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Adopting a child from overseas: is it allowed under Sharia law?
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Hetty Gleave
Partner at Hunters incorporating May May & MerrimansIt is not uncommon for people wishing to adopt a child to look beyond the shores of the UK to a foreign jurisdiction. The Adoption and Children Act 2002 sets out the English court's jurisdiction to make adoption orders in respect of children with both British and foreign citizenship but although the procedure for adoptions within the UK is clear what is the position in the overseas country?
Following the fall of the Ceausescu regime in the 1990s hundreds of well-meaning couples travelled to Romania and scooped up malnourished children from Romanian 'orphanages' to bring them to the UK for a better life. However in some instances they discovered that the children were not in fact orphans that proper procedures in Romania had not been followed and crucially consent from the child's family who with diligent inquiry could have been traced had not been obtained. Some cases resulted in the English Courts having to make the heart-breaking decision of whether to send the children back to their country of origin and their...
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