue, as both the adoptive parents and the children need to meet U.S. immigration requirements, as outlined in the Immigration and Nationality Act. As an example, at least one of the parents-to-be must be a U.S. citizen for the child to qualify for an adoption visa; an adoption visa allows the child to come to the U.S. immediately after adoption, and makes it easier for the child to become a U.S. citizen. The child needs to qualify as an "eligible orphan" as defined in the Immigration and Nationality Act. The parents need to have an approved homestudy and USCIS clearance to bring an orphan to the country. And so on. With Sri Lanka, the issue is not on the American side. Agencies have tried to work with Sri Lanka on both kinship and non-kinship adoptions and have given up in frustration in the past. Whether things will change is not clear.

Yes i just adopted from Sri lanka and presently we happily living in thUKwe just finish our paper work and the birth Certificate of the child is confirmed and everything is now ok,this is thanks to an International Adoption agency called Shey enterprises,you can reach them at this email ,sheyenterprises@contactoffice.net.They will follow up and you can get your child withing the next four months.They have a supper fast program.and they are highly Connnected.

Hi, We have a friend who's from Sri Lanka, but working in Dubai, who is expecting a baby. She is thinking about giving the child up for adoption. My husband and I would like to offer to adopt the child, but don't how to go about doing this or even it it's aloud. We are from the US. We would like to do an independent adoption. Any suggestions would be appreciated.