American living in South Africa wanting to Adopt from Lesotho

June 11, 2013

Hello, my wife & I are from the states and live in South Africa for the last five years and have tried adopting here, but after a couple years of trying have learned it is not possible as we don't have permanent residency and after speaking to the woman in charge of signing off on all adoption in Pretoria she has assured us that without permanent residency we will never be able to adopt here. We have been told that Lestho is allowing adoptions. I have found an agency in America that does it, but was wanting to know if anybody knows about how to do it locally. We don't live too far away from Lesotho and would like to look into this option but just wanted to know if any one else has stories of doing this without going through the one adoption agency in the states that has official approval.

Thanks.

sak9645

June 12, 2013

Lesotho is Hague compliant, so you almost certainly will need to use a Hague-accredited U.S. agency to complete your adoption and ensure that your child has the ability to enter the U.S. with you if you return home, and to get him/her U.S. citizenship.

Sharon