Better find yourself a beard if you’re looking to take home a Mikhail or a Svetlana.
Mowcow Times: “A new round of U.S.-Russian negotiations on child adoptions that started Wednesday in Moscow swiftly decided that same-sex U.S. couples would be banned from adopting Russian children. Only heterosexual married couples will be permitted to adopt children, as Russia does not recognize same-sex marriages, said Alina Levitskaya, a senior official at the Education and Science Ministry, Interfax reported. U.S. and Russian officials still must negotiate ways to monitor Russian children adopted by U.S. parents and the possible transfer of the children to new families if something goes wrong, Levitskaya said.”
joao
“a Mikhail or a Svetlana” – i guess this was supposed to be funny, but it just sounds like profiling.
gina
This is a change in policy since they used to allow single women to adopt from Russia. It wasn’t uncommon that lesbian couples would have one partner go over as a single woman, adopt the child, then have the other partner do a readoption in the US. Perhaps the Russian government got wind of that.
It’s a shame, because as someone who adopted my daughter from Russia more than 12 years ago, i can attest to the number of children who are in their orphanage system (over 700,000), and the difficult fate which awaits those who age out of the system at 16 (nearly 1/3 commit suicide, the incarceration rate for boys is extremely high and a large number of the girls are recruited for the sex trade).
The Russian government is, unfortunately, very much currently run by nationalists and right-wingers and the Orthodox church once again has a strong impact. A lot of terrific children will be missing out on growing up with families. 🙁
Dandy
Why would anyone want to go to Russia to adopt when there are so many children in the USA who need adoption?
Fitz
@Dandy: Because the stock of what is available is pretty bleak. I wouldn’t want a crack baby. But then, I also wouldn’t really want one whose mother had poor nutrition or who sat untouched in a nursery for 9 months.
hephaestion
Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky & Rimsky-Korsakov (all gay Russians) are rolling over in their graves.
the crustybastard
When the USA drops its institutional bigotry against its own gay citizens, I’m sure I’ll be able to muster plenty of outrage about Russia’s shitty attitude toward gay US citizens.
Aaron in Honolulu
And this policy is supported by Russia’s Education and Science Ministry. What a joke.
D Smith
@Dandy: because the fact remains that in many states LGBTQ individuals can not adopt. and even in the states that allow LGB individuals adoption rights, T-folks are excluded (not everywhere but most places).
chicagotist
@the crustybastard: Dahling, what you’re missing in The Moscow Times version is what was said in other newspapers in Russian – American delegation has agreed to this tightening of policy. Russian-language sources keep quoting this Russian official saying that Americans have found a way to phrase the agreement in such a way as to prohibit same-sex couples from adopting without contradicting state laws.
Brian in BK
There aren’t any countries that allow same-sex couples to adopt children together. This isn’t really news.